History of Graphic Design Unit 2

W A Dwiggins

(typographer, calligrapher, puppet maker, advertiser): first writes the words "graphic designer"; emphasis on design because it involves planning. Through his inventive stencil technique, Dwiggins inserted a lyrical form of abstract decoration and colorful stylized illustration into the vernacular of American graphic design. - Makes stencils - Hand-lettering: exquisite typographer; mixes lettering - Designs Metro, sans-serif alphabet; later Caledonia and Electra - Loves color from old Japanese prints and Persian miniatures - Did work for Knopf for 20 years

The Bauhaus

A German interdisciplinary school of fine and applied arts that brought together many leading modern architects, designers, and theatrical innovators.

Expressionism

A form of art in which the artist depicts the inner essence of man and projects his view of the world as colored by that essence. It emerged on germany in three main groups: Die Bruke, Der Blaue Reiter, and Fauvism. It rejected authority and felt empathy to the poor/social outcasts and believed in art as a means of new social order. Its theories on color and form, and concepts, images and methods of visual organization, had a major influence on design and provided new insights and processes. Major players: Kandinsky, Klee (Blue Rider) Matisse (Fauvism)

Suprematism

A type of art formulated by Kazimir Malevich around the 1910's. to convey his belief that the supreme reality in the world is pure feeling, which attaches to no object and thus calls for new, nonobjective forms in art shapes not related to objects in the visible world. Malevich came from working in futurism and cubism. He rejected utilitarian function and pictorial representation in favor of 'the supreme expression of feeling' through pure form and color/elemental geometric abstraction. Suprematists believed art must remain an essentially spiritual activity apart from needs of society. It's essentially the opposite of constructivism (which came afterwards)

Herbert Bayer

During the Dessau period the Bauhaus's typography workshop, taught by __________ , solicited printing orders from local businesses and made typographic design innovations. This professor designed a universal type that reduced the alphabet to clear, simple, and rationally constructed forms.

A M Cassandre

Art Deco poster and advertising designer, used cubist and futurist design devices in posters. He was a Ukranian immigrant to Paris who worked there from 1923-1936. His designs were bold, simple and emphasized two-dimensionality. He used simplified planes of color with subjects reduced to iconographic symbols. Integration of word and image into total composition was key to his work. He was fascinated by the beauty of machines (futurism) and some of his best work was for railways and steamships. He also designed famous typefaces such as Acier and Bifur He used an airbrush (paint blown onto a canvas through a gas tube) - can control the circumference of the spray; new tool. - Work was idea-oriented - L'Atlantique: this ship is stable, huge; made the ship out of a perfect rectangle

Marcel Duchamp

Dada artist

Art Deco

Descended from Art Nouveau, this movement of the 1920s and 1930s sought to upgrade industrial design in competition with "fine art" and to work new materials into decorative patterns that could be either machined or handcrafted. Characterized by streamlined, elongated, and symmetrical design. Influenced by cubism, the bauhaus, de stijl, and suprematism.

E. McKnight Kauffer

Edward ("Ted") McKnight Kauffer was one of Europe's most prolific and influential advertising poster artists during the twenties and thirties, and as innovative as his more celebrated French counterpart, A.M. Cassandre. The American designer was influenced at a young age by the first modern art exhibition in America in 1913 to move to Europe (which he thought was more on top of trends in the art world). His work showed influence by cubism and futurism. He designed hundreds of posters for the London Underground, and all his posters were reductive, editing complex environments into interlocking shapes, elevating advertising to high art.

El Lissitzky

El Lissiztky best realized the constructivist ideal and his legacy profoundly influenced graphic design. The basis of his work was founded on mathematical and structural properties of architecture. He introduced 3D illusions into his work and the canon of constructivism. He taught with Malevich and Chagall, and transformed suprematist forms into political symbolism. He was socially responsible, a master of technology, and a creative visionary. Through the work of El Lissitzky, type became an abstract design element. Lissitzky believed that good typography should achieve for the reader what voice tone conveys to the listener. The designer was no longer dependent on illustration to tell a story. Type was no longer restricted by the rules of symmetry.

