Sport Pictograms For Rio 2016 Olympic And Paralympic Games Unveiled

The ‘Rio 2016’ Organizing Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games has unveiled its official sport pictogram designs. There are 64 designs in total: 41 Olympic and 23 Paralympic.

For the first time, the graphic icons represent all Olympic and Paralympic sports. For the latter, prostheses, blindfolds and other elements were depicted in what the design team describes as “the integration of the athletes’ different impairments with sport in a balanced, natural way”.

The strokes used in the pictograms were inspired by the official ‘Rio 2016’ typography: “Based on the contours of Rio, the font represents elements such as the calçadão de Copacabana (Copacabana promenade), which is depicted in the letters ‘m’ and ‘n’, and the Pedra da Gávea (a mountain in Rio de Janeiro), which is depicted in the letter ‘r’.”

The strokes were first made by hand, and then reconstructed on a computer. The shapes of the athletes’ bodies and their sports equipment were rendered in these strokes of varied depth—the single, continuous strokes allude to the agile and fluid movements of the athletes. The pebble-shaped borders come in varied shapes to suit each pictogram, harmonizing well with the designs.

“The pictograms, from now until 2016, will serve as a communication platform for the promotion of the sports, for partner activations, and will be present in all the Games’ visual identity, including their application in venue decoration, signposting, tickets and licensed products, among other things,” said ‘Rio 2016’ Brand Director Beth Lula.