GID01 - History of Graphic Design – A
Final Project Posting
BY JOHN VILLA
My
footsteps through the History of Graphic Design
My
footsteps through the History of Graphic Design
The Blog Title is presented in three typographic fonts available in a modern word
processing application called “MS WORD”, by Microsoft, an important company in
the Information Age, which symbolize the journey through the history of graphic
design which I took.
After a week of wrapping up work for another class and finishing a busy work where I completed a new financial report design and received approval for production on another report, I sat at my favorite coffee shop, The Beanery in Alameda, CA, ruminating about my time spent in the class History of Graphic Design and how to conclude my learning experience. I started the class as a formal introduction into design for a new career opportunity in business systems reporting that tied together my broad career experience in business and international experience therein. Did I learn more than I expected? Did I learn anything that I could apply to my career or to my overall life experience that I could share with others?
Over the course of the last 10-week class we compiled a series
of weekly blogs based on our reflections on the assigned reading in our book Megg’s History of Graphic Design
and external experiences.
Some questions posed by Kent Manske, our instructor at
Foothill College, were:
- What did you learn? How do you see things differently as a
result?
I have used the cursory and broad exposure furnished in the
class in some of my current design and report layouts at work as we worked on
some new enhancements to our new Standard Reporting reports which are
web-based. These reports go out to over 5,000 users monthly and have a
broad-based user-group from Finance to non-Finance users such as garage and
fleet vehicles managers to power plant managers.
- What did you not learn? Why was the class not valuable to you? How could it
have been more valuable?
- What new connections did you make regarding graphic design and the evolution
of human culture?
- What new interests might you have based on what you've been exposed to?
- How will you apply what you've learned to experiencing life, your
understanding of other disciplines, your future career?
- What is the future of graphic design?
In my first blog I was posed the question “Question:
what I will learn and how will I apply it?” and in response after I
thought about if I achieved what I had wrote ten weeks ago in my blog would be:
“YES!”
In travels during the course I found that I became opened to
my surroundings in an interesting way. I as student of business and culture
with an interest in history, I found that ruminated on design graphics, their
layout, type and font and images or illustrations, and would recall the period
or design school that it may have had as its genesis.
Here are few examples I found over the last months what I
relate to them from my class learnings.
This San Diego Airport mural is of the poster that
advertised the Pan-American Exposition of 1915.
The airport and Balboa Park in San Diego has many interesting artifacts
from the exposition, which include architecture and some old photos and
posters. As my family tree passes through San Diego during the time of the
exposition, this holds some value to me.
I believe this example is typical of chromolithographic prints of the
era and combines the scrolling typography and artistic design of used in public
communications from the 1880s through 1920 prior to the Art Noveau styled work
of post WWI. The center-piece is the logo from the expo.
Mural 1)
Logo 2)
Logo 2)
1) Photo of Mural San
Diego Regional Airport, John Villa
2) Logo Exposition, Copyright © 2014 Balboa Park, All Rights Reserved. Produced by the Balboa
Park Online Collaborative, http://www.balboapark.org/old2015/historicphotos
This album cover is symbolic of the blending of movie fame
images and art and font that brought about in the 60’s and 70’s. Album art was
growing in importance and an important artistic component. The symbolism of upward
looking gaze and the sunset are important implication of Crosby’s search for
self-identity after his time with his band Crosby Stills Nash and Young.
David Crosby David-Crosby
- If I Could Only Remember My Name, Atlantic – SD 7203,
Released Feb. 22, 1971 Copyright (c) – Atlantic
Recording Corporation. Album Cover Photography By
[Front Cover (16 MM Movie Frame)]
At the SF AC Transit Terminal I discovered these interesting posters.
Reminiscent of 1940-1960 poster styles which employed simplistic message such as this work by is represented in a contemporary graphic style using photography and typographic font that is bold and clean versus the artistic style of design known as cubism. For example his posters for American Airlines air travel to visit California was a women on a beach with a ball. Colors used in the poster were blue, red and tan, diagonal type and bold words, shaped geometric font, and big blocks of tan and blue and a red ball. The two posters for Hawaiian Airlines employ via modern photographic imagery similar simple color format and simple statements.
