Michael Paukner’s infographics go beyond the usual function of the form: his original collection of posters titled “See The Bigger Picture” range from straight-faced renderings of crop circles and planetary “energy grid theory” to stunningly simple illustrations of the Pythagorean theorem or the mathematical golden ratio as expressed by planetary orbits.
     The range is profound but the style remains the same: clean, elegant, and, above all, informative. But what Paukner chooses to inform us about is, more often than not, a piece of arcane legend or a pseudoscientific theory that few of us have ever heard of. Paukner explains, “It all began when a drunk guy behind a bar told me about Planet X and 2012 some years ago.… I bought some books and found some other topics like ancient knowledge, religion, old prophecies, crop circles, and other mind-blowing facts and theories. I started to feel like Fox Mulder, always searching for the truth out there.”
     Several years later, Paukner’s Flickr page has registered millions of views in only six months, and he’s been the subject of features in several design magazines. Paukner is no stranger to fame — he’s also the lead singer of the popular Austrian band Excuse Me Moses, whose last album leaped to #13 on the Austrian charts — but the success of these graphics was very unexpected to him.