Postcubist Pictorial Modernism

Era between world wars, art deco and cubism combined, trust in machines and technology. Appears in the work of A M Cassandre and McKnight Kauffer

Frank Pick

For much of the first forty years of the 20th century, Frank Pick was the hand on the tiller of London's transport system and created a structure from which Londoners still benefit. Virtually every Londoner will daily come across an aspect of Frank Pick's legacy, and yet few will be aware of it. Without Pick, we would not have the roundel, that iconic representation of the London Underground, the famous Tube map, the typeface in which the station signs are written or the art deco stations that pepper the outer reaches of the Central and Piccadilly lines.

Walter Gropius

Founder of the Bauhaus, influenced by Behrens and the Werkbund by the belief in the unity of the arts and functionality.

What is Constructivism?

From Blok in 1924 1. Building of things by all available means, with the practical purpose of those things as the primary consideration 2. Economic use of material, exactly as much material as is indispensable, the properties of the created thing must DEPEND upon the employed material 3. Constructivism does not imitate the machine, but finds its equivalent in the machine's simplicity and logic 4. NOT any particular branch of art (i.e. painting, etc) but art as a whole

Giacomo Bella

Futurist painter who made "Dynamic of Dog on a Leash" impression of motion

Giovanni Pintori

Italian GD who was the art director at Olivetti for 31 years. Colorful juxtaposition.

American Railways

Largest purveyor of corporate identity in America in the late 19th-early 20th centuries—hundreds of shipping companies had their own colors/logos/etc that would have been painted on boxcards example: Herbert Matter's design for the new haven railway - projection of modernity/industry; geometric slab serif; bold black and red color scheme

Propoganda in WW1

Printing techniques had advanced rapidly by this time, while radio and other means of visual communication had not, so the poster was a very important medium for governments as propaganda to: recruit soldiers, boost morale, demonize the enemy, collect bonds/donations Posters made by central powers and allies were radically different Central powers: influenced by vienna secession/bernhard; simple and pictographic, medieval blackletter, limited copy Allies: Illustrative, literal rather than symbolic, pushed traditional values of home and family, appealed to sentimentality/patriotism, used shame and scare tactics to honor leaders and disparage the enemy Some of these strategies had an impact on advertising after the war, creating a dark age

Constructivism

Renunciation of 'art for art's sake' and suprematism led by Tatlin and Rodchenko in 1921. Devoted to serving communist society and to functionality, and opposed to 'worthless' art forms like painting and favored poster design, industrial design and applied arts.

Alexander Rodchenko

Rodchenko was an ardent communist who brought inventiveness and experimentation to typography, montage and photography. His interest in geometry led to analytical precision in his work. He abandoned painting for visual communication as a form of social responsibility. His interest in photomontage was an effort to invent illustration techniques appropriate for the 20th century. He applied the concept of 'serial painting' a precursor to modern visual systems.

Varvara Stepanova

Wife of Alexander Rodchenko, influential in the Russian Avant-Garde, and, later, constructivism. She was clearly influenced by cubism and futurism, and used her art for revolutionary change and the betterment of society. She was also involved in theater design, including design for sets, textiles and costumes.

Richard Floethe

Supervisor of the WPA poster initiative been 1935 and the early forties. Floethe had studied at the Bauhaus and genuinely believed in a utilitarian approach to art. The designer, he felt, should be equally at home in industrial design, stage design, typography or painting. Floethe's dedication to good design, his democratic organization of the studio to maximize creative output, and advances in silk-screen technology contributed to a change in design thinking. And in spite of economic conditions, the camaraderie which developed among such a large group of artists working together, silk-screening together, struggling together, created a genuine expansion in the concept of work. The small two- or three-person advertising studio grew into a community.

