Form Follows Function

Module TFD1064. Design for Communication

Project – “Form Folows Function” Klaudyna Joczyn

u1258977 [email protected]

[email protected] 07540159894

Form Follows Function

Form Follows Function Page 2

Forms in Modernism, a visual set: the unity of typography, architecture and the designed artsVirginia SmithBroadway, New York - 2005Watson – Guptill Publications160 pages0-8230-5624-4

Virginia Grace in her book introduces Modernism to the readers. This book is written in quite formal style; however the language used is straightforward and complicated words and phrases are avoided. Grace mainly described architecture and typography, to show how large (buildings) and small (letters) scales were affected by Modern artists. “Forms in Modernism” is very pleasant book to read, as the style of writing is understandable for anyone. The author leads through the world of modernism chronologically, from 1900s when Modern culture started through 1960s when it came to an end and finishing in 1990s introducing a little bit of Post-Modernism. Virginia Grace in her book talks about the most important icons of Modernism such as: Jan Tschichold, Walter Gropius, Bauhaus and De Stijl. She also manages to guide reader through basics of Art Deco and its principles. It starts with an explanation that early Modernism (especially in Bauhaus) Modernism was based on the belief in functionalism, clarity in design, use of basic geometric shapes

Book ReviewForms in modernism

and colours and formal perfection; and then later in the century it starts to develop into organic designs, natural shapes, waves, in photography to fake naturalness and casualness. There is a very wide section of the book dedicated to the German art school – the Bauhaus, because as the author states: “Today the Bauhaus can be understood as major, but not the only source of Modernism”. Grace also explained how Modern culture summarised in the Paris Exhibition in 1925 was adapted and started to be practiced by Americans. It then moves to 1960s when Modernism ends and Post-Modernism starts. Designers start to play with composition, type and pictures in freer layout. She describes how Post-Modern artists used forms created by Modernists and rethought, reused them; and how they destroyed previously accepted order. Book is filled with over 270 black & white photographs and illustrations, which really help to understand the subject. There are very few pages fully filled with text, most of the time it is laid in a way, which allows small blocks of

text on the page along with pictures, what makes it easier and more pleasant to read the book. It has also very clear and wide Index, which makes it easier to find information. Every piece of information used by the author is backed up in bibliography, so that anyone can access these sources.I think that this book is written really well and keeps the reader interested and engaged all the time. Book covers 100 years of art with use of basic language and clearly stated information. It can interest even people who usually don’t like to read historical books.


ModernismIntroduction to the movement

Modernism started in the first half of the XXth century, after First World War and the Industrial Revolution.Artists were brought up in the new, industrialised culture in which traditional values began to change diametrally.

Graphic design began to be known to the public as “The New Typography”. It used simple, sans-serif typefaces with no ornaments and decorations. Modernism mainly formed in art schools (e.g. Bauhaus, Swiss schools etc.)

After the Paris Exposition showing modern artwork, Modernism started to appear in America. Artists immigrating from Europe brought the modernist spirit with them and inspired American architects to build skyscrapers.

Modernists wanted to change the world for better with their art. They were striving for the new world, which would be free from war, conflicts and human greed. Modernism rejected naturalism and academism and all past periods. Adolf Loos talks about this rejection in an essay written by him - “Ornament and Crime”. In this essay he explains that there should be no ornaments and decorations, but only forms stripped to their essential parts. Artists and designers in differnet proffesion started to share this thought. This rejection of ornaments was their expressionof rejecting past centuries that had tolerated war, poverty, dieseases, coflicts etc. They thought that using continuing to use decorations would be very much illogical.

In the beggining of XXth centuty artists and designers were questioning what art, its principals and function is. Art started to be an expression of truth and tended for precision. It was very experimental and radical. Designers aimed at clarity, certanityand order. The usual centered composition of the page changed into de-centered, assymetrical layout. Colours and composition of the page were greatly influenced by abstract painters, such as Piet Mondrian. Art reflected needs and purpose. Everything in visual disciplines was logical, unsentimental, constructed of primary colours and geometrical figures. Functionality was the main message of the movement. Simply, form had to follow function. New principles of design started to form.

