Sunday, April 19, 2009

Thesis statement

Stefan Sagmeister is a world-renowned innovative and influential designer who allows his soul to shine through his work, reflecting his personality while still communicating effectively.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Psychedelic Posters

“Poster mania” took place in the 1960s as an American poster craze that embraced the social activist spirit of the young nation. Its grassroots beginnings came from self-trained designers and artists who gathered inspiration from art nouveau, comic book, and pop art, among other art movements. These posters used flowing curves, recycled images from popular culture, intense colors, swirling imagery and warped letterforms. The posters related “anti-establishment values” and commented on social movements like civil rights, the Vietnam War, the women’s liberation and the search for alternate lifestyles. Artist Peter Max (with his “Love” poster), and David Lane (with his symmetrical, contour, simple lined posters) were two of the influential poster designers of the psychedelic poster mania.

I really liked the flowing nature of these posters and how well they represent the era that they were created in. The colors and visual vibration resonate with the “psychedelic mentality” of the public that were viewing the posters. The imagery and color really helped to convey the mentality.

I just wish that there were more recognizable poster examples given in the book; or from sources that we would recognize, like propaganda for the Rolling Stones, etc.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Ch. 21 Conceptual Image

Chapter 21, "The Conceptual Image" is about an approach that came from Poland, United States, Germany and Cuba. In Poland, after WWII began, the design community basically came to an end until Communism was established. However, only state-controlled institutions and industries requested design work. Trepowski was a famous Polish poster designer because he was able to reduce imagery and words into a succinct statement. Tomaszewski was famous because after all of the somber and darker posters, he re-embraced a brighter, positive, colorful world of poster design. Jerzy Janiszewski was also an important figure because of his Solidarity logo design, which was a symbol worldwide for struggle versus oppression.
In America, photography began to replace illustration beginning in the 1950s. A more conceptual approach was then born for illustration; the “Push Pin” designs expressed an openness and reinterpretation of visual imagery, as well as an integration of words and image into a total design. Chwast and Glaser were two of the influential artists of this time with their experimental magazine, poster designs, and Glaser’s contoured, flat shapes of color with black outlines. These two also invented some novelty display faces. In 1980, design finally became a truly national profession for Americans.

I was really impressed with the Poland school of design and the community that outlasted the Communist reign and restrictions. I think it shows that design is an important part of this world if it could outlast the evil of those days, as well as keep a bond between professionals and create a community for them, even when illegal (Solidarity).

The question I have is about the advancement of illustration in the US after the 1950s. I can see the uniqueness of Glaser’s illustration, using black contour lines and flat colors; is this what the evolution was, or were there other major advances in illustration?

(I presented Chapter 20.)

Monday, April 6, 2009

Ch. 18 & 19

Chapter 18, The International Typographic Style, is about the 1950s movement that came out of Switzerland and Germany, also known less formally as Swiss design. These designs were asymmetrical yet very organized on a mathematically-structured grid. Objective design and copywriting did not put exaggerated claims on the design either. These designs also typically used sans-serif typography, set in flush left/ragged right paragraphs. It was seen as progressive design that was socially important. Ernst Keller set the "standard of excellence" for Swiss design, and the Basel School of Design was a major influence in its geometrically-based curriculum. Many widely-used fonts came out of this design time, too, such as Univers (by Frutiger), Helvetica (Hoffman & Miedinger) and Palatino, Melior and Optima (Zapf). The design style caught on quickly, becoming widely used in the 1960s corporate and industrial graphics, specifically by MIT. 

Chapter 19 is about The New York School, the influence of modern art/Swiss design on American design from about the 1940s-1970s. Paul Rand was a major influence, putting his knowledge of the modern movement into major graphic design. He designed many magazine covers, reducing the design to the symbolic essence that he wanted to convey--he used universal, ordinary signs and symbols to translate his visual ideas, and often used juxtaposition of  colors, ideas, or imagery to make a statement. Lustig, another important designer, used symbolic imagery to convey an essence of the contents of a book on its book cover. Yale University School of Art also had a major influence at this time, with Josef Albers as the director of the art school, and Eisenman as the director of the graphic design program. George Lois was a master at this time of completely integrating visual and verbal design, which he executed on many Esquire magazine covers, among other things. 

What I found most interesting in this chapter was that figurative typography was just emerging. Gene Federico was one of the first graphic designers at this time to use letterforms as imagery. Type also finally began to have connotative meaning in compositions as well. 

One question I have is, why did it take so long for typography to be used as connotative expression? Couldn't the Dada or futurism compositions be considered exploration of connotative typography? 

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Weekly Sketches

Once again, I redesigned the Heinz ketchup label. The first design is inspired by Peter Behrens’ design in the early 1900s. His designs were very structured and geometrical, so I changed the shape of the label itself to be a rectangle with 90 degree angles, and then used linear elements as well as circles. I used the circles, which I would make red (to echo the image of a tomato) to hold each letter of the word ‘Heinz.’ I then made the bottom portion of the label primarily circular, but still intersected with some linear elements. Overall, the design is clean and neat and geometrical, like Behrens’ work. As for typography, Behrens used a bracketed serif font; on this matter, I would depart from his influence and use a simple, bold fat face. I think the thick, bold type would stand out more, as well as keep the clean and simple look of the label.

The second label is inspired by the Plakastil movement. The posters of this era used reductive imagery and flat planes of color. I mirrored these characteristics in my design by making the main imagery a giant red tomato with a simplified green leaf/stem on the top. Plakastil experimented with placement of type somewhat, so I aligned “Heinz” on the curve of the tomato to make the type and imagery work together. I think I would use a fancier font for this design, as Plakastil posters also experimented with sometimes.