The Cannabis Cup reminds me of what I read about the Art Nouveau stylized posters prominent during the 1920 to 1940 in Europe and the US.
Some graphic design images had no words just an image to convey
the message. The design and composition is subliminal of Arnold Schwarzenegger
iconic Brazilin photo-shoot in 1977 espousing the good life for a contemporary
American male, healthy physique, fine wine, beach and a blonde looking
admiringly. During this phase a new health fad and gym industry took off in
American culture from the 1970’s through today. The photo is followed by contemporary book
designed from the 1950s to 1980’s. The font style combined with the image are
employed in the covers show boldness and strength to convey the image of the
book’s and magazine’s content.
On the site dedicated to Harold Zinkin, whom I have never heard of
although I have studied bodybuilding since the 1980’s, wrote “But Harold Zinkin was a pioneer in the fitness industry. So
instrumental was he as part of a group that started the building movement in
Muscle Beach in the 1930’s, that Arnold Schwarzenegger named Zinkin the “father
of modern body building”. Born in San Francisco, Zinkin was the son of
Russian immigrants who as a young man sculpted his body into a specimen of
strength. During World War II, he served in the Navy as a physical therapist. Harold won the first "Mr.
California" title in 1941 and in 1945 he was first runner-up in the
Mr. America bodybuilding competition. In 1953, Zinkin moved to Fresno and
opened gyms.”
2) The New Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding :
The Bible of ... www.amazon.com260 × 331Search by image, The New Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding : The Bible
of Bodybuilding, Fully Updated and Revised: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bill
Dobbins: 9780684857213: Publisher:
Simon & Schuster; Rev Upd edition (November 5, 1999)
These BART posters combine varied styles. When I reviewed them I thought of the works preceding the work done for the London Underground by Austin Cooper. My blog about Austin Cooper and Cubism follows herein, but here are the BART images that I found interesting.
Counting Cuneiform 17. About the
sumerian Tablet
... A large and rare Sumerian
bi-facial baked clay tablet featuring many lines of Cuneiform
My journey through the course was captured in our weekly
blogs. Here are a few that illustrate my journey and culminate with week 10.
In my Blog for week 1, I wrote:
“Question: what I will learn and how will I apply it?” After
reading the preface to Megg’s History
of Graphic Design 1 and perusing the book’s photos and reading
the captions I came to realize what this course may offer me.
I hope that this course offers me more insight in to how to
communicate better with my community and my management and peers at work, for
example as when I assist in the design of business information reports. My work
involves the concept of “Big Data” (large quantity of data that may or may not
be related) and how to communicate this information more effectively and to make
it meaningful to our clients. So I ask myself – how may an understanding of the history of communication and the
evolution and need for graphic design help me?
I have always been interested in history and culture. I have
studied Chinese, Spanish, Russian and English languages primarily. The
photographs of hieroglyphs, old manuscripts and books, scrolls to billboards
signage, and posters indicate that we all need to communicate our thoughts – I
think the need to express one’s self is at the foundation of graphic design. How
we humans have achieved the fulfillment our need to communicate is found within
the technical aspects of pictures, symbols, and writing, and what these
ultimately mean to civilization.
As I progress though the course I look forward to learning
more about the communications evolution, and drawing conclusions on this topic
that will assist me in my future endeavors.
1. Phillip B. Meggs and
Alston W. Purvis, Megg’s History of Graphic Design, 5th Ed. (New
Jersey: Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2012).
In my week 1 my blog I posted our review of the prologue. What an interesting beginning to our area of
study. The Part 1: Prologue to Graphic Design covered the visual message
and techniques employed by man over time from the invention of writing and use
of alphabets to streamline sounds into text. The Asian contribution utilized
pictographs and artful written forms such as calligraphy, culminating in
presenting the artful development of illuminated manuscripts which I believe
where meant to transcend communication and deliver to its owner societal
status. These chapters were all fascinating, and as I read through the chapter
I thought how our need to communicate and the content or message has not
changed very much over time, only the mode and method utilized.
