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Typography IIIMoustafa HassanPublication Project

Course :Name :Project :

T Y P E

AN

D

Like many disciplines dependent on tech-

nology for execution or production, type

design has under-gone a series of fun-

damental revolutions and changes in the

past century. Driven by technological advances, this process has completely changed the way people work with type, to the point where someone employed in the field had to adapt to a significantly changing situation multiple times throughout a career. At the beginning of the transition there was the 19th century hot metal typesetting with its very complex and expen-sive mechanized equipment invented by Monotype and Linotype, which started the Modernist Design movement. After, a period of opto-mechan-ical photocomposition systems followed in the 1950s and 60s, in which printing with cast letter-forms was replaced with exposure of optical outlines on spinning disks of glass onto light-sensitive paper, this further pushed the Swiss International Style to a global scene. Looking at these transitions, two designers who have been active during the Modernist and Post-Modernist movements come to mind, Adrian Frutiger and Wim Crouwel. These designers are also currently semi-active, meaning again they witnessed yet another transition occurring in typography by the digital simulation of these similar processes, by the computer.

CHARACTER

“Form without function is formalism. typography

can neither be modern nor beautiful if it just pays

homage to form rather than fulfill its purpose – a

legible communication.”

Adrian Frutiger was born in Unterseen, Switzerland on May 24, 1928. At the age of 16 he was apprenticed at the printer Otto Schaerfilli for four years. From 1949 to 1951, he studied at Kunstgewebeschule in Zurich under Wal-ter Kach and Alfred Willimann.

He started his journey as a type-face designer at Deberny Et Peignot. Up till now he has designed sixty six typefaces from classical to modern, and from serif to san-serifs typefaces. With Univers being probably the most well-know typeface that he designed. During the 1950s and 60s,

Adrian Frutiger

Adrian Frutiger’s first commercial typeface was Président – a set of titling capital letters with small, bracketed serifs, released in 1954. A calligraphic, in-formal, script face, Ondine (“wave” in French), also was released in 1954. In 1955, Méridien, a glyphic, old-style, serif text face was released. The typeface shows inspiration by Nicholas Jenson, and, in the Méridien type, Frutiger’s ideas of letter construc-tion, unity, and organic form, are first expressed together.

Frutiger was at the center of the Mod-ernist movement,

where they valued a much more func-

tional and scientific approach to design

and typography. these ideals later

lead to his approach to designing his

San serif typefaces Univers and Frutiger.

Adrian was able to realize that a

systematic approach to expressing the

different weights of a typeface would

be very useful, this became the building

block of Univers, with the numbers

system.

Wim Crouwel, born in Groningen, Netherlands in 1928 is a graphic designer and typographer. Vigorous and always distinguished, his career spans from the 1950s until the 21st century.

Adrian Furtiger’s Univers

Wim

Crouwel’s

Architype Ingenieur

Wim Crouwel, born in Groningen,

Netherlands in 1928 is a graphic designer

and typographer. Vigorous and always

distinguished, his career spans from

the 1950s until the During his studies, he left art school to become a painter, who leans towards Expressionism, but as he got more and more involved with the design modernist move-ments, he discovered the pleasure of organiz-ing visual information in an aesthetical context. The contrast between Crouwel as a lyrical expressionist painter and objectivist functional-ist designer couldn’t be more extreme. This lead to his work being much more emotional and humanistic in comparison to his fellow modernist designers.

As a designer he felt related to the Bauhaus ideas and the swiss-inspired international style. He was fasci-nated by the rational aspect in Bauhaus typography, which he discovered through Karl Gerstner’s and Gerard Ifert’s work.

Although his ideas were bauhaus-related, unlike many Crouwel was not a dogmatist. He was fascinated by the ideas about serial and mass production, as he stated “we need the machine since we have no time”. But he also believed “the machine cannot replace the precision of the human eye and human feeling”.* Crou-wel’s work has always consisted of these two essential elements: the emotional aspect and the rational one.

As a designer he felt related to the Bauhaus ideas and the swiss-inspired international style. He was fasci-nated by the rational aspect in Bauhaus typography, which he discovered through Karl Gerstner’s and Gerard Ifert’s work.

Wim Crouwel, born in Groningen, Netherlands in 1928 is a remarkable and inspiring figure with an inventive spirit and vision, vigorous and always distinguished. He designed his first poster in 1952. After leaving artschool he became a painter leaning towards Expressionism, but as he designed this first poster he discovered the plea-sure of organising visual information in an aesthetical context.

drian Frutiger’s first commercial type-face was Président – a set of titling capital letters with small, bracketed serifs, released in 1954. A cal-ligraphic, informal, script face, Ondine (“wave” in French), also was released in 1954. In 1955, Méridien, a glyphic, old-style, serif text face was released. The typeface shows inspira-tion by Nicholas Jenson, and, in the Méridien type, Frutiger’s ideas of letter construction, unity, and organic form, are first ex-pressed together.

Frutiger’s 1984 typeface Versailles is an old-style serif text with capitals like those in the ear-lier Président. In Versailles, the serifs are small and glyphic. In 1988, Frutiger com-pleted Avenir (“future” in French), inspired by Futura, with structural likeness to the neo-grotesques; Avenir has a full series of uni-fied weights. In 1991, he finished Vectora, a design influenced by Morris Fuller Benton’s type faces Franklin Gothic and News Gothic. The resultant face has a tall x-height and is legible in small-point sizes.

Adrian Frutiger’s first commercial typeface was Président – a set of titling capital letters with small, bracketed serifs, released in 1954. A calligraphic, informal, script face, Ondine (“wave” in French), also was released in 1954. In 1955, Méridien, a glyphic, old-style, serif text face was released. The typeface shows inspiration by Nicholas Jenson, and, in the Méridien type, Frutiger’s ideas of letter construction, unity, and organic form, are first expressed together.

Frutiger’s 1984 typeface Versailles is an old-style

serif text with capitals like those in the earlier Président. In Versailles,

the serifs are small and glyphic. In 1988,

Frutiger completed Ave-nir (“future” in French),