There were Swiss art schools and German Bauhaus, which educated young artists, designers and architects in new, very radical ways, in the spirit of times and the movement. Many great artists came out of these schools. Today Bauhaus is understood as the main source of modernism, in fact many people think that Bauhaus is a name of an art movement and not a name of school working in this movement. Term Modernism in Graphic Design started to be used around 1925-1930 in the most significant period of this movement (which was dated at 1920s and 1930s). Modernism still has a great influence on today’s Graphic Design, with designers around the world still working within the principles established by Modernists.

Modernist typographers were aiming at pure, undecorated, simple letterforms and logical page layouts. They started to bring assymetry and hierarchy to the page composition, so that it would suggest the readind order and follow the natural eye movement. This meant fewer typeface sizes and weights used around the page. Some of the designers avoided uppercase letters, especially in Germany as there every noun starts with a capital letter. Jan Tschichold one of the leading typographers and designers in Modernism claimed that only sans-serif typefaces were following the spirit and needs of modern times. Typographers tried to create a universal typeface, which could be used in any form of design. It is thought that they’ve achieved this with Helvetica.

In the mid-century modernism began to change slowly. Idea of using geometrical shapes and formal perfection started to fade away and was replaced with casualness and faked naturalness. This can be clearly seen in the way actors were posing in Hollywood photography. New typefaces were immitating the casual handwriting making designs look personal. It communicated warmer, human feeling. Designers aimed to create organic work rather than purely geometrical. Modernism, disliked by the public and attacked by totalitarian states for its too serious, strickt, pure and inhuman forms was slowly comming to an end. Replaced with the Post-Modernist era, which will fight everything what Modernism stood for.

form

follows

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modernism


BauhausGerman School of Art

Walter Gropius opened Bauhaus with a modernist manifesto.

“The ultimate aim of all creative activity is a building! The decoration of buildings was once the noblest function of fine arts, and fine arts were indispensable to great architecture. Today they exist in complacent isolation, and can only be rescued by the conscious co-operation and collaboration of all craftsmen. Architects, painters, and sculptors must once again come to know and comprehend the composite character of a building, both as an entity and in terms of its various parts. Then their work will be filled with that true architectonic spirit which, as “salon art”, it has lost.

The old art schools were unable to produce this unity; and how, indeed, should they have done so, since art cannot be taught? Schools must return to the workshop. The world of the pattern-designer and applied artist, consisting only of drawing and painting must become once again a world in which things are built. If the young person who rejoices in creative activity now begins his career as in the older days by learning a craft, then the unproductive “artist” will no longer be condemned to inadequate artistry, for

his skills will be preserved for the crafts in which he can achieve great things.

Architects, painters, sculptors, we must all return to crafts! For there is no such thing as “professional art”. There is no essential difference between the artist and the craftsman. The artist is an exalted craftsman. By the grace of Heaven and in rare moments of inspiration which transcend the will, art may unconsciously blossom from the labour of his hand, but a base in handicrafts is essential to every artist. It is there that the original source of creativity lies. Let us therefore create a new guild of craftsmen without the class-distinctions that raise an arrogant barrier between craftsmen and artists! Let us desire, conceive, and create the new building of the future together. It will combine architecture, sculpture, and painting in a single form, and will one day rise towards the heavens from the hands of a million workers as the crystalline symbol of a new and coming faith.”

