Mut zur Wut 2023

Posted on by Mut zur Wut e.V.

Once again from March 1st, up until the April 30th, you can upload your posters to the international competition’s website Mut zur Wut 2023!

At the moment our world aches under tremendous tensions, as power structures tremble and societal pressures erupt through heated media outlets. In such times of turmoil, acting in a level-headed, solution-oriented, and compassionate manner is both challenging and invaluable.

As creatives, we have a special gift that society can greatly benefit from, especially when the stakes are high: creatives are able to reflect and communicate ideas in a way that transcends boundaries, be they language, cultural identity, age, gender, or belief system. Our anguish and anger ought not to push us to the extreme fringes of the political spectrum! We need to channel it and use it in a visually constructive way to inspire healthy discourse and constructive approaches to solutions.

Be creative, be bold, be honest!

Especially this year the Mut zur Wut jury hope to receive many great submissions, from many beautiful places and wonderful people.

As always, the contest’s process for submission is completely free of charge and uncomplicated for the creators. Your posters can simply be uploaded onto the contest’s website.

The 30 most striking submissions will be displayed from mid-July until the end of August 2023 in the public space, certain areas in different cities, and hopefully again in multiple exhibitions.

Mut zur Wut 2023

Deadline: April 30th, 2023
Design: Bureau Progressiv
Jury 2023: Tereza Ruller (Netherlands), Toan Vu-Huu (France), Ruohan Wang (Germany), Klaus Welp (Finland), Daniel Wiesmann (Germany)
The jury will meet at the second weekend of May in Heidelberg, afterwards the winners and finalists will be contacted.

Submit your work here

You can find all information about the call for entries and the submission process on the website and can also download it. For further information, Mut zur Wut will keep you updated on their facebook-page, Instagram, and Mut zur Wut.

Women’s Empowerment

Posted on by Mansoureh Rahnama

Women’s Empowerment—Live the change, change lives (WE—LCCL) is an international campaign to empower women through creative works. In particular, the campaign advocates for new creative approaches to addressing women’s empowerment. They invite international designers, artists, writers, critics, historians, and filmmakers who want to work for gender equality to participate in our project, a campaign that will include a design & art award, a book publication, a short film competition, and a matchmaking workshop.

This is a call and campaign for the empowerment of women in Iran. It invites artists, designers, illustrators, and anyone who will join Thinkup Editions on their journey and create a sign to empower women in Iran with their contributions. In particular, they would like to address the current circumstances of women in Iran, young and old, to collaborate with women and create a sign of solidarity. The brutal attacks on women in Iran have caused massive protests within the country and around the world. In addition to the economic and social issues that put women in poverty and thus in unequal economic and social conditions, many women (including minors) have been arrested, harassed, raped, and even killed.

The number of artists and especially female artists in Iran has increased in recent years, and their work challenges traditional gender roles and societal and political expectations. They use various mediums to address social, cultural, and political issues, contributing to a broader dialogue on gender, identity, and human rights. Despite challenges such as censorship and limited exhibition and career development opportunities, the increasing visibility of female artists in Iran is a positive sign of progress towards gender equality and greater freedom of expression.

The Women’s Empowerment campaign promotes the women’s movement through art and culture professionals from the international community and supports it through public relations in European countries, but also in countries outside Europe. Thus, the serious situation in Iran is presented as a situation confronting the global women’s community and the women’s movement in Iran is supported with the power of art; through art, this untenable situation can be presented critically.

A series of exhibitions in Germany, the Netherlands, and other European countries with works of art is being planned. The location and exhibition dates will follow.

1st THINKUP Editions Art & Design Awards
The Women’s Empowerment art competition will award a prize to young and established artists in 2023. The competition is open to all artists, designers, illustrators, and groups from anywhere in the world. Artists are invited to participate in the campaign with their artworks. The artists with physical artwork or installation should send us an image of the artwork first via email.

1st Innovative short film Awards
As part of the project, they invite filmmakers from around the world to participate in our campaign by sending their innovative short film or documentary about the women’s movement in general and / or in relation to the current situation in Iran. The competition is open to all film crews, young filmmakers, video groups, and film groups from anywhere in the world. For more information, please see the Short Film rules.

