No Words: The Visual Rhetorics of Mosaic and Antienvironment in Steve Lawrence's Avant-Garde Periodical Newspaper (1968-1971)

A newspaper without words is as perplexing as it sounds, but this is precisely the case with Steve Lawrence’s picture periodical Newspaper. I argue that Lawrence disrupts the traditional newsprint medium by engaging with the mosaic’s fragmented, discontinued, and random form that underscores a non-linear and participatory narrative, ultimately positioning the reader as an active co-creator in interpreting the visual chaos. This visual fragmentation mirrors modernist tendencies – expressionism, cubism, and pop art – allowing for multiple entry points for interpretation. As a result, Lawrence constructs Newspaper as an antienvironment that requires the reader to recognize and reveal the invisible structures that govern the art and media environments. Ultimately, this study explores how Newspaper dematerializes its identity as a news medium while resisting the systems it critiques and anticipates shifts in media literacy through its adaptive mosaic format.