Technologies and how these transform society. Overall, a focus on two very important women. Firstly, Phyllis Pearsall (1906-1996) who, in 1936, began cycling the streets of London on her bicycle, charting an alphabetical index of the sprawling city, eventually creating the London A-Z. This new way of organising information builds upon this idea of the new importance of typography in modern society, particularly cities. In the urban sprawl, typography communicates where we are, instructs us on how to act, where to go, warns and cautions, both officially and not.
As things changed and transportation and technologies developed, so did the cities methods of communication; signs had to be legible at higher speeds, which brings us to the second woman of note in relation to this topic, Margaret Calvert. Calvert, and her former teacher and then colleague Jock Kinneir were commissioned by the UK Government to create the designs of Britain’s road signs. One of the biggest changes implemented was the use of lower-case type, as this was much easier to read quickly due to the human eye taking in the shape of the word, not necessarily every unique letter.
Looking at Harry Beck’s tube map, and the fact that the stations it charts have little or no geographical bearing, this idea of cities as subjective and reliant on a person’s experience within a space was touched upon.
Guy Debord, Guide Pychogéographique de Paris
Wolfgang Weingart (Born 1941)
Weingart is known as the father of the typographic movement, Swiss Punk (or New Wave) Typography. Born in Switzerland, he was later schooled in typesetting and even eventually trained to become a typesetting, working in a small print shop.
He later came into contact with Emil Ruder and Armim Hoffmann, founders of the Basel School of Design, and presented his work to them. As a result, he became a student of the school but then graduated to teaching typography on the request of Hoffmann.
Weingart began with Swiss typography as his starting point before he ‘blew it apart’ creating what he describes as something he happened to be doing, a 'Weingart Style’ but what became internationally known as Swiss Punk, part of the New Wave design movement that was occurring in direct reaction to modernism.
The work of Wolfgang Weingart can be seen in reaction to the ideals and practices of Swiss Typographic style; the idea of typography as transparent and fit for purpose, with grids affording and maintaining order. Weingart saw things differently and wanted to see how far the fundamental aspects of typography could be pushed. Aspects such as legibility.
However, he wasn’t so much of a rebel as an inquisitive mind and he simply saw no reason why information couldn’t inspire emotion and intrigue 'what’s the use of being legible, when nothing inspires you to take notice of it?’. He didn’t entirely rip apart Swiss typography, he thought that four typefaces were enough, two of which being Akzidenz Grotesk and Univers (Emil Ruder’s favourite).
“I was motivated to provoke this stodgy profession and to stretch the typeshops capabilities to the breaking point,and finally, to prove once again that typography is an art.” Wolfgang Weingart
Examples of the International Typographic Style from its pioneers, Ruder, Hofmann, and Müller-Brockmann. Posters were seen as one of the most effective forms of communication.
All show very strong, clear gridwork, the use of only sans-serif type, and simple, bold block of colour (sometimes photography).
To be SUBJECTIVE is to be personally involved; to have a personal opinion on something. To be OBJECTIVE is to be removed, to view from the outside - to stand apart.
Josef Müller-Brockmann (1914 - 1996) wrote Grid and Design Philosophy in 1981; defined a philosophical standpoint for typography - the power we have as designers to work with words could constitute democratic actions. He believed typography should be objective.
Müller-Brockmann style = one single typeface, predominantly lowercase, integration of some illustration, embracing abstraction.
Good typography is transparent. Design does not get in the way of communication. People shouldn’t notice design. Müller-Brockmann and Beatrice Warde carried this message.
Modernism (1940s)
Typography is functional.
FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION
The way something looks is determined by its job. The way something looks affects the way people react to it - designers have a massive responsibility.
Clean, modernist style brought clarity to a bewildering world. The 50s were a time of huge change. Life was mechanised, urbanised, and industrialised, new communities emerged, values changed. Emphasis was on the social, rather than the individual. Mechanised work led to emphasis on impersonal, rather than crafted artisan. War.
This was the new world in which the new typography arrived. The rise of anonymity in design. Pure design. Jan Tschichold wrote Die Neue Typographie. Systems and rules, standards and regulations introduced to design work. Principles against false decoration e.g. international paper sizes, gridwork.
Helvetica became a default typeface. Perhaps its the only typeface which has achieved that invisibility because of its overuse. Recent return of modernism and non-aesthetics in 90s-00s.
International Typographic Style / Swiss Style (mid-50s)
The culmination of minimalist trends in typography, led by Hoffmann, Ruder, and Müller-Brockmann. Minimalism and neutrality.
‘PERFECTION ACHIEVED WHEN NOTHING (IS) LEFT TO REMOVE.’
Neutrality
In order for a typeface to be neutral, a lot of trust is required. Some people argue that technology is neutral, that there is no pre-determined way for how an invention is to be used - it is full of unknown potential. But Jerry Mander argues that neutrality in technology is a mere illusion and can never really exist. Technologies are designed with a user in mind, and therefore was designed for use in a particular way. The alphabet is a technology, it was created, and it was made for literate people. Is it possible for the alphabet to be neutral?