Technical processes of communication have changed over the
thousands of years since man and woman emerged from caves and created
cities-states and the more structured civilizations that we have today. Today’s
society has almost instantaneous communication between neighbors, citizens,
governments, and countries as the likes of scanners and bar codes, social
media, television, and the internet. The use of technological advancements to
solve the same issue of exchanging information rather its business information,
tax records, literary or history, or simply communicating with one’s loved
ones. These are basic ties to our past.
Just as the use of reeds and brushes replaced sticks and paper replaced
the use of clay tablets, the method of human communication has changed over the
millenniums and will continue in the foreseeable future. A futurist may say the
past is the best predictor of the future. We will need to continue to
communicate with forms, symbols of sounds or thoughts or processes until such
time some form of telepathy is used.
In the past humans in many lands and cultures communicated
to manage their society and improve their lifestyles. As with the invention of
any tool, the creation of drawings and writing methods was born from the need
to present one’s thoughts or ideas. Organized groups and varied civilizations
created many forms and methods to communicate such as hieroglyphs, pictures
that represented sounds, markings and alphabets to achieve their communications
goals.
In Megg’s Chapter One 1, the reference to the
counting of goats and sheep in picture 1.6 was interesting. I could see myself
creating one of these clay tablets as I work in the accounting profession. The
caption read “Archaic table fragment from the late fourth millennium BCE. The
frilled hole denotes a number, and the pictographs represent animals in this
transcription of sheep and goats”.
As societies and civilizations grew either organically or
through expand trade and war, the need to expand on aspects that were present
in society, such as commerce and taxes, lead to the creation of alphabets. Alphabets were created in different forms to
meet the needs of society. Initially a picture or jab of a reed in clay or on a
parchment led to refinements that led to more simplistic written from.
I watch the crowd at Oracle all cheering on the GS Warriors.
Most spectators are wearing yellow tees that communicate their support and
emotional state of inclusion – the t-shirt has written on it “Strength in
Numbers”. I imagine some Babylonian or Greek wearing a robe to a horse or
wrestling event that indicates their support for a favorite. Another example I
found in Megg’s Chapter 2 2 was about the discovery of writing on
walls in Pompeii. The discovery was akin to modern day signage and graffiti.
The archeologist discovered literary writings and crude obscenities. The caption for the picture 2-20, it read
“Wall writing from Pompeii, first century CE. Over sixteen hundred messages
ranging from passages from Vergil to crude obscenities were preserved under
more than 3.6 meters (12 feet) of volcanic ash.” I found interesting in this
caption that the use of “billboards or wall painting” were used, likely by professional, as well as
the “tagger” or graffiti artist penning his art. Again the message unchanged,
just the mode or process.
I think as we proceed through the course we will see many
similarities between the content of human communication over time. The
difference will be stylistic or in methodology or process, and the tools will
be different such as digital computer or telecommunication-oriented like a
smartphone and app.
2. Phillip B. Meggs and
Alston W. Purvis, Megg’s History of Graphic Design, 5th Ed.
(New Jersey: Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2012), Chapter 02, Alphabets, pg, 30.
One of my favorite areas during the course was on Cubism.
Here is my thoughts:
Cubism – Picasso’s artistic genius translated into graphic design by Cooper and Kauffer Cubism is one of my favorite forms of art. In fact Picasso is one of my favorite artists. My father actually looks like Picasso at times too. When I look at the some contemporary uses of cubism, I think of our national park badges and emblems, and the CNN LVE symbol as I watch the news at the time of my writing this blog. Examples are below. Cubism was a born from the work of Pablo Picasso. Picasso genius of interpreting his cultural ancestors art and tribal art was a natural derivative of his environment and his influence of the impressionistic artists such as Cezanne. As with all artists when they surpass the basics some have genius moments that move their work beyond the ordinary. The influence of Picasso cubic art form created the genesis for Cubism graphic design. This work influenced many artists even to today’s artists and graphic designers. Then as Cubism was developing a few graphic designers to reflect on are: A.M. Cassandre, Joseph Binder, Austin Cooper and Edward McKnight Kauffer. Cassandre’s and McKnights work was paramount in leading a change in post WWI graphic design of cubism. They blended geometric design, streamlined design and zigzag approach with decorative carry over of the art deco trend using less realism in design and drawing of images. Both used a spatial design and organization of symbolic images and objects with type or lettering bring about a composition that was compelling. Austin Coper used cubism in his London Underground (subway trains) posters leveraging cubic shapes and rhetoric and color. For example, the posters stating that is cooler or warmer underground used bright primary colors to drive underground usage. Red cubes for warmer and blue to emphasize a cooler environment. The artistic shapes of multiple cubes in various positions and sizes are exploding upwards from the base of the poster is genius giving the illusion of temperature transfer. A photo of Austin Cooper is next to his poster for using the London Underground.