Walter Gropius , 1919

Walter Gropius in his manifesto states that all art schools should come back to workshop based teaching, as all artist should learn craft techniques first. He says that there is no difference between the artist and the craftsman because all of the artists need to know craft techniques and then apply some creativity to it e.g. if thy want to create wood sculptures they first need to learn how to operate the tools used for this and how to make particular cuts etc. Once they will know this they can then apply this to their creative ideas and produce a piece of an artwork. This manifesto calls for artists to combine practical use and aesthetic look in their work; they should aim at creating objects which would look more modern, simpler, but at the same time would

keep their practical use. Walter Gropius also says that all of the artwork people produce should be influenced by architecture. They should learn composition of a building as a whole as well as of its components to be able to create work with true architectonic spirit. That is because all of the creative work produced in the world is always going to be used in surrounding of the buildings. Gropius wants to unite architecture, sculpture and painting in a single form. This manifesto persuades people to create a world of art in which things are made, built by artists and not only drawn or painted onto paper, in which art schools would have workshops in which this work would be produced instead of having classes in which students would all draw the same

figures and copy other artists.I think that Gropius achieved what he was talking about in this manifesto by building Bauhaus, as Bauhaus was all about workshops and architecture and many great designs and inventions come from Bauhaus students. Like in architecture in Bauhaus everything was based on primary shapes and primary colours. Throughout all of the artwork created in Bauhaus we can see architectural influence and how artwork produced there would complete the buildings. They were creating artwork which was very practical and could be used in our everyday life. Everything they design was actually created by them in workshops and not only designed on paper.


Bauhaus was founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius and was the centre of design in XX century. It affected everything. It was founded in Weimar (small, provincial town in Germany) during political and economical chaos. Bauhaus started the revolution of the way in which people were educated in art schools. They have started the workshop based method of education. These workshops trained people as artists and craftsmen at the same time. Students didn’t design things on paper but were actually making them by hand. Workshops were taught by the craftsmen under the supervision of the artists. Before Bauhaus art students used to sit in the studio and all did the same thing, copying previous artists work, painting with watercolours etc. They also learned art history. Bauhaus was very free. Students could create whatever they wanted. Bauhaus allowed both men and women to apply to their courses. Bauhaus started to combine art with practical use of the object. They were producing designs whit future mass production in mind. At first, elegant and simple objects created in Bauhaus were considered very plain.

There was an emphasison use of primary colours and geometrical shapes. In 1923 more and more people were supporting socialism in Weimar. As Bauhaus were against National Socialists Party, they were communists and they had to close the school. In 1925 the Bauhaus re-opened in Dessau as it was politically more liberal. Typography in Bauhaus was bright, bold and simple without any decorations – even serifs. Graphic design was all about optics and communication theory. In theatre they were pushing the boundaries of design, architecture and form. They could experiment with everything. People wanted their children not to look at the Bauhaus students. Women from Bauhaus wore trousers and man ponytails. They were seen as the punks of Dessau. As Nazis took control over the Dessau’s council they have closed the school. Because of the fact that Bauhaus has been making connections between art and technology Nazis said that ‘they were on the wrong path’. Bauhaus re-opened in Berlin, where it then ended. Teachers and students of Bauhaus spread all over the world taking their ideas with them.

BauhausGerman School of Art

In 1925 Bauhaus started Typography and Advertising workshops directed by Herbert Bayer (previous student of Bauhaus). Herbert Bayer wanted to eliminate use of uppercase letters, as nouns in German were capitalized and he thought of them as a fragment of the past, past full of war and conflicts. He achieved his goal and Bauhaus banned use of uppercase letters in 1925, however they constantly broke this rule in designs. Typographers in Bauhaus wanted to eliminate serifs completely (which later on became banned by them) and use a geometric base for every letterform. Typographic philosophy began to be based on utility.

Bauhaus is now understood as the main source of Modernism. Many greatest Modernist artists and designers were involved (as teachers or students) with Bauhaus. Between them we can find people like: Walter Gropius,Wassily Kandinsky,Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Herbert Bayer, Joost Smidt, Josef Albers, Marianne Brandt etc.