Book Publishing: word selection for the women’s movementShort fiction stories or poetic works on women’s empowerment are wanted for the book project. They ask that you propose a story / route for the women to continue to empower themselves that you indicate in your text. You are free to accompany the women with your power of words. The only condition is that you feel yourself in the role of women and then write about it. We want to find a new roadmap for hope—for the women who, out of anger and despair, cut their hair and fearlessly take to the streets.

In 2023, The Women’s Empowerment—Live the change, change lives art competition will award a prize to young and established writers. The competition is open to all writers, critics and reviewers from anywhere in the world.

Women’s Empowerment

1st THINKUP Editions Art & Design Awards:
Submission deadline: March 31st, 2023
Submit via email for design / illustration / motion design
Submit via email for artworks
Exhibition date: June to August, 2023

1st Innovative short film Awards
Open call: January 30th, 2023
Public screening: August 15th – 31st, 2023 or later
Submit via email
The screening copy of an accepted film must be sent no later than June 30th, 2023 here or to the following physical address: THINKUP Editions, Athener Weg 1, D-44269 Dortmund, Germany

Book Publishing: word selection for the women’s movement
Deadline for proposal: May 1st, 2023
Text length:  1–3 pages
Write an email if you have any questions

More information and updates can be found on the website, Facebook, or Instagram.

Thoughts are Liquid. 

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

Thoughts are Liquid. is a one-year artistic experiment with 1,000 questions answered by six designers in 216 posters. The decisive factor was the desire to counteract distance and passivity in a time marked by change and uncertainty. A domino game of ideas, exchange, and change of perspective was triggered: as the main role the medium poster between art, design, and new ways of working. The results of this process are shown in the form of a poster exhibition.

Thoughts are Liquid. was born from the idea to walk together and question the artistic process of design. Can we find an interface between art and design and can we open up a space between free design and art? What is the goal of a poster without a commission? How much freedom does the creative process need? Is design democratic or does design democratize communication? Can we construct ways of working that together we can wear each other out and at the same time develop further? Can we open up to each other and thus move the process forward? Possible answers and further questions can be found in the posters of this experiment. Through a variable rotation system in which each poster was worked on by each designer, a total of 216 posters (6 × 6 × 6 = 216 posters) were created within six rounds (one round consisting of six poster series, with six posters per series). Thoughts are Liquid. is a poster exhibition by six friends and designers Sara Cristina Moser, Mado Klümper, Sarah Baumann, In Chae, Sunnyi Löhmann, and Antonia Terhedebrügge. Virtual meetings around poster design were established, creating a platform for regular discourse and dialog. The goal of the exhibition is to share the creative democratic process and the resulting insights and interfaces, and to continue the conversation together.

Thoughts are Liquid.

When?
March 24th until March 26th, 2023

Where?
Mehringdamm 64
10961 Berlin
Germany

Cyanidin Screen Printing

Posted on by JoSi

Printing at home is popular—Cyanidin shows you how it works. Watch the tutorial and find out how to make your own screen printing vegetable colorant with ph indicator:

1. The Color
– cook red cabbage for 30 min. in water
– evaporate 80% of the colored water
– thick it with cornstarch
– let cool down
– stir creamy

2. The Prints
– screen print with it
– let dry prints

3. Color the Prints
– Take two spray bottles
– fill them with water
– add caustig soda to the first bottle
– add citric acid to the second bottle
– spray on pictures, (red is acid, green is soda)
– to get brown or yellow, use heat

It is vegetable colorant, so the pictures will not last forever, but you can exhibit them a few months. Its ephemeral art. Soda and acid you can get as powder in a grocery store.

Silkscreen printing is a technique that involves using a mesh screen to transfer ink onto a surface. While traditional silkscreen printing involves using specialized inks, it is possible to make your own natural vegetable-based inks at home to use with this technique.

Watch the full video tutorial here!