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Another poster by Cooper attempted to get patronage to be smart riders by using creative type in basic colors in cubic form, as shown in the “Help the conductor” poster from 1940’s. I like this one as it was very important from riders to keep moving through the underground as the underground was used in the evenings as sleeping quarters for many Londeners during WWII. Another WWII poster is celebrating the flags of Allied Nations, this is a very interesting poster, as cubism s about geometric shape, which flags are natural rectangles and of primary colors, but the structure of the poster is interestingly a “U” shape. Does this translate into “UNITED” in your mind?
3
Edward McKnight Kauffer work was
obviously similar, yet I think his style was more industrial in some cases but
very geometric and sharp oriented and laden with the basic colors of and a lot
of black and white and negative space to make the objects pop off the page.
This is based on the posters I reviewed online. For example his posters for American
Airlines air travel to visit California was a women on a beach with a ball.
Colors used in the poster were blue, red and tan, diagonal type and bold words,
shaped geometric font, and big blocks of tan and blue and a red ball. .
5
1 Forgotten London Underground posters - Telegraph www.telegraph.co.uk400 × 640Search by image It is Warmer Down Below; by Austin Cooper, 1924
2. Artist: Austin Cooper - Poster and poster artwork collection ... www.ltmcollection.org300 × 288Search by image Artist - Austin Cooper. Artist Details. Collection of London Transport Museum 3. http://flashbak.com/22-amazing-edward-mcknight-kauffer-book-covers-32704/ “Help the conductor” - London Transport poster by Austin Cooper, 1942 by mikeyashworth on Flickr.
4 Poster Parade | London Transport Museum blog.ltmuseum.co.uk1480 × 2352Search by image They shout for joy, they also sing – Flags of Allied Nations, 1944, Austin Cooper
In my study of
contemporary graphic design the PushPin work was paramount in many changes
experienced during the last 50 years. In
my blog I titled, Pushing the Pen and the Push Pin Duet of Milton Glaser and
Seymour Chwast, I presented my thoughts here.
As photographic technology and the
market for this product and its use matured in the 40’s and 50’s, four men of
different backgrounds whom attended Cooper Union, a free and liberal college in
their era that did not discriminate against race sex or religion, lived
together while at Cooper Union. I believe this exposure and their assemblage
led to their prolific careers. The four art students whom founded Push Pin
Studio a few years after their graduation were: Seymour Chwast, Milton Glaser,
Reynolds Ruffins, and Edward Sorel. Ruffins a black student was to become a
prominent artist, illustrator and graphic designer. A son of Jewish immigrants,
Sorel grew up in the Bronx and attended the High School for Music and Art with
Ruffins – Sorel would become a cartoonist and famed political satirist.
Both Sorel and Ruffin along with Chwast formed a magazine called Push Pin
Almanack while they plied their new approach to graphic design in the early
1950’s. After graduation Glaser received an eye-opening Fullbright Scholarship
to study in Italy with Giorgio Morandi at the Accademia di Belle Arti. Glaser
study etching and art.
When Glaser returned to New York the
four men formed Push Pin Studio. After a while Chwast and Glaser were only left
at Push Pin Studios whom continued work in graphic design and influencing
graphic design in the US and Europe. The style they developed was based on
total communication or holistic approach to graphic design combing image and
design layout. They pooh-poohed the iconastic approach of International
Typographic Style and thought and designed outside the lines and applied
various styles from other forms, like art nouveau, wood block and font styles
in a nonlinear and structured format.