Walter Gropius was born in 1883 and died in 1969. He was a German architect and founder of Bauhaus. He studied architecture in Munich and Berlin in 1903-1907 and from 1910 he he started his own architectural practice in Berlin. Gropius thought that the aim of all artistic activity is architecture. With this belief he founded art school in Weimar in 1919 - Bauhaus. He hired some great artists to work in his school such as: ohannes Itten, Gerhard Marcks, Lyonel Feininger, Georg Muche, Paul Klee, Oskar Schlemmer, Wassily Kandinsky, Josef Albers and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Whole curriculum of the school was based on wrokshops and experiments with art and crafts. In 1925 Walter Gropius had to move his school to Dessau, because of the political matters and he designed the new building for Bauhaus and Masters Houses. He gave up the position as a head of school in 1927 and moved to England in 1934. Three years later he was invited to teach at Harvard. He designed his own hous which then brought him commissions for private houses. To one of his greatest designs we can also include the Pennsylvania Pavilion created for the New York World’s Fair.


De StijlPiet Mondrian and Others

De Stijl was founded in 1917. It was a Dutch srtistic movement with members such as: Theo van Doesburg, Piet Mondrian, Vilmos Huszar, Bart van der Leck, Gerrit Rietveld, Robert van Hoff and J.J.P. Out. Artists working in this movement wanted to achieve abstraction and universality, by using only essential colours and forms. Their works were constructed with horizontal and vertical lines, squares, rectangles and primary colours. Their compositions were strongly assymetrical. Aesthetic balance of the composition was achieved by artists with use of oppositions and contrast. The movement was greatly influenced by Cubist paintings.In 1924 Piet Mondrian broke with the grop, because he did not agree with their new theory that the vertical line is more important than horizontal and vertical ones. After death of its founder Theo van Doesburg in 1931 the De Stijl group did not survive.

Piet MondrianHe was born in 1872 to a Dutch aristocratic family and began to study art in 1892 in Amsterdam’s Rijksakademie van Beeldene Kunsten. In 1912 he arrived into Paris and began to refine his own style highly influenced by Cubism. He tried to achieve the highest levels of simplicity in form and colour. He started to paint very pure compositions, based on primary colours and rectangles. He moved to New York in 1940 to escape World War II and died in 1944. Mondrian was the founder of abstract art. His abstract, geometrical paintings were a great influence for other artists and designers. They influenced the use of grid system on page layout, which graphic designers use to this day.


Jan TschicholdMaster of Typography

Jan Tschichold was born in 1902 in Germany and died in 1974 in Switzerland. He was designer, writer and a teacher, very well aware of his own importance in the design world. In Britain he is most famous for refashoning Penguin books with horizontally banded covers. He attended the Bauhaus Weimar exhibition and since then he became involved with Modernist typography. The New Typography was his first major work published in 1928. In his book Tschichold talks about principles of design. He thought that we should all use sans-serif typefaces, photographs rather than illustrations and the layout should be assymetrical.Piet Mondrian

and his paintings were a great inspiration for Tschicholds page layouts. He was called a “cultural Bolshevist” by Nazis, who were against Modernist movement. In 1933 Tschichold was taken into custody and he has been told that his modern ideas would not be tolerated. After spending four weeks in prison Jan Tschichold left Germany and moved to Switzerland in August 1933. In 1947 he’s got a job in England with Penguing book designs. He set new rules and standards for book production in UK.Rules which Tschichold set as to fow to space letters and words on the page and what typefaces to mix are still followed by today’s graphic designers.

one sans-serif typeface

only two colours used (apart from white for the background)clear hierarchy

assymetrical layout repetition in rectangular shapes

four column grid

design divided into three horizontal sections


Neue GrafikSwiss Magazine

four column grid

clear hierarchy

one sans-serif font

black and white are the main colours used (white for background, black for type)

in most of the issues there is a coloured rectangle going through the middle of the cover, it is in one solid colour

divided into four horizontal sections

Neue Grafik was a Swiss magazine published quarterly in 1958-1965. There were 17 issues published and released. It was one of the most important publications talking about contemporary and historical Swiss design called “International Typographic Style”or “Swiss New Typography”. Edited by designers: Richard Lohse, Josef Muller-Brockmann, Hans Neuburg and Carlo Vivarelli. It was translated into English, French and German.


