In the part of this lecture we focused on was the history of graphic design. We firstly looked at books that we could relate to when talking about the history of the graphic design, these were:
The looking closer series
Megg’s History of Graphic Design
Graphic Design a New History
Graphic Design a concise history
Design and the question of history
But we will be looking more closely at these two books known as:
Art Chantry Speaks – A Heretic’s History of 20th Century Graphic Design and A novel in two semesters by Chip Kidd.
The first one that was produced was Megg’s History of Graphic Design that was written and created in 1985, this book is the first time that the words “Graphic Design” and “History” are used and mentioned together. It was based on an academic subject that was an on going project until she died in 2002. However, the book and history of graphic design will live on, as Steven Helier said that the book had actually made history itself. Megg’s approach to the book was very ambitiously encompassing. We were told not to start our essay with from “since the dawn of time”. We then looked at some painting that were created Before Christ (BC) and After Christ (AC). These were interesting to look at and find out where Megg’s approach was founded, one of the paintings evolved from printing and type (where it was both a technological and Atheists history. The story within the book connects to the different styles and movements of arts and crafts, art nouveau, modernism, the international style and the new typography. These connected with the interior design known as William Morris, also the book that is known as “the studio” that was produced in 1894 by Aubrey Beardsley. Where Aubrey Beardsley talks about the art movement of AVANT-GRADE. The next book we looked at was Peter Behrens who talks about the geometric and sans serif style, we were also shown New Typography by Jan Tschicholdt and the book called Giselle by Armin Hoffman that was published in 1959 that is related to the international style.
However, Megg’s approach is also very limited. We were then shown different and alternative covers for Megg’s History of Graphic Design of how the design era and art movement has developed throughout the years. They have done this so that the cover of the book will fit with how the art and graphic design style has changed.
We then moved onto the book called Graphic Design a New History that was published in 2007, the book was aimed to predicate the idea that graphic design. This book is a similar to the style of Megg’s book, as it is the breakdown of the art styles and movements.
After this we looked into the two newest books, which were Art Chantry Speaks – A Heretic’s History of 20th Century Graphic Design and A novel in two semesters by Chip Kidd.
We firstly looked at Art Chantry Speaks, where he describes himself as a cultural propagandist of the lowest order. Some of the topics that this book focuses on id the History of the Happy Face, Sister Corita Kent, who is an agitprop nun and blind designers. He takes his book in three directions, where the language of design that he uses is like modernism as a Retro. It like a messing model of conversion.
We then watched an animation which was Rooty toot toot, this had a Italian modernist style. A cartoon modern style, I found that this style was nice and very creative. After this we then looked at the NASA logo. And infographics for America, I found that this was very interesting and quite creative. Overall I found that this lecture was interesting because I learn't quite a lot about the History of Graphic Design.