Olivetti

The Olivetti company is the leading corporation in the western world in the field of design for patronage in architecture, product design, and advertising. They saw design as a way to shape a reputation for quality and reliability. It represents an important lesson on the organization of all the visual aspects of a company unified under a single aesthetic standard. 1. Italian Typewriter corporation with commitment to humanist ideals and technological progress 2. Adrinano Olivetti hired Giovanni Pintori as a designer who worked there for 30+ years 3. Used complexity of form as a metaphor for high-technology; graphic shapes visualize mechanisms and processes 4. Received international recognition for its commitment to design excellence

London Underground Identity

World's first electric railway system opened in London in the 1890's; Frank Pick was the man who commissioned some of the most recognizable icons of London Underground's identity: 1. He designated space for poster boards at each station entrance to advertise for the underground which focused on promoting 'destinations' that you could travel to on the railway in an eclectic style (many designers contributed) 2. His commissioned logo design (the roundel still used today) and signs stood out against urban clutter 3. He commissioned an exclusive typeface for the underground: a sans serif with consistent weight of strokes, proportions inspired by roman inscriptions with functional clarity, designed by edward johnson 4. His advocacy expanded beyond graphics to architecture, station and train design

Filippo Marinetti

Wrote the Futurist manifesto

Jan Tschichold

__________, the son of a designer and sign painter in Leipzig, Germany, applied the new design approaches to a wide audience of printers, typesetters, and designers through his book Die Neue Typographie (The New Typography). He was disgusted with the "degenerate typefaces and arrangements" and sought to find a new asymmetrical typography to express the spirit, life, and visual sensibility of the day.

Surrealism

a 20th-century avant-garde movement in art and literature rooted in Dada that entered the Paris scene in 1924 that sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind, intuition, and dreams. It was founded by the poet Andre Breton and inspired by the writings of Freud. It was more of a way of life and a way of thinking than an aesthetic style. It held poetic faith in humanity and the spirit of mankind. The stream of consciousness method of creation relied on automatism to express truth in thought.

Dada

a nihilistic art movement (especially in painting) that flourished in Europe early in the 20th century. It reacted to the carnage of WW1 with shock and nonsense. It was anti-war, anti-technology, anti-religion, etc (opposed essentially all established entities of power). Concerned with chance and randomness vs choice. Claims the invention of photomontage with jarring juxtapositions and chance associations (hannah hoch) . Most prominent leader was Marcel Duchamp

Cubism

an early 20th-century style and movement in art, especially painting, with a way of seeing that challenged reality and traditions of pictorial art by presenting many perspectives at once/multiple viewpoints simultaneously; catalyst of geometric abstraction Genesis: Picasso and Braques Influenced by African tribal art and masks/impressionism which also challenged traditional ways of seeing light in art It is still figurative, but its figures are reduced to geometric shapes It has a relationship with the process of human vision Analytical cubism at its beginnings, turned into synthetic cubism

Abstract Art

art that does not attempt to represent external reality, but seeks to achieve its effect using shapes, forms, colors, and textures. moves away from objective reality towards emotions and subjective personal responses. Symbolic, distorted, pronounced line and color, explored tactile mediums

John Heartfield

founding member of the Berlin dada group who held vigorous revolutionary political beliefs and oriented many of their artistic activities toward visual communications to raise public consciousness and promote social change. His last name is the English name adopted by Helmut HERZFELDE as a protest against German militarism and the army in which he served from 1914 to 1916. used the harsh disjunctions of photomontage as a potent propaganda weapon and introduced innovations in the preparation of mechanical art for offset printing. He targeted the Weimar Republic and the growing Nazi party in book covers, magazine covers and illustrations, and a few posters His montages are the most urgent in the history of the technique. He did not take photographs or retouch images but worked directly with glossy prints acquired from magazines and newspapers.

Hannah Hoch

photomontage/dada

Futurism

poet Filippo Marinetti published the manifesto of futurism in 1909—"the beauty of speed" Grew out of cubism but with an enthusiasm for war, speed, motions, the machine ago and modern life. it was aggressive and destructive in nature. it began in poetry but grew to emcompass other forms of art liberated from constraints like grammar, the grid, and linear page structure (which traditionally was determined by the printing press) to create dynamic compositions Examples of painters: Giacomo Bella and Umberto Boccioni

WPA Poster Project

the government's poster project—35,000 designs—played a vital role in many artists' lives during a tumultuous period of American history. The project provided jobs for thousands of unemployed artists during the Depression. By publicizing the activities of various state, city and federal agencies, they announce safety rules, promote obedience to the law, and advocate prenatal care, noise abatement, visiting the local library, and prevention of syphilis. In addition, they record a time of change in American graphic design. Silk-screening as a medium came into its own under the WPA as a system of mass production and a valid way to produce art, both for the printmaking division and for the Poster Project.