Armin HofmannSwiss Designer

Armin Hofmann is a Swiss graphic designer, born in 1920. He completed a lithography apprenticeship and started to tech typography at the Basel School of Design by the time he was 27 years old. Shortly after he became head of the school. For most of his life Armin Hofmann was designing postersas he thought this is the most efficient form of visual communication. He experimented with composition, photo montage and typesetting in his designs. Posters designed by Armin

Hofmann were in black and white, as he says: “A primary in blacka and white posters is to counteract the tivialization of colour as it exist today on billboards and in advertising”. Hofmann wrote a book titled “Graphic Design Manual: Principles and Practice”, which to this day is a reference book for all graphic designers. His posters can be seen in many major art galleries today.

black background with white typography

only black and white photography used

clear hierarchy

asymetric layout

two different sans-serif typefaces

typeface based on geometry, straight lines, circle and arches.

bits of text aligned in different ways


Emil RuderSwiss Typographer

Emil Ruder was born in 1914 in Switzerland. Ruder attended Zurich School of Arts and Crafts, where he was taught principles of Bauhaus and Tschichild’s New Typography. He was a typographer, one of the formers of Basel School of Design and Swiss Style. In his opinion the purpose of typography was to communicate ideas with writing. He used sans-serif fonts and like all Swiss Style designers he preferred asymmetrical layout. He was a really important designer of 1940s and 1950s and his use of grid system is a great influence for today’s web designers. He wrote a book on typography titled “Emil Ruder: Typography” which was published in German, French and English. “Typography has one plain duty before it and that is to convey information in writing. No argument or consideration can absolve typography from this duty.” Emil Ruder

only black and white colours usedasymmetrical layout

sans-serif typeface

very clear use of grid system

letters not centred, but moved towards the top of the rectangles

top and right margin wider than the bottom and left ones

equal distance between each rectangle

looks a little bit like eye test table


Paul RandAmerican designer

Paul Rand was one of the most influential American graphic designers, who was born in 1914 and died in 1996. He was working with illustration, advertising, typography and industrial design. Laszlo Moholy-Nagy used to say about Rand that “his fantasy is boundless”. Rand strongly believed in fundaments of modernism and defamiliarazing the ordinary. He used to change familiar, everyday objects into commanding symbols. Paul Rand was influenced by Cubism, Constructivism, Bauhaus and De Stijl and transformed these movements into his simple American design style. In 1938-1945 he designed covers for Direction magazine. He worked for free as he thought that this would help him create more honest art. However he is mostly known for designing logos (especially for his IBM logo) and a lot of them are still in use today.

use of photography

only black white and red used

handwriting typeface

wire represents a war-torn gift and a crucifix

red dots look like splashes of blood

it lacks the usual formal perfection of modernism


Helvetica“Best font of all time”

Typeface designs are greatly influenced by fashion and technology. In modernism, when Helvetica was introducend, there were massive changes in Europe. We were after I World War and Industrial Revolution; things began to be mass produced. Type designers were concentrated on creating a universal, neutral, sans-serif typeface, which could be used for any designs and had a great clarity. In 1957 Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann working for Haas Type Foundry designed a perfect typeface called Neue Haas Grotesk. Its design was based on another typeface - Schelter Grotesk. To make thhis typeface more marketable internationally they had to change its name to something simpler and that’s how it became known as Helvetica