Footnotes

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

The editorial of the 4th issue of Footnotes—the periodical bulletin of applied research in type design—reads: “Dear reader, you’re holding D, the fourth issue of Footnotes, the periodical bulletin of applied research in type design. In this field, technology is a defining element, be it a constraint or a liberation. With Telefont, the custom typeface for the last printed Dutch phonebook, Martin Majoor designed for the rough newsprint environment using the Ikarus technology in the heyday of the phone booth. Did you miss flipping through that thick and puffy flexible book? You’ll be able to witness the experience of millions of readers or a bunch of kids, randomly in search of a number to dial anonymously. Back in those days for real, feel that pulp texture, augmented reality you’ll see. Some people record 4-track using sampling, others write 2-track while avoiding auto-plagiarism. As he was writing his thesis at the University of Reading on Ikarus, the technology named after a Greek mythology character, Ferdinand Ulrich documented its trajectory here. Not a digest, this thorough chronicle—a glimpse of the past—will help you assess the landscape of current type tools. Proximity networking, Ferdinand talked on the phone with Martin, who shared his experience interning at URW, experimenting with Ikarus to draw his first typeface Serré, bridging theory and practice in the form of a case study.

Has he experienced The Hacienda? The name of Ben Kelly probably rings a bell to him. Trained as an architect, Joost Grootens, a graphic designer specialised in the arrangement of complex content in the form of books, explores type design. You are here, step by step, one problem at a time. In this sixth episode of the One-off series, he shares his polymorphous journey through shapes with Ceremony, a formal nomenclature informed by his studio’s content-mapping practice.

Street credits. Peeling layers of billboards and grasping from the many materialities of large letters, Pierre Pané-Farré listened to the whispering of ghosts to come up with new theories. Through manufacturing processes, another way to look at technology, a tangible, and analog one. On the last page, facing the index, you’ll discover proofs, namely a selection of in-progress type projects by the contributors of the current issue, as well as C and a guest. Extra extra, read all about it! This new issue marks a turning point, as adjustments needed to be made to perpetuate this editorial adventure started in 2016. Wearing many hats—editor, designer, publisher, publicist & distributor—reality struck back with experience for the mastermind. To carry on, reward authors better, maintain editorial freedom without any advertising noise, print locally a bike ride away, I chose to raise the price fairly.

Footnotes

Publisher: La Police
Editing & Design: Mathieu Christe
Release: October 2022
Format: 165 × 235 mm
Volume: 48 inside pp.
Iconography: 102 illustrations b/w
Lithography, Printing & Staple Binding: Geneva, Switzerland
ISSN: 2504-0413
Price: CHF 30.–
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The press check series at the printed © supertiptop.ch
Pictures of posters © Mathieu Christe, La Police

Faire Type

Posted on by FaireType

Based in Brooklyn, Faire Type is an independent type foundry working at the intersection of graphic design and type design to craft letterforms beautiful in form and versatile in function.

With a rigorous attention to every detail, their type catalog is a built on the foundations of historical knowledge, formal exploration, and careful technical and technological execution. Consisting of six typefaces, Faire Type’s catalog is a mixture of fresh-takes on storied material, and completely original work.

FAIRE Sprig reimagines the classic typeface Cheltenham through a modern lens, and pairs it with a proportionally harmonious geometric grotesque typeface, FAIRE Sprig Sans. FAIRE Luma layers organic serif forms on a faux monospace skeleton, with a contrast axis that allows things to get dramatic—perfect for display and large headlines. FAIRE Palme, a calligraphic sans-serif, takes inspiration from the expressive sans-serifs from legendary type designer Roger Excoffon. And FAIRE Octave, a serif typeface, is a beautiful digital execution of an Elzevir print typeface.

All typefaces are available to test and purchase in regular and variable font formats on Faire Type’s new website. Their website also features easy-to-download free trial fonts, and student discounts.

Faire Type

Type Foundry: Faire Type
Availiable Fonts: FAIRE Sprig, FAIRE Sprig Sans, FAIRE Luma, FAIRE Luma Reverse, FAIRE Octave
Website

GRID.

