An Introduction

Once again, my head has filled to the brim with facts and fragments of the available knowledge the world has to offer. I am always amazed about the amount if information people are able to store in that magical computer called the human brain. I guess the saying goes, “the more you know, the more you know you don’t know.” The compilation of research, insight, and investigation found in this blog is my reaction to what I didn’t know and thanks to Megg’s History of Graphic, this graphic design history class, and the blogs of all my fellow students participating in this glorious exploration, I know how little I actually know. So, while I take the time to defragment my brain, file all of this information in the proper synapses, and make space for more information, please take a moment to enjoy my blog.

A Reflection

The arduous task of tackling the history of graphic design has led me to believe that there is no tackling the subject, of any sort. The information of design is so vast and complex that it would take a lifetime to research and absorb it all. Yet, in a brief twelve weeks I was able to obtain a glimpse of what a large amount of important artists, typographers, and designers, as well as early man and the developments of society, have contributed to the history of graphic design. In my own investigations, I have learned how a handful of those many successes have left their mark on the world. Much, much more is there to be explored and I guess it’s a good thing that I have a lifetime left to enjoy doing so. 

Our textbook, Meggs’ History of Graphic Design, is quite the large book with plenty of color filled pages of various works from posters to typographical samples. That does not mean that this book was easy to get through. The text is rather dense. Philip B. Meggs and Alston W. Purvis’ delivery and writing style, although packed with information, is very dry and can be difficult at times. I understand that the five pound book is meant for academic purposes, yet I feel the flow of the book has a stop and go attitude. Meaning, it gives you a little information of one person then stops and starts on another person and then stops. This pattern continues throughout the book and took some time to get used to. I almost felt I would be better served by a list of names with their contributions listed next to them. The dense reading often led me to take naps in between sections in order to compound the information, recharge and have another go. My naps helped me enjoy they process a lot more as I am intrigued in all the information that Meggs’ has to offer and I do realize that text is only a beginning to exploration.

My exploration, thus far, has brought me a great learning experience, about graphic design and about myself. I have learned that having a greater knowledge of history can expand my breadth of what I am capable of. Understanding different styles and different schools of art will help me in a applying an appropriate aesthetic and graphic solution to a specific problem and that there are multiple solutions to solve those problems. 

This history is there to guide us and show us the rules and how the rules were made so as contemporary designers we can, not break the rules but, expand them and add to them and create something which contributes to our society. It is important to understand that design is our surrounding environment and our lives are completely submersed in it. It is more important that we recognize the designs that surround us and why that laptop in front of you has those subtle curves and lines. 

I have also learned that I am capable of writing a small book about graphic design. I believe I have written more pages for this class than I have ever before, which is a truly remarkable accomplishment for myself. I have realized I have much to explore.

 There are many subjects of design like Bauhaus and Constructivism that have peaked my interest and Meggs has merely given us a snippet. I now have a new quest to find books that many these designers have written about theories and ideas that are sprung from their own experimentations with design.

I stated at the beginning of this blog and at the start of this course, I stated that I planned on enjoying it and I did. I am not going to say I didn’t get frustrated at times because at points I had to remind myself, “just enjoy it.” For the greater part, learning about cave art, to the development of the alphabet, to the introduction of typography, art nouveau, Bauhaus, punk, digital art, etc. has been thoroughly enjoyable.

Info Here, There, Everywhere

Simply put, I am in awe. Two words - environmental graphics. A lot of times we do not realize how much we are surrounded by graphic design in the areas we visit. When we travel the world, a new city, or even when we walk down the street, we are completely engulfed in environmental graphics whether it is simple street signs or an elaborate corporate design scheme that screams for attention. 

In our travels through Megg’s History of Graphic Design we were introduced to the ideas of environmental graphics by the use Edward Johnston’s London Underground logo in conjunction with Henry C. Beck’s London Underground subway maps. Trains and stations were also painted to match the colors of the logo. The placement of these elements in subways and marking the subway entrances not only helped locate and move about the subway systems, but contributed to the overall branding of the subway line. The Underground continues to have a vibrant identity.

The same type of environmental graphics ate depicted in sources of transportation and traffic signage. Robin Cook and Don Shanosky designed the set of glyphs for the Department of Transportation in 1974 to give information to an international audience, transcending language and literacy barriers.  Street signs and traffic signage have been designed to be easily read and to give appropriate direction yet many small towns and cities will develop street signs that are distinct from their neighboring city. For example; Mountain View, California uses a municipal blue or a forest green sign with a standard san serif font. The green and blue signs have a suburban urban motif being closer to a metropolitan area.  You will know when you have left Mountain View and have entered Los Altos, California when your street signs turn from blue to brown and use an italicized sans serif font in all capitals. The brown color of Los Altos’ signs are significant of national park signs and emphasize the city’s more wooded environment. 

In our current era of the “digital revolution,” environmental graphics has become extremely bold especially with the addition of digital color sign boards and large, thin and color LED screens. Lisa Strausfeld’s display for Bloomberg L.P. headquarters in New York is an amazing info graphics demonstration in using digital boards to present a dynamic display of financial information. The same style of info graphics displays are becoming common spectacles for sporting arenas and events. They create dazzling visuals and re-enforce the high energy of a given event. The HP Pavilion, used for the Sharks NHL hockey team, uses continuous digital screen that spans the inner circumference of the arena, infusing the interior with color and light to bolster and influence crowds while re-enforcing the HP and Sharks brand.