(Helvetia - Roman name of Switzerland) in 1961 and it became an identity of “Swiss Style”designs. As Swiss designers started to spread around the world, Helvetica went with them. This type spreaded into designs of big corporations such as BMW, Bayer, Lufthansa, Microsoft, Panasonic, American Airlines, Knoll, Bank of America etc. It became so popular, that people could see it everywhere around them on signs, logos, flyers and so on. Helvetica started to take over worlds typography. When Apple introduced its first personal computer with very few typefaces to choose from in it and Helvetica among them it began to spread and became even more popular. Nowadays designers cannot avoid Helvetica, as they use Adobe suite and

h


GraphisThe International Journal of Visual Communication

Graphis was a Swiss magazine first published in 1944 by Dr. Walter Amstutz and Walter Herdeg. It revealed work of designers, artists, photographers and illustrators. It was one of the classiest magazines published back then with carefully selected best talents of the times. In 1986 it was sold to B. Martin Pedersend and moved to New York. Graphis stopped to bring profit to its publisher and was discontinued. Nowadays Graphis has a website with Archives of artwork from its annuals.

centered layoutfew different typefaces

illustrative typeface used for masthead

experimental typography

collage

very large point size

not a lot of ‘white’ space


PostmodernismIntroduction to the movement

In 1960s artists began to realise that Modernism failed to change things in the world, so that they started to reject it. It was the end of Modernism and start of Postmodernism.

Postmodernists were dismissing the past as they thought it was irrelevant to the present. Postmodernism was accusing Modernist designs that they were too formal and too functional. This dismissal first started to be visible through architecture and buildings such as Sydney Opera House and the Ronchamp Chapel. Deconstruction was one of the biggest concerns of this movement. Order and the composition of the page were destroyed, grid system was rethought and elements scrambled. Dismission of the rules approved by Modernism, so needed to achieve order was an aim of Postmodernism. Designers now were lead with intuition not with logic like in Modernism. It was no longer believed that “universal” typeface could answer all demants

of design. Instead Postmodernists practiced iconoclastis, irreverent and innovative typography. They tried to suggest the meaning of design with type and layout of the page. It was a working form of anarchy, as everything was done against accepted rules and forms. Technology started to develop very quickly and forming a personal computer changed the design irrevocably. Now everyone was able to create designs in their own houses, creating their own typefaces etc. People were discovering new possibilities in istability, tension and fragmentation. Postmodernists believed that no culture and no society is more important than other ones. They valued art for its imperfection and for its local and temporary look.


David CarsonAmerican graphic designer

David Carson is one of the most known typographers and surfers. Famous for his boundary - breaking, experimental typography. Carson was the art director of Ray Gun magazine. He was born on 8th of September 1952 in Corpus Christi in Texas. Best known for his experiments with typography. He was the most influential graphic designer of the nineties. Nowadays he own two studios: one in Del Mar in California and the other one in Zurich. First signs of David Carson’s talent were shown at very young age, but his first contact with graphic design was in 1980 at

the University of Arizona on his two week graphic course. He art directed few different music, surfing and skateboarding magazines through the 1980’s. He love the experiments with the type. Most of them are based on typography. Carson deconstructs the texts and gives a new, original and expressive look to the text; makes the text ‘alive’ on the pageand sets the text on the page in a way which attracts the attention and make the viewer bounce with his eyes all over the page, so that his attention cannot be taken of the design.


Ray GunMagazine

Ray Gun was an American alternative rock-and-roll magazine. It was first published in 1992 by Marvin Scott Jarret, and designed by David Carson. Ray Gun had a great influence on today’s graphic design industry. It broke down and re-asembled rules established by Modernists. It pushed the limits of design, layout and typography. It had a chaotic, abstract look, sometimes even impossible to read, and at the same time it created a lasting impression. During the 1990’s Ray Gun produced 70 issues of the magazine. Because of its cutting - edge design and layout, the musical artists and pop culture icons spotlighted were usually ahead of the curve. It was stopped being published in 2000, but it is still possible to buy it today on online auctions. Although, as it is more collectable stuff now rather than being a magazine itself it is rare to find it and the copies of it are usually quite expensive.