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

The podcast GRID. reflects on the creative, psychological, and economic challenges in the design profession and makes experiences, mistakes, and figures transparent. It promotes a comprehensive understanding of design disciplines among each other and creates a place for interfaces, networking, and interstices. Like a grid, Grid shows a multitude of approaches and possibilities and supports young designers in orienting themselves, developing further, and positioning themselves.

Grid is as authentic as possible, naturally follows a content structure, offers variety, is up-to-date, allows opinions, is innovative, has social relevance, and offers an international perspective as far as possible. This is done in an entertaining way, but also offers expertise, tips, and insights into projects from professionals. Moderation and talks by and with Prof. Dr. Ralf Beuker and Prof. Dipl. Des. Rüdiger Quass von Deyen.

Post to the (younger) design self
The current episode is about the (secret) classic: the advice we would give ourselves if we met our younger selves. Each of us has certainly critically questioned things in life and wished he/she had decided differently from time to time. In this episode we are again supported with perspectives, opinions and statements from experts who have already finished their design studies a few years ago and share their experiences with us from their current perspective as brand manager, design professor, illustrator, and designer/project manager: How do I evaluate professional or even personal challenges, yesterday and today? How can I build and maintain sustainable relationships and networks that are not only important to me professionally, but also support me in my private life? What is and was important to us in life and how would we like to set our priorities today? But the point of giving advice to ones younger self is also to draw on experiences and insights from the past to help oneself better navigate the present and future.

GRID.

Language: German
Listen here to the newest episode!

Dongola Architecture Series

Posted on by laetitia_d

The Dongola Architecture Series (DAS) is a biannual book series that offers unique insight into Arab culture through the lens of its most iconic contemporary architects, and attempts to grapple with our environment’s past and present to better inform how we design our future.

Each issue focuses on a specific architect’s formation and processes, and on their contributions to regional knowledge production. DAS is not an endorsement of style, but rather of methodology, affect, and synchronicity with the world. It is an investigation of the ethics, politics, positioning, and decision-making processes of the people tasked to analyze, build, and narrate the world we live in.

The first issue, titled Notes on Formation: Ammar Khammash dives into the perspective of Jordanian architect, artist, and anthropologist Ammar Khammash. With more than 30 years of practice in a wide array of fields, Khammash embodies the ethos of DAS: architecture as a trans-disciplinary tool of expression, and as a method of imagining and reimagining the future. His focus on cultural and natural heritage, and his deep respect for the environment, leads to the production of work that is truly and intimately in conversation with its surroundings. His projects, which include the Wild Jordan Center, the restoration of the Church of Apostles, and the Royal Academy for Nature Conservation, have been recognized internationally for the sensitivities and solemnity with which Ammar has approached them. This has led to his being awarded the 2019 Global Award for Sustainable Architecture. Echoing the history of the land it rests on, and the ways in which it functions, Ammar’s work becomes a fundamental part of its landscape and context.

Ammar Khammash is a renowned architect, anthropologist, and artist. His trans-disciplinary expertise have led Ammar towards a distinct vision of territorially rooted innovation. His work includes everything from commercial projects, sustainable tourism, and restoration to cultural centers and landscape design. Khammash Architect’s Royal Academy for Nature Conservation was short-listed for the 2017 Aga Khan Award in Architecture. He was also awarded the 2019 Global Award for Sustainable Architecture.

Dongola Architecture Series—Notes on Formation: Ammar Khammash

Publisher: Dongola
Editor: Raafat Majzoub
Art Director: Reza Abedini
Release: 2023, expected by 1st quarter
Dimensions: 23 × 28 cm 
Volume: 216 pages, hardcover
Printing / Binding: Anis Commercial Printing Press
Language: English
ISBN: 978-9953-970-07-3
Price: € 69.–
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Leipziger Typotage 2023

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

Type is form is emotion is joy. The 28th Leipziger Typotage 2023 celebrate the various facets of typographic joy. The desire for haptics in digital times in the form of calligraphy, letterpress, or print finishing. The desire for new techniques and experiments, the desire for the printed word, for reading, for colors, and forms. The desire for new perspectives. The lectures will focus on type design, visual communication, and type research.

