Form follows Function

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Neville Brody:

The layout for the Nike advertisement Brody did, reminds me of the works of El Lissitzky and other artists from the Bauhaus modernism period.

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Kandinsky:

1866 - 1944

Russian Painter and Art Theorist.

Credited with painting purely Abstract works.

Studied Law and Economics at the University of Moscow.

He only began studying art and painting at the age of 30 - life drawing, sketching and anatomy.

Studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in 1896.

He returned to Germany in 1921 and worked at the Bauhaus until the Nazi's shut it down in 1933.

He taught a basic design class at the Bauhaus, as well as Analytical drawing and a course dedicated to 'Colour'.

He was particularly interested in forms study, points and line forms - he wrote 2 books discussing the matter.

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Dada: The Revolt of Art by Marc Dachy

Emerging in 1996 from the melting pot of abstract painting and avant-garde poetry, Dada was a crisis in art, a leap outside the ranks of the “isms”, a complete insurrection. Reinventing the mechanisms of creation and thought, a group of young artist fundamentally changed the world’s conception of art. The incandescence and integrity of this individualist revolt were to become the yardstick for all avent-garde art in the future.

What Was Dada?

Dada was a word, a rallying symbol, an intentionally derisory anti-label. As a provocative slogan it wrong-footed the critics, who habitually pinned pejorative labels on new tendencies, such as Cubism. The tone was set: the Dadaists were not aiming to win over the critics, but to mock them.

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Marian Bantjes

1963 - Present

Canadian designer, artist, illustrator, typographer and artist.

She worked as a book typesetter from 1984 - 1994.

She became well known as a professional talented Graphic Designer from 1993 - 2003, when she was partner and senior designer at Digitopolis. 

She left to become a Graphic Artist.

Works primarily with type and ornament.

She is known for her highly detailed vector art, obsessive hand work, patterning and ornamental style work.

In 2005, she was named one of the top 25 up and coming designers to watch.

Her clients include Pentagram, Saks Fifth Avenue, Bruce Mau Design, Print Magazine, Wallpaper, WIRED, The Guardian and The New York Times.

I chose Bantjes as her work doesn't really have one specific style. In image four you can see that her sketches for that particular type are very traditional, something you would see in an old book. But when you look at the fifth image, it's completely different in that it has sharp edges and extremely straight lines and angles.

The only thing I can pick out from her work is the similar layouts. She includes a lot of writing on occasions yet manages to keep a fairly large amount of white negative space. 

I chose to include the first image as it she is showing her process through a project she was working on at the time. This is structure is similar to what I will be doing with my title designs and layout thumbnails.

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Barbara Kruger

1945 - Present

She works primarily in black and white.

Her typefaces include 'Future Bold Oblique' and 'Helvetica Ultra Condensed'.

Her works are very aggressive and are made to put her point across.

She attended Parson's School of Design.

Her work is often seen better at billboard size.

She has made covers for world famous fashion magazine Elle.

She is a huge feminist, which again compliments her aggressive tones.

She doesn't often take the image herself, they are almost entirely found images from the past.

She's a conceptual artist.

She sometimes uses poetry within her works.

Her themes include:

Religion

Sex

Racial Abuse

Gender Equality

Consumerism

Greed

Power

Barbara Kruger is probably a popular Postmodernist artist to many people, however I definitely had to include her in my research even though she hasn't designer her own typeface.

Her works are primarily made from found images which is something that attracted me in the first place. I'm fascinated by history and their black and white imperfect images create an amazing theme throughout her work.

She uses a red border to create a bold impact around her images but then also uses it as a background to her type. This makes you look towards the writing rather than the image and I think this a really great technique she has used. 

The first image above was created for one of many feminist demonstrations and the last image is of one of her most recent exhibitions. I think that this is unlike any other exhibition I have ever seen, as her work is quite literally everywhere and you are taken aback by how much impact it has on you. 

The second image is an example of how her type isn't always horizontal. She does use angles and varying sizes of text which show's she isn't afraid to mix it up a little too.

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Michael C Place:

Founder of Build.

He first worked with Trevor Jackson in London.

He arrived at The Designers Republic in 1992 and worked there for 9 years.

He studied Graphic Design at Newcastle from 1988 - 1990 but it ultimately didn't work for him as he primarily wanted to work on record sleeve design and doesn't hide the fact that he left after two years.

in 2000 he took a break from design and went on a 10 month world trip and on his return began the foundations for Build.

He features in the Helvetica Feature Film (2007).

There's a great interview with the man himself on the Computer Art's website.

I chose to look at Michael C Place based on the fourth image above. I love his approach to typeface in that he doesn't stick to the standard formations of the single letter. Although that image doesn't advertise a font, the third image does. The word is made up of shapes and flowing lines and I really think that it works well. 

I found the third image on the Form Magazine website, in which Build had been hired to design their 'poster'. I genuinely think that it is a beautiful simple piece, with lots of white negative space emphasising the opacity of the bright bold colours.