Ray Gun’s owner, founder and publisher Marvin Scott Jarrettalco created such magazines as Bikini, stick and huH. He is currently the editor - in - chief of Nylon, a New York - based fashion magazine. Ray Gun magazine puts more pressure on the type rather than on pictures. It uses deconstructive, grunge typography. The purpose of type is to attract the attention of public view to the whole magazine. Designers avoided the bright colours and went for more tonned shades. There were many different fonts used. However designers went for simplicity when choosing the font. Most of them were sans serif and there were no script fonts used. Sometimes it is hard to read the text, or even not possible to read it and in some cases it is bleeding off the page. The background of the front cover is quite simple, usually with just one picture of music band. The texture of the design is rough and urbanic.

destroyed, grunge typeface

destroyed photography, looks like it has been cut in half

hard to read the text

braking down the gird

very free design, layout; opposite to Modern layout where everything is in order


Jamie ReidArtist & Anarchist

Jamie Reid is an English designer and anarchist, born in 1947. He was creating designs for the Sex Pistols band. His designs started to define a punk-rock English scene of 70s. He also started a Suburban Press, which produced material for anarchists. A picture of Queen with safety pin going through her lip created by him became a symbol of punk rock. He is mainly recognized by his typefaces made out of cuts from newspaper headlines and placing letters in the style of a ransom note. Reid created artwork protesting against racism, nuclear weapons and a fairer justice system. He is still creating artwork nowadays and has exhibited in London galleries.


Neville BrodyEnglish designer and typographer

Neville Brody is a graphic designer, typographer and art director, born in 1957 in England. He is known for designing Arena and The Face magazines and also for designing covers for Depeche Mode. Brody is also a founder of Research Studios and one of the founders of Fontworks. He was greatly influenced by dadaism, pop art and mainly by punk rock culture. With his experiments Neville Brody pushed the boundries of common design rules. He has worked with some big companies such as BBC, Kenzo, The Times etc. creating publishing, films, packaging and websites. He has also designed 27 different typeface families.

different typefaces (some with serifs)

braking grid system

very dynamic typography

tight tracking

only black and white colours

not equal sizes of photographs and they are not laid out in an obvious grid


Barbara KrugerConceptual artist

Barbara Kruger is an American artist born in 1945. She works in New York and Los Angeles. Her work is composed of black and white typography and white text on red background. She’s mainly using Futura Bold Oblique or Helvetica Ultra Condensed typefaces in her work. Most of her artwork is about consumarism, feminism and desire. The most famous quote from her work is: “I shop therefore I am”. She was a lecturer at the California Institute of Art, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and the University of California, Berkeley.

photomontage

phrase based on Shakespeare’s “I think therefore I am”

comments on consumarism

bold, sans-serif typeface

white letters on red background

red border around the photograph


Barney BubblesEnglish graphic designer

Barney Bubble’s real name was Colin Fulcher. He was born in 1942 and died in 1983. Bubbles was an English Graphic designer working mainly with music industry in 1970s and 1980s. Packaging for music records which he designed were full of symbols, they were very mysterious. He was also a director of few music videos, two of which were never released to the public. In 1987 he redesigned the NME (music magazine). In 1980s Bubbles was also known for his furniture designs.


Graphic Design TodayHow modernism and postmodernism influenced today’s design

Modernism and postmodernism had a great influence on today’s graphic design. Designers took something from both of these movements and applied to their work. I think that from modernism the most significant thing we took is grid, use of the grid system and hierarhy in our designs. We also still tend to go for sans-serif typefaces (not always, but in most cases) and simplicity. From postmodernism I think we mainly learned that we should allow some freedom in our designs, that we shouldn’t stick to the strick rules of modernism, but we should try to stretch boundaries and experiment with our own work. I observed that grunge typefaces and backgrounds, so popular in 80s are still being used nowadays. I think that we can very easily observe that our designs are more frivolous

than they have been in modernism in animation, advertisment, especially TV ads. Designers nowadays also still stick to the rule “FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION”. This means that even though people expect our designs to look good and proffessional our main aim is still function of the design, the job it intends to do. For example when we design an advert for orange juice, we try to make it look original, engaging etc., but our main goal is to persuade people to buy this product and form of the design (the way in which design is created) should reflect on its function; in simple words we should create this advert to look good, so that people would go out and buy this particular juice over different drinks that are on the market.

