Arts and Crafts- social conscious, reaction against industry

-Break away from comfort house

Abstraction, anything other than real, continuum

Versccum- can advertise if artist designs ads

-60s design came out of Art Nouveau art in San Fran.

-everything is a remix- watch series

-try to be new, the grade does not matter

p22- revival- vernacular type

Art Nouveau- Gasglow- Secessionist

Peter Behrens- designer for AEG- German power company

-early advocate for sans serif font

-first comprehensive identity package-AEG

- pioneers non-load bearing walls

- 1904-interested in relationship with circles and squares

-1906- designs linoleum pavilion- combines circle and square

Make 3D lamp based on Behrens’s geometry!

1907-hired by AEG- artistic adviser

1908- copyrights logo- metaphor of honeycomb for design.

         - identity should have connecting elements

         -colors, type, layouts, elements, etc.

applies system of base units to tea kettles- Taco Bell mentality!

Turbine building design- form follows function- modernist thinking

1890- first electric cars in London

1914- WWI, AIGA founded!

Lucion Bernhard- At14, gets kicked out of house

Designs Priester poster- rejected at first but chosen anyway

-leads to an entire school of poster design

-rides idea all the way

-did not like Bauhaus and theories, only a job- longest running debate in GD

Placostil- poster style

Sophisticated, not literal- abstract

WWII posters

-AXIS- graphic, well designed, decoding

-ALLY- illustration, spoon fed

James Flagg- “I want you” poster- most reproduce image

Ludwig Hohlwein- poster designer, master

-1914- figure ground play

-reputation tarnished by association with Nazis

-Nazis had great designs

-Hitler did not like the design aesthetic, called axis posters “wrong minded” and ally had best, spoke to lowest common denominator

-Hohlwein good at emotion with contrast

- “And you?” poster

 

1918- example of modernism and cubism

abstract, not pictorial representation 

A.M Cassandre- one of the greatest poster designers in 20^th century.

-poster for telegraphy

-built on base grid , rational decisions, internal recognition  

The solution is in the problem, the more you define the problem, the more obvious the solution

Grids, ratio, and proportion tell you how to solve the problem

   

 

 

Dunonnet Liquor

Name breaks down in to multiple meanings

Dubo- doubt

Dubon-some good

Dubonnett

Paul Rand revisits this

Suprematism

- how do I express emotion?

-influenced by futurism (kinetics), cubism

-art for art’s sake ( no flowers or puppies, just visceral emotion)

-rejects utilitarian function, pictorial representation

-everything can be  said with this relationship, theoretical approach

-Kazimir Malevich

 

Constructivism-Russia

-Tatlin, Rodchenko, Lissitzky

Thoughts

I am starting to discover that I am highly influenced by modernist design. An interplay of shapes, colors and textures is something I always try to apply in my art. The approach Versccum took by having artist design the ads I find to be very refreshing when ads were not very appealing at the time. Plus the art nouveau approach I find to be more interesting than the illustrative approach found often in the states.

         I consider Peter Behrens to be one of my design heroes. For a while, comprehensive or integrated design has interested me and to see Behrens be the first guy to apply such an idea to design in remarkable. Behrens’ approach to AEG’s identity has carried over into how branding is approached today. Behrens’ interest with the relationship between squares and circles fascinates me as well, something I may experiment with later on.

         As much as I am 100% American, form a design perspective, I have more of an appreciation of the Axis propaganda posters than the Ally posters. May it has to due with my appreciation of modernist design, but it seemed to be more forward thinking at the moment than the current but over-played illustration-with-type approach. Hohlwein’s “and you?” poster was dark but highly effective and well designed. It has a expressed rule-of-thirds but is broken by the figure. The image is also vague enough to disguise the eyes in the top third and forces the viewer to “discover” the image in some way.

         The image that struck me the most was A.M Cassandre’s poster with the ship. I am a believer in the grid system so his work appeals to me but this onw stands out the most. His simple but creative approach to depicting the ship with the long vertical and dramatic contrast in size makes this a dynamic piece! The geometric feel and grid broken beautifully by the type and smoke creates a great eye flow through the composition.

         Concluding on the note of suprematism, I have great respect for the artist who can design with only a handful of shapes. I have seen this approach in Russian and Scandinavian art. While I do not design to that level of simplicity, that level of simplicity and clarity of communication is the nirvana of design. Some other work I’ve seen from Swedish designers Pierre Keller and Max Bill reflect the suprematism ideals with more color in some pieces. Looking at Kazimir Malevich’s work, I am grabbed by it and I do feel my eye moving around the piece even though there may be at most 2 squares. It definitely shows how powerful the choice of color, size, and shape can be.

Questions

All of this amazing work has mostly occurred in Europe, so when do these styles and approaches reach the U.S?  How is it translated and what may differentiate similar work done in the U.S to the work done in Europe? Much of the European work is image-based, are there any examples of Type-based work? Recently, I’ve been noticing a sizable modernist influence in a lot of design, does it seem plausible that the a gradually rebirth of modernism is occurring or a reinterpretation of it?