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Post Modernism

Studio Dumbar:

An international agency with a Dutch heritage.

"Visual branding, online branding".

It involves a strong expertise on communication and branding.

Studio is lead by Liza Enebeis, Karmen Kekic and Tom Dorresteijn.

It was founded in The Hague, 1977 by Gert Bumbar.

Located in Rotterdam, Shanghai and Seoul. 

Their most recent work was advertisements for classical music group, The Amsterdam Sinfonietta (some of which are featured above).

I chose this group as I thought their work had a great personality too them and you could see that they clearly new their style and what direction they went in. 

Some of the featured posters for The Amsterdam Sinfonietta remind me of something quite modernist which is perhaps another reason I was attracted to their work.

Their backgrounds are generally quite hectic; still using standard shapes like the modernists but twisting them and manipulating them into something obscure and abstract. They have similar qualities to the 1960s. The second image resembles folded paper, and their logo also includes folded paper which I really love as it gives their work texture and gives the audience a sneak peak into the work they do. 

While the backgrounds are extremely bold and busy, their typography is very simple and fairly straight forward. This offers a calming affect to their dizzy backgrounds. 

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References.

References for all my images used on this blog can be found on my Pinterest: pinterest.com/taylornicolesim/

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Schwitters

1887 - 1948

He worked closely in Surrealism, Constructivism, Dada and Sound.

He had a passion for Poetry.

Graphic Design is his main area of work.

However, he does include illustration and typography within his works.

He is most famous for his collages.

Merz Collage Barn - a barn he purchases from a family he started living with that became a huge piece of art. You can still see it today.

His semi-abstract work led to meetings with the Berlin Avante-Garde.

He has also worked in Sculpture.

I chose Schwitters as although he is definitely a Modernist artist, his work borderlines Postmodernism as it is unlike any other artist of his time. I think as he travelled a lot due to the Nazi's invading his country, he wanted (and  had to) work with things he could find lying around.

Some of his work strongly represents the modernism period such as image four - the bold colours and block shapes again, were a main focal point in this period.

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Joost Schmidt

1893 - 1948

He was a master at the Bauhaus.

He has a Diploma in Painting.

Trained in wood-carving.

He was head of the Advertising, Typography, Printing and Photography department at the Bauhaus.

Schmidt was a Prisoner of War.

He became a draftsman and illustrator of maps

Had numerous design exhibitions in the USA.

He taught Lettering from 1925-1932, Sculpture Workshops from 1928-1930 and Life Drawing classes from 1929-1930.

He is most known for this advertisement poster for the Bauhaus exhibition in Weimar.

A Visionary Typographer.

I particularly love Schmidt's work as they are very simplistic, using primarily straight lines and block shapes.

The way the type follows the famous shapes on his world renown Bauhaus advertisement, leads your eyes from the top of the page down to the adjacent words at the bottom.

All his work has a similar appearence, using blacks and warm oranges and reds on cream backgrounds. However, I chose the fourth image because I thought it looked quite different to his other work. It combines some clever photography and dark, subdued colours with minimal writing.

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El Lissitzky:

1890 - 1941

He produced Propaganda works for the Soviet Union.

He was an important figure in the Avant-Garde

He started teaching at the age of 15.

The function of the pictorial representation was a large component of his work.

He was inspired by post-world war Russia.

Suprematism.

His work greatly influenced the Bauhaus and Constructivism period.

I particularly love the layout of Lissitzky's typography. He uses a mixture of layering and diagonal lines to lead you around his posters and create 3 dimensional appearances in some instances.

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Walter Dexel:

1890-1973

Studied Art History in Munich.

His early work was heavily influenced by Cezanne's Landscape paintings.

He was dismissed by the Nazi's from his post as a Graphic Design Lecturer.

His later works were influenced by Cubism and Expressionism.

He wrote a book with his wife on his issues with Modern Living.

He worked with artists such as Moholy-Nagy from the Bauhaus.

1920s Constructivism was a major part of his work.

He became Head of Exhibitions in Jena.

He had a comprehensive approach.

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Artist Research:

My first steps for this new brief is to research many Modernism and Postmodernism artists and develop this information to form part of the content for the Broadsheet we are creating named, New Graphic Design. I will then transfer all this information from my blog onto InDesign and use the grid structure to keep it all neat and tidy.

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The Bauhaus Archiv 1919 - 1933 Book Review

  The Bauhaus Archiv Museum of Design in Berlin holds the most important collection on the Bauhaus today. The book is dedicated to the study of its history and features information regarding the new Bauhaus in Chicago and the Hochschule fur Gestaltung in Ulm; it was written by Magdalena Droste and published by Taschen. Droste covers all areas of the Bauhaus from the very beginning to its unfortunate end and how it influenced the way art is seen forever. The information is drawn from the Archiv’s extensive collection and follows it’s movement in art and architecture and the many people that helped it gain its fame.