A few examples by Glaser present to
discuss are his famous Bob Dylan poster which was included in over 6 million
albums. This poster combined a black silhouette of Dylan in black outline
similar to the Victorian art called silhouette, with a wavy concept of Dylan’s
massive curly hair in an art deco stylized curly and vibrant-colored coif (see
Fig 21-19)1. A second example is Glaser’s poster titled, Art
is … WHATEVER. The cover conveys a blend of shadowed silhouette to convey
perception and a similar black bolo hat and graphic font very plainly to see in
black and red color there two form a “face or head” but without a human face to
express conceptuality. This is very intellectual graphic design that
blends image and content. He makes the viewer think about the balance
between perception and conception. 2
I liked Glaser art for Poppy
Records. This business poster or drawing illustrated the company as it
developed a need to break from it competition. Its shows a concrete block
with a Poppy ring out of it. The combination of surrealism and geometric shape
is effective in concept to show a break from conformity is illustrated in this
poster called, FROM POPPY WITH LOVE (3).
An example from Chwast combined art
and image and history along with the political statement of the bombing of
Hanoi in North Vietnam in his poster of Uncle Sam eating planes bombs and
homes - in his mouth. The poster done in a similar art deco style with a
more cartoonish Uncle Sam in three colors: of purple, green and orange. The
poster caption simply states: End Bad Breath.4 Chwast work was
also used in music and entertainment industry. Two posters of Chwast are his
Lincoln Center Philharmonic Hall Poster depicting Judy Garland 5 and
the album cover for The Threepenny Opera 6
In both of these artistic materials,
Chwast combined free-form shape to symbolize the person, breaking form the
illustrative forms to more surrealistic drawing of the person, with vibrant
shape. The Judy Garland poster exudes a warmth and coolness of the singer,
whereas the album cover for the German play The Threepenny Opera is equally
enticing wth a smiling woman and disheveled hair similar to the Dylan coif with
a man in pinned striped suit sitting on the woman shoulder. The cover has
woodblock imagery to its structure along with a varied typographic font, similar
the styles used in the Industrial Age where posters virtually yelled at the
reader with its varied fonts sizes and typographic formats. Chwast brilliantly
designed through the concept a unity of varied graphic design techniques and
methods.
Here below are three examples
of Chwast's work: The poster to end the bombing of Hanoi, and two works
associated with entertainment, the Judy Garland Poster for Lincoln Hall and the
album cover for the German Threepenny Opera play.
(1) Figure
21-19. Milton Glaser Bob Dylan poster, 1967, Megg’s History of Graphic
Design, p.442. Copyright 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights
reserved
(2) Figure
21-22. Milton Glaser, Art is…Whatever poster, 1996, Megg’s History of
Graphic Design, p.443. Copyright 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All
rights reserved
(3) Figure
21-21. Milton Glaser, Poppy Records, FROM POPPY WITH LOVE poster, 1968, Megg’s
History of Graphic Design, p.442. Copyright 2012 by John Wiley & Sons,
Inc. All rights reserved
(4) Figure
21-26. Seymour Chwast, Protest Bombing of Hanoi poster, 1968, Megg;s
History of Graphic Design, p.444. Copyright 2012 by John Wiley & Sons,
Inc. All rights reserved
(5) Figure
21-23. Seymour Chwast, Judy Garland at the Lincoln Center poster, 1960, Megg;s
History of Graphic Design, p.443. Copyright 2012 by John Wiley & Sons,
Inc. All rights reserved
(6) Figure
21-24. Seymour Chwast, The Threepenny Opera album cover, 1975, Megg;s
History of Graphic Design, p.443. Copyright 2012 by John Wiley & Sons,
Inc. All rights reserved
To conclude my final essay
presentation, I would summarize that I have learned much about graphic design.
The last image is of O.CO which I
took during a game. I took the photo as
it symbolized a slew of graphic information.
At the stadium we can see graphic design in many forms from company
brand name signposts and sports team logos to banners and numerical electronic
billboard information. I could not imagine huge clay blocks doing this work nor
large paper scrolls. The digital age has changed what we see and how fast we
see it. I discovered that as I go through my day I think more often of imagery
and symbolism, and how communication takes many forms.