Father of Rambo(w)

The truth is, we are surrounded with conceptual images every day. We are constantly deciphering images and juxtapositions which challenge us into looking deeper. I thought psychedelic posters were interesting and part of the kid that still lingers around inside me wants to delve into that world, but now I see it as merely relative to a time. I understand how they represent the significant era of “freedom and love” but something in me just says that they were just a bunch of hippies ripping off art nouveau and adding in colors that were “trippy.” I guess it is the concept what is important here.

What really caught my attention in the chapter about the conceptual image are the works by Gunter Rambow (b.1938). His name got me thinking of a certain movie war veteran that wreaked havoc through a small town, but I digress. As a fan of M.C. Escher optical illusion drawings when I was a kid, Rambow’s surreal manipulated photographs are hauntingly attractive to me. Unlike the psychedelic posters where you are saying, “Is that text? What does that say?” you become intrigued with Rambow’s imagery and wonder what the true meaning is.

 

When looking at Rambow and Michael van de Sand’s  S. Fisher-Verlag poster, there is a book standing in a space. The book has a window on it with the sun shining through so bright that it casts the light and shadow on the ground in front of the book and does not let be scene what is beyond the window is not visible.  Naturally, the image gives the impression that the text contained in the book is the answer to what is beyond the window.

It is interesting to see Rambow’s work as it predates the use of photo editing software like Adobe Photoshop. To see realistic looking images in an unprecedented surrealistic manner by, what seems to be, a painstakingly process of taking photographs, melding and layering them, and then reshooting them, is almost unimaginable. Yet Rambow pulls it off with great detail with highly thought provoking content.

The poster, Utopie Dynamit is a great example of content that challenges the viewer. The print was designed in 1976 and shows the explosion and defragmentation of a corporate (the modern glass box) looking building. Without context, the image suggests the destruction of the modern corporate architectural identity and without a understanding the language it is written in, an English reading viewer might decipher it as utopian ideals blowing up capitalistic ideals or a capitalistic utopia is exploding. Viewing the image after the 9/11 gives the image more of a terroristic identity. To understand the image we must understand the context. The Utopie actually refers to a movement in Paris between 1967 and 1978 that included architects, socialists, and urbanists who protested the reform of architectural education, the expansion and replanning of the Parisian urban planning o Charles de Gualle, and the domestication of military and industrial technologies. This information now gives some external knowledge about the image and its meaning. Utopie was trying to combat the modernization of architecture in favor for design that followed historical Paris.

Another of Ranbow’s iconic surreal book image is a poster for S. Fisher with a light bulb superimposed as if it lives in a space inside the book cover. The design implies that ideas are to be found inside the book or sheds light on the subject.

“Sigh”… Conceptual design… so much fun.

A large amount of Gunter Rambow’s work can be found at  www.gunterrambow.de

Sources

Meggs History of Graphic Design

The MIT Press

MoMA.org 

Gunter Rambow 

How Symbolic.

The “International Typographic Style,” is discussed in chapter eighteen of Meggs’ History of Graphic design as a typographic style, derived from Swiss designers, which influenced design across the Western World. However, this typographic style did not communicate across a truly international audience without the introduction of pictograms.

Originally introduced during the Bauhaus were Gerd Arntz and Otto Neurath’s isotype pictographs. These pictographs used simple symbolic images used to convey certain amounts and types of people in graphic manner. In the way they were used, a supplemental text was needed in order to show the context of the information presented. With influence of modern design including Bauhaus and the Swiss’ International Typographic Style, the United States Department of Transportation commissioned the American Institute of Graphic Arts in 1974 to create a set of symbols, which could transcend language barriers. A true international visual language was born from this project and can be seen all over the world, with slight modifications to accommodate differences in languages. The Olympic Games have also repeated the use of pictographs in order to surpass language barriers by having symbolic images represent different types of sports. 

National Parks Symbols

Department of Transportation Symbols

The use of the pictogram is ever so present in our modern society. We are bombarded with them on a daily basis whether we go to the airport, school, or the mall. We find them as icons on our “smart phones” and as playful images on t-shirts. They are easily recognizable and quick to register in our brains, but is this really a good thing? Could the constant use, or over use of pictograms be dumbing the population down?

 

Mike Judge is a writer and animator most notably known for his creation of Beavis and Butthead on MTV. He also created the well-known animated sitcom, King of the Hill. In 2006 Judge wrote, directed, and produced the movie, Idiocracy, a satirical comedy that explores the idea that only stupid people are breading. The protagonist, played by Luke Wilson, awakens in the future to find that he is the smartest man alive when in his time he was simply average. This future world in is plagued by advertisements catering to a population of invalids and in a scene in which he visits the doctor’s office, the nurse hovers over a keyboard with pictograms of a series of ailments. The images are hilarious as some of the ailments indicate death, yet the idea that person needs little intelligence to interpret them seems pretty dismal if this is the future.

Scene from Idiocracy 2006

 Sources
Meggs History of Graphic Design
AIGA
lardbiscuit.com
IMDB
wikipedia.org - Mike_Judge