  The origins of the Bauhaus (pg. 122) can be traced as far back as the 19th Century and starting under horrible circumstances, the Industrial Revolution. John Ruskin was among the first to criticize the inhumanity of the conditions of the working people in England. Among his many admirers was William Morris who went on to turn Ruskin’s ideas into reality with great success; they both shared a ‘hatred for modern civilization’. Morris learnt that his ideas were only reaching a small audience so began creating Academies that specifically targeted ‘arts and crafts’ that ventured further afield to places such as Vienna, Berlin and Belgium.

  The many well-known artists that helped change the future of art at the Bauhaus were Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Vassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee. They didn’t just focus on one specific area of art; instead they used many different media such as graphic printing, wood and stone carving, mural-painting, architecture and theatre.

  From this book you can clearly understand the development of modernism within the Bauhaus and why they focused so much on creating objects and paintings that are unlike any other. The building-block game by Alma Buscher was created in 1924 (pg. 93) and is a strong example of modernism as well as Joost Schmidt’s graphic advertisement for chess (pg. 94); both are very simplistic using the standard colours and shapes.

  The scene designs (pg. 104) by Kurt Schmidt and Xanti Schawinsky for Theatre at the Weimar Bauhaus are amongst my favourite pieces within this book as the childlike shapes and colours with subtle complexity are a great advertisement of how the Bauhaus’ creativity clock ticks.  

  The Bauhaus exhibition in Weimar (1923) was the perfect time to publicize their work and put their graphic design talents into luring people in with their bold and simple advertisements. There were multiple adverts made for the exhibition and I believe that Joost Schmidt’s poster in 1923 (pg. 107) was the most iconic for its round and square motifs. As it stands, Joost Schmidt seems to be the most popular graphic artist for their advertising needs and from his work (pg. 134) it is easy to understand the influence he had on the future of graphic design. Still today, we see minimalistic and modern work everywhere we go and notice that more often than not, it has a greater impact on the audience than a highly detailed piece.

  The printing workshop soon developed into ‘The Printing and Advertising Workshop’ in which a small department was included that primarily used a sans-serif script in all type sizes (pg. 148) with a ‘platen press’ and ‘rotary proof press’. All the advertising needs were made from the school’s advertising workshop and were designed by the lecturer Herbert Bayer or his students.

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David Sim

I've spoken to my Grandad who is trained as an Art Teacher at St Johns College in York about his perception of Postmodernism and Modernism. Like many people have said, it's very hard to pin down Postmodernism to a certain period of time, so therefore it is basically up to you and what you think.

He gave me a few notes and suggested a few books to me that would help me understand a little better - all this information is in his opinion and is not 100% factual.

He said to be looking round anything post 1960s.

It was primarily a reaction to Modernism.

Traditional style painting began to fade and other forms of medium started to come about.

It was a movement that was made to shock people.

It isn't really related to an 'ism' (surrealism for example).

Consumerism is definitely more important in Postmodernism and became more involved in advertising.

Just for novelty and used lots of tricks.

A lot of cynicism - is it really art?

Based on all this information, I believe I have a bit more of an understanding on what Postmodernism is, and will feel slightly more confident with my research.

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Quick Summary

Modernism

Term used to embrace a diverse range of art movements and ideas that emerged during the first half of the 20th Century and profoundly influenced the subsequent development of art, architecture and design. There was also a widespread utopian belief that mechanisation and technology if properly used could produce a better less divided society.

Post Modernism

Design movement that evolved in the mid 60s as a critical response to the dominance and perceived sterility of Modernism. Embracing art, architecture and design. It re-established interest in ornament, symbolism and visual wit. Unconstrained by dogma, post-modernism designers rejected modernism's obsession with progress and challenged the fundamental tenets of order and discipline espoused by the Bauhaus.

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Brief 4: Final brief for this module.

You are to submit design proposals for a new graphic design publication entitles, New Graphic Design. The first issue will focus on Form follows Function - an exploration of Modernism and Post Modernism.

Part One

Research into Modernism and Post Modernism generating a body of work that explores the origins and philosophy of the movements. Your visual work should be an expression of the movement and not a pastiche. You should aim to convey the essential nature of the movement. You will need to understand the social, industrial and political concerns which influence both movements.

Part Two

You are to submit designs for a broad sheet, which should be based on your personal and original visual research.

You should produce for Part Two:

Mast Head

Cover Design

Inner Page/s

Inner Pages

The inner pages can include your Manifesto, Typeface (if relevant to the movement) and your research article.

Helpful Websites

www.thegridsystem.org

www.type.method.ac

www.thedesignshack.net

Remember:

Kerning - is the space between letters

Leading - is the space between each sentence

Tracking - is the space between words

Layout for Broadsheet cover

A3 Portrait

Date

Issue One

Title: "New Graphic Design"

Subheading: "Form Follows Function - An Exploration of Modernism and Post Modernism".

Requirements:

Body of original visual research based upon Modernism/Post modernism

Evidence of thumbnail visual and design layouts

Evidence of grid, layout, type and image selection and experimentation

Evidence of multiple solutions and design refinement

Mast head

Broadsheet cover

Inner page