The program

Birgit Alabowitz (Leipzig): Refining print products—for all senses!
Ann Bessemans (Hasselt/Belgium): Typefaces for Children’s Reading (in English)
Céline Hurka (The Hague/Netherlands): The Reproducibility of Type.
Moritz Schefers (Leipzig): Risography, WTF?
Stefanie Vogl (Berlin): The desire to create and how to retain it
Petra Wöhrmann (Munich): Joy and Stubbornness. Handwritten, please.

The conference will be moderated by Christine Hartmann, member of the Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Druckkunst Leipzig e.V. (Society for the Promotion of the Art of Printing Leipzig).

To kick off the Typotage the evening before (May 12th, 2023) the Swiss graphic designer and letterpress printer Dafi Kühne will talk about his experimental letterpress posters. From computers to pantographs, he uses a wide variety of tools for his designs and prints on presses from the 1960s. Since 2009, his studio babyinktwice has been producing posters as well as leaflets, invitation cards and magazines.

To round off the conference, a letterpress workshop and a guided tour of the exhibition Dafi Kühne: Letterpress Posters? will be offered on Sunday, May 14th, 2023.

The Leipziger Typotage are an event organized by the Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Druckkunst Leipzig e.V. (Leipzig Society for the Promotion of the Printing Arts) and take place at the Museum of the Printing Arts, an active museum that brings historical casting, typesetting and printing processes to life in an authentic workshop atmosphere. www.druckkunst-museum.de

Leipziger Typotage 2023

When?
May 13th, 2023

Where?
Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Druckkunst Leipzig e. V.
Nonnenstraße 38
04229 Leipzig
Germany

More information here.
Registration now online!

CXI 2023

Posted on by Juliane Lipp

Join the CXI—Europe’s biggest Corporate- and Brand-Identity conference!

What determines the success of a corporate or brand identity project? What are the criteria on the part of the client and the agency? And how can such a complex process be successfully implemented?

Many aspects play a role here—and in particular the quality of the cooperation between client and agency. For this reason, both sides present the course and development of a project at the CXI conference.

The speaking companies and agencies present their view of things from very different positions—and yet together—explain problems and present their solutions. This way, the entire range and complexity of the task becomes clearer, and decisions and motivations, as well as the resulting outcomes, can be made more comprehensible.

The CXI conference is organized by the FH Bielefeld and, with almost 1000 visitors, has become the largest European Corporate- and Brand-Identity conference.

Registration for CXI 2023 starts on Monday, February 27th at 11 A.M.—don’t miss it as the tickets are often sold out quickly! Registration for students begins after the start of the semester on April 3rd at 12 P.M.

When?
May 26th 2023

Where?
Lokschuppen Bielefeld
Stadtheider Strasse 11
33609 Bielefeld

Speakers:
Inken Barz, Strichpunkt
Jan Fischer, Hamburg Towers
Coralie Grau, Jokolade
Henning Klimczak, Sherpa Design
Jessica Krier, R/GA
Petra Mackeová, ŠKODA
Martina Miocevic, Studio Mathilda Mutant
Gabor Schreier, Saffron (Madrid)
David Steingrüber, Strichpunkt
Zach Stubenvoll – Meta
Stephanie von Behr – Founderland
Johannes von Kreuz – Sherpa Design

REGISTRATE

Neue DIN Family

Posted on by Ivo

Is it possible to rethink THE German design icon? For the sake of its longevity, the Fontwerk team is convinced that you HAVE TO! Neue DIN Family by Hendrik Weber, Andreas Frohloff, and Olli Meier.

With a compact overall impression, extreme widths, a variable-first approach, and a touch of elegance, they have combined the requirements of the digital world with modern German engineering. The DIN typeface has been thoroughly reimagined in a way that their brand new flexible incarnation breathes life into the Normschrift standard. And just like 100 years ago … It’s 100% made in Berlin.

Neue DIN Family

Designers: Hendrik Weber, Andreas Frohloff, Olli Meier
Foundry: Fontwerk
Release: January 2023
Languages: European and African Latin
Weