Design Literacy

by Steven Heller

  Copyright © 2014 by Steven Heller

  All Rights Reserved. Copyright under Berne Copyright Convention, Universal Copyright Convention, and Pan American Copyright Convention. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Allworth Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

  Allworth Press books may be purchased in bulk at special discounts for sales promotion, corporate gifts, fund-raising, or educational purposes. Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Allworth Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or info@skyhorsepublishing.com.

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  Published by Allworth Press, an imprint of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

  307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

  Copublished with the School of Visual Arts

  Allworth Press® is a registered trademark of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.®, a Delaware corporation.

  www.allworth.com

  Cover and interior design by Anderson Newton Design

  Page composition/typography by Anderson Newton Design

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

  ISBN: 978-1-62153-404-4

  eISBN: 978-1-62153-413-6

  Printed in China

  DEDICATION

  James H. Fraser and William Drenttel

  They will be missed so very much.

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Foreword by Rick Poynor

  Introduction

  SECTION 1—PERSUASION

  Propaganda and the Art of Lying

  Simplicissimus Poster

  THOMAS THEODORE HEINE

  Neue Jugend

  JOHN HEARTFIELD

  The Peace Symbol

  Black Power/White Power

  TOMI UNGERER

  End Bad Breath

  SEYMOUR CHWAST, DESIGNER

  Men with No Lips

  ROBBIE CONAL

  SECTION 2—MASS MEDIA

  Jugend and Simplicissimus

  PM and AD

  Picture Magazines of the 1930s

  Direction

  PAUL RAND

  Book Covers

  EDWARD GOREY

  Portfolio

  ALEXEY BRODOVITCH

  Industrial Design

  ALVIN LUSTIG

  Holiday

  FRANK ZACHARY

  Vogue

  ALEXANDER LIBERMAN

  Scope

  WILL BURTIN

  Esquire

  Eros and Avant Garde

  HERB LUBALIN

  Push Pin Graphic

  SEYMOUR CHWAST, MILTON GLASER, REYNOLD RUFFINS, EDWARD SOREL

  Evergreen and Ramparts

  KEN DEARDORF AND DUGALD STERMER

  East Village Other

  Zap Comix

  Culture Tabloids

  Emigre

  RUDY VANDERLANS AND ZUZANA LICKO

  RAW

  FRANÇOISE MOULY AND ART SPIEGELMAN

  Beach Culture

  DAVID CARSON

  Dell Mapbacks

  SECTION 3—TYPE

  Blackletter

  Bauhaus and the New Typography

  Type as Agent of Power

  Peignot

  A.M. CASSANDRE

  Cooper Black

  OSWALD COOPER

  Homage to Velvet Touch Lettering

  Hand Lettering

  JOOST SWARTE

  Pussy Galore

  TEAL TRIGGS, LIZ MCQUISTON, AND SIAN COOK

  Template Gothic

  BARRY DECK

  Manson/Mason

  JONATHAN BARNBROOK

  Typography for Children

  Berthold’s 1924 Hebrew Type Catalogue

  SECTION 4—LANGUAGE

  Depero: Futurista

  FORTUNATO DEPERO

  Lorca: Three Tragedies

  ALVIN LUSTIG

  Merle Armitage’s Books

  MERLE ARMITAGE

  About U.S.

  LESTER BEALL, BROWNJOHN CHERMAYEFF GEISMAR, HERB LUBALIN, GENE FEDERICO

  Ha Ha Ha: He Laughs Best Who Laughs Last

  LOU DORFSMAN

  Going Out

  GENE FEDERICO

  Man with the Golden Arm

  SAUL BASS

  The Area Code (Parenthesis)

  LADISLAV SUTNAR

  Modern Paperback Covers

  Bestseller Book Jackets

  PAUL BACON

  Blues Project

  VICTOR MOSCOSO

  The Split Fountain

  Red

  Best of Jazz

  PAULA SCHER

  The Bald Soprano

  ROBERT MASSIN

  SECTION 5—IDENTITY

  Modern Mark Maker

  WILHELM DEFFKE

  Flight

  E. MCKNIGHT KAUFFER

  McGraw-Hill Paperback Covers

  RUDOLPH DE HARAK

  Dylan

  MILTON GLASER

  NeXT

  PAUL RAND

  Dr. Strangelove

  PABLO FERRO

  Restaurant Florent

  M&CO.

  The Public Theater Posters

  PAUL DAVIS

  The Public Theater

  PAULA SCHER

  SECTION 6—INFORMATION

  Catalog Design Progress

  LADISLAV SUTNAR

  The Medium Is the Massage

  QUENTIN FIORE

  New York Subway Map

  MASSIMO VIGNELLI

  New York Subway Map Goes Digital

  MASSIMO VIGNELLI AND ASSOCIATES

  SECTION 7—ICONOGRAPHY

  The Master Race’s Graphic Masterpiece

  Clipping Art, One Engraving At a Time

  1939/1940 New York World’s Fair

  Shooting Targets

  Darkie Toothpaste

  Jambalaya

  STEFAN SAGMEISTER

  SECTION 8—STYLE

  Mise en Page

  The Great Gargantua and Pantagruel

  W. A. DWIGGINS

  Vanity Fair and Fortune Covers

  PAOLO GARRETTO

  Artone

  SEYMOUR CHWAST

  The Lover

  LOUISE FILI

  The Cult of the Squiggly

  French Paper

  CHARLES SPENCER ANDERSON

  SECTION 9—COMMERCE

  Show Cards

  Priester Match Poster

  LUCIAN BERNHARD

  The First Record Album

  ALEX STEINWEISS

  Cheap Thrills

  R. CRUMB AND BOB CATO

  Dust Jackets of the 1920s and 1930s

  Atoms for Peace

  Comic Strip Ads

  Bibliography

  Index

  Acknowledgments

  There would be no Design Literacy if not for Tad Crawford, publisher of Allworth Press. His ongoing enthusiasm and support for my work, specifically and design writing and research in general, is simply invaluable. His contributions are not heralded enough.

  Thanks to Gail Anderson, designer of this edition, my colleague in books and teaching, who is not only a great interpreter of my raw material, but a stunning author in her own right (write).

  Having Rick Poynor write the foreword for this book is the first time since one of my earliest books that I’ve had a voice other than mine introduce a book. I have great admiration and warmth for Mr. Poynor and his work. Thank you.

&nb
sp; James Victore was the original designer for Design Literacy and most of the 30-plus Allworth books I’ve worked on. I am indebted to him for creating graphic identities that continue to give me great pleasure to have and hold.

  Appreciation to Thornwell May, our editor at Skyhorse/Allworth, for seeing this revision through the intricate production process.

  I owe a great deal to the good offices of David Rhodes, President of the School of Visual Arts, who has long generously supported my projects and Allworth Press. Thanks also to Anthony Rhodes, Executive Vice President of SVA.

  I am grateful to many people who have given me inspiration and raw material to work with. In no particular order they are: Paul Rand, Lita Talarico, Mirko Ilic, Seymour Chwast, Paula Scher, Radislav Sutnar, John Walters, Martin Fox, Massimo Vignelli, George Lois, Robbie Conal, Edward Gorey, Stefan Sagmeister, Michael Bierut, Jessica Helfand, Christoph Niemann, Cathy Leff, Marshall Arisman, Tom Bodkin, Deborah Auer, John Macleod, Hans Reichert, Lucas Dietrich, Laurence King, Eric Himmel, Elaine Lustig Cohen, Allan Rapp, and scores of others living and dead.

  Most of all, I thank my wife, Louise Fili, for being such a bright and elegant light in my life and Nicolas Heller, our son, who makes me proud every day of my life.

  — SH

  Foreword

  BY RICK POYNOR

  For many years, Steven Heller has been the most prolific and committed writer covering the field of graphic design. He may also be its most knowledgeable and wide-ranging author. But even if we qualify that, as a precaution, and just say “one of the most knowledgeable,” there can be no question that he is the most generous when it comes to sharing his vast wealth of knowledge with readers.

  I have a running gag with him about which of his scores of books are currently in my “Heller top ten.” Design Literacy went in immediately on its first publication in 1997 and there its successors remain. I regard it as one of his most valuable, satisfying, and enduring publications. Heller supplemented the original edition with Design Literacy (Continued) and then he blended the two together in the second edition of Design Literacy. With this volume, he once again retunes the line-up of essays, and if the book keeps attracting new readers, there is no reason why it shouldn’t continue to evolve. One thing this signals is that Heller is not at all precious. The book, like the man, is restless, curious, a buzzing zone of energy.

  For anyone—designer or not—who wants an understanding of what graphic design is, or has been, Design Literacy offers an excellent introduction. Unified histories of the subject tend to be big, worthy, and ponderous. Their fate is often to be dipped into for reference rather than read from end to end. Despite its thematic structure, Design Literacy is a book devised to be absorbed in any order and savored at whim. As with many essay collections, part of the pleasure comes from bouncing serendipitously from one revelation to the next. These short-to medium-length pieces are loaded with information and insight. Heller’s subject is the everyday graphic paraphernalia that surrounds us, and he handles his task with urbanity, wit, and a tender concern I suggest we can only call love.

  It’s strange there aren’t more books about graphic design like this, but there really aren’t. Heller proves here that graphic communication can be a readerly subject like any other. Can we become properly “design literate” without a broad working knowledge of the kinds of material he surveys so adeptly? I think that’s unlikely. We can only develop design literacy by informed looking, and this juicy collection reaffirms Heller as one of our most attentive and fluent guides to the territory.

  Design Literacy Third Edition

  Design Literacy was originally called “Object Lessons: Understanding Graphic Design,” but fortunately I was made to realize that not only was this title too imprecise, it was too cute. Conversely, Design Literacy was like a call to arms, a manifesto of sorts—“I want my DESIGN LITERACY!!!” (apologies to MTV). Since discourse about verbal, visual, and cultural literacy were in the air around the time of publication in 1997, and design literacy was a subset of that, the title tapped into the zeitgeist and continues to have resonance. Arguably, the title just might account for the book’s success.

  Design Literacy was conceived as a complement, of sorts, to the landmark A History of Graphic Design by Philip B. Meggs, first published in 1983. As the first graphic design history textbook, Meggs’s book mapped the historical landscape, expanded formal terrain, and built a foundation (and floor plan) for design literacy. It also served as a catalog of potential themes for aspiring design writers and historians, like me, to take further. Yet, at the time, I also thought there was more to the exploration of graphic design’s past and present than simply studying the traditionalist or modernist canon, against which all design had been measured. Meggs did a heroic job of organizing, categorizing, and prioritizing the heretorfore chaotic historical field. Yet admittedly he often just covered the surface. I chose instead to focus attention on individual stories about what I believed were essential artifacts of graphic design—mostly printed paper—probing the makers of such things directly or indirectly for answers as to how and why they were created, rather than only profiling them as makers or masters or pioneers. The first edition of Design Literacy: Understanding Graphic Design was, therefore, a collection of essays on “objects” in a broad sense—some canonical others eclectic.

  With an audacious X (symbolizing illiteracy and promising the opposite) on the cover designed by James Victore, Design Literacy was comprised of brand new and rewritten articles, reviews, and essays about graphically designed things—books, magazines, posters, typefaces, etc.—which I had authored for various periodicals over the course of a decade or more. These pieces were supplemented with a few contributions by co-author Karen Pomeroy (a designer and researcher who had assisted me on earlier projects).

  This book is a tasting menu, with a smorgasbord of dishes that ultimately nourishes … but may leave some people hungry for more.

  My goal for the book was to invest cultural value into graphic design while diminishing the stigma of ephemerality. In the first edition introduction I wrote: “There is now a realization that graphic design is not as ephemeral as the paper it is printed on. Certain advertisements, posters, packages, logos, books, and magazines endure as signposts of artistic, commercial, and technological achievement and speak more about particular epochs or milieus than fine art. Many objects of graphic design are preserved and studied as more than mere historical wallpaper. Curiously, though, the makers of these objects—graphic designers—have tended to undervalue the historical significance of artifacts found in their own backyards. Those who claim visual literacy are often ignorant when it comes to understanding and appreciating the objects that are imprinted with the language of their own practice.”

  Some of these essays were based on interviews with the respective makers, some involved primary and secondary research, and still others involved first-hand experience. Ellen Lupton noted in a review of the book, that I was talking more about my own “literacy” and how it evolved than a book about literacy. An astute assertion to be sure since I have long used design history as a tool for self-education. Without having had a formal university education, the research and reporting that has gone into many of my essays is akin to devising my own home-study courses. If this is a flaw, then perhaps it is owing to the fact that many of the essays in Design Literacy are written with the same nerdy fascination I’ve always possessed when presented with astonishing facts that I want to share with others.

  Milton Glaser, whom I greatly admire, told me mano a mano that Design Literacy was “all meat and no potatoes.” This blue-plate metaphor implied that my short essays on loosely linked subjects lacked cohesion, which left the reader hanging without more overt connections between objects. In fact, Milton put his finger on what might be called my own learning curve. Although I have become fluent in many of the subjects I write about in the book, I am also constantly learning about the whys and wherefores—how graphic designs res
ponded to all kinds of external cultural, political and economic stimuli. So to continue Milton’s food analogy, this book is a tasting menu, with a smorgasbord of dishes that ultimately nourish … but may leave some people hungry for more.

  My formulation for Design Literacy was (and is) similar to how I curated the conference “Modernism & Eclecticism: A History of American Graphic Design,” which I did (with Richard Wilde) annually for the School of Visual Arts (SVA) throughout the ‘90s, and was an armature on which I hung many curiosities. By that I mean, if I wanted to learn more about the history of wood type, I’d invite the expert Rob Roy Kelly to speak on the subject, assuming that others like me would absorb the knowledge and enjoy the show. If I wanted to hear about what it was like to art direct Esquire in its golden years, I’d invite Henry Wolf. His raves and rants would be filtered into future essays on the subject. Rather than a directed theme, M&E was a collection of close encounters. Design Literacy is the outcome of engaged curiosities—rather than a directed history, it is a collection of facts and observations that contribute to our overall knowledge of graphic design, mass communications, and popular perception.