Universal Principles of Design, Revised and Updated
by William Lidwell, Kritina Holden, Jill Butler
Horror Vacui
A tendency to favor filling blank spaces with objects and elements over leaving spaces blank or empty.
Horror vacui—a Latin expression meaning “fear of emptiness”—regards the desire to fill empty spaces with information or objects. In style, it is the opposite of minimalism. Though the term has varied meanings across different disciplines dating back to Aristotle, today it is principally used to describe a style of art and design that leaves no empty space. Examples include the paintings of artists Jean Dubuffet and Adolf Wölfli, works of graphic designers David Carson and Vaughan Oliver, and the cartoons of S. Clay Wilson and Robert Crumb. The style is also commonly employed in various commercial media such as newspapers, comic ...
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