F O R MF O L L O W SF U N C T I O N


Grid SystemsBasics

Grid system is an approach to bring together pictures, symbols, fields of text, headlines, tabular dates etc. Their main advantage is that they bring clarity, efficiency and continuity to the design. Successfully used grid system introduces systematic order to the layout of the design and distinguish different types of information. Passive composition of the grid is when intervals between each element are regular and they produce a field of texture that is inactive. By introducing changes to the grid composition and breaking it down designer stimulates and involves the viewer. By changing intervals between lines designer intoduces visual hierarchy to the design, what helps the viewer’s eyes to establish importance of different elements of the layout as well as keeps him intrested in the design.

Column - vertical alignment of type

Flowlines - alignments that breaks the space into horizontal bands

Modules - individual units of space separated by regular intervals

Spatial zones - groups of modules

Margins - negative space between the edge of the page and the content

Modular grid Column grid Manuscript grid Hierarchical grid


































Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Armin Hofmann


Bauhaus


Emil Ruder


Emil Ruder


Emil Ruder


Emil Ruder


Emil Ruder


Helvetica


Helvetica


Helvetica


Helvetica


Helvetica


Helvetica


Helvetica


Jan Tschichold


Jan Tschichold


Jan Tschichold


Jan Tschichold


Jan Tschichold


Modernism


Modernism


Modernism


Neville Brody


Neville Brody


Paul Rand


Paul Rand


Paul Rand


Paul Rand


Paul Rand


Paul Rand


Piet Mondrian


Piet Mondrian


Piet Mondrian


Piet Mondrian


Piet Mondrian


Jamie Reid


Jamie Reid


Jamie Reid


Barbara Kruger


Barbara Kruger


Barbara Kruger


Barbara Kruger


Barbara Kruger


Barney Bubbles


Barney Bubbles


Barney Bubbles


Barney Bubbles


Postmodernism


Postmodernism


Ray Gun


David Carson


David Carson


David Carson


Today’s Graphic Design


Cover


Cover


SummaryExplanation of my work

Mediums used for experiments:

I’ve used mainly diifferent inks with thin brushes and drawing pens and also some watercolour paint, guache and oil paints, pencil and coloured pencils. I did use old, teared newspapers and magazines and a craft knife to make cut outs in pages.

Typefaces:

When I moved my design experiments onto the computer I wanted to keep the inner pages consistent. I’ve used very few typefaces and point sizes throughout the designs. My main typefaces were Syntax, Corbel and Bodoni, however I did use few different ones in some places, especially in postmodernist designs. For the main body of text (articles) I tried to use 10pt or 12pt as much as I could.

Pages reflecting artists:

I’ve tried to work around the original designs and paitings of artists I’ve talked about on the pages. For example I took Piet Mondrian’s painting and used it as my basic grid for double page spread about him. By doing this it is easier to associate pages with artists. Although I worked with the original works of artists I kept my designs fresh, new and original, so that they wouldn’t look like copy of their works.

Why black & white?

At first I started to work not only with black and white, but also with colour. After few pages of modernism and modernist artists I’ve realised that most of the time I’m using mainly or only black and white colours for my spreads and that’s when I started to think to myself “What if I created the entire magazine in black and white?”. I thought that modernist desigs were mainly in black and white anyway, so that it would easily work with articles about modernism, but I was a little bit concerned about my postmodernist designs. I thought that it could be interesting to set myself such a massive limitation, as not to use colour for postmodernist designs, which were all about freedom and breaking, extending the boundaries and that it would be a really hard work for me, but also that in the end it could be all worth it. I also thought that it would keep my magazine more consistent and it would make the magazine stand out from the others, as nowadays it is rare to see a design without use of colours (only in black and white).


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