Josef Müller-Brockmann was a Swiss graphic designer whose work is most commonly categorised as being part of the Swiss International Style movement; a style that encompassed art, architecture and culture and emerged during the 1920s. “Hallmarks of the style are asymmetric layouts, use of a grid, sans-serif typefaces like Akzidenz-Grotesk, and flush left, ragged right text”.
The Grid: ‘the designer’s work should have the clearly intelligible, objective, functional and aesthetic quality of mathematical thinking…[it] should be a contribution to general culture and itself form part of it’ - Müller-Brockmann.
This idea of design having a 'higher purpose’ in terms of its affect on culture was a theme throughout Swiss Style, and echoed through Modernism, as illustrated by Jan Tschichold in Die Neue Typographie, 'anonymity in the elements we use and the application of laws transcending self combined with the giving up of personal vanity in favour of pure design’.
Modernism: “form follows function” was the mantra of Modernism, that the aesthetics of an object were secondary to its function or purpose.
Helvetica, 'the people’s typeface’ is one of the most famous typefaces of all time, it was developed in 1957 by Max Miedinger in Switzerland for the Haas foundry, and the name itself comes from the Latin word for Switzerland. Helvetica is widely used due to its readability and neutrality. The above image shows the poster for the film, Helvetica, confirmation of its fame, or to some, infamy. Eric Spiekermann describes the typeface as 'air […] it’s just there. There’s no choice. You have to breathe, so you have to use Helvetica’.
An introduction to the work of Walter J. Ong, author of Orality and Literacy, a piece that explores the history of communication. Below are quotes from Ong that I found to be of interest. In particular, those ideas relating to changes in language, beginning first as sounds, becoming tangible as movable type, before finally the development of digital technologies reverted letterforms backwards, to ‘binary pules stored within the physical memory of the computer chipset’:
What the reader is seeing on this [screen] are not real words but coded symbols whereby a properly informed human being can evoke in his or her consciousness real words, in actual or imagined sound. It is impossible for script to be more than marks on a surface
The alphabet implies that a word is a thing
Print situates words in space […] print suggests words are things far more than writing ever did
The invention of print made it so that knowledge was organised, it was 'exactly repeatable’ and democratised. But it also created a separation between the author and reader. Whilst knowledge is shared, in some cases meaning could be lost and text became formal and immutable, as 'readers knew they could look but not change’.
Definitions:
Interface: a point of connection, where two systems, subjects, organisations meet and interact; a surface that is a boundary between two portions of matter or space
Logocentrism: “language at the centre of everything” a belief that holds speech superior to writing as a method of communication due to it being closer to the original source
Phonocentrism: is the belief that speech and sound are primary to the written word, or language
Transliteracy: the ability to read, write and interact across a range of platforms, tools and media from signing and orality through handwriting, print, tv, radio and film, the digital social networks
Walter Ong (1912 - 2003)
Explored the connections and relationships between spoken and written language; wrote Orality & Literacy.
Visual language transformed our entire society - the way we perceive a sense of knowledge. Think of typography as the connection between language and technology. How has technology affected what communication is to us? New developments are blurring the lines between speech, writing, print, and screen.
Interface: a point of connection - where two things meet and interact.
Logocentrism: language at the centre of everything - distorts our relationship with an objective ‘reality’. We need to put a label on something in order to understand it - we need words for comprehension. Language becomes transparent. We forget it’s a invention, that it was humans that designated meaning to words.
Phonocentrism: Speech comes first, written text is secondary. Text is just a collection of symbols that evoke speech in the mind once deciphered by people.
Where do words go once they leave your mouth? How did people remember stories before written text? Storytellers used to use visual triggers to associate the next steps of the story - virtual reality. Memory.
Memory → Writing
Words can now be kept and stored into shapes that represent an idea. Preserving sound. A huge leap in human communication. Writing is a technology.
Writing → Print
Writing was once seen as a gift from God, usually only a skill possessed by monks in monasteries who copied out the Bible.
But print streamlined the process of writing and made it more permanent. Movable type broke words down into individual shapes. A letter became a mark, became an object, representing a sound.
Communication became mechanised, faster than a monk in a scriptorium could ever write. With the invention of efficient communication came a sense of knowledge (books, media, records etc.) that led to sophistication of society. Print led to new systems of organising knowledge.
Electronic Transformation
New digital technology combines the fixity and permanence of print with the speed, dynamism, fluidity, personality, and character of speech. We can type in real time, with mistakes we might naturally make in speech.
Written text and spoken word is merging and becoming an ambiguous category.
Gerrit Noordzij
Unlike dictionary definitions, Noordzij’s classification of typography avoids linking it to any specific medium, as this is open to change. Typography is not necessarily just letters printed on a page, it can be graffiti, shapes or even the human body.
Johannes Gutenberg - the inventor of movable type; transforming letters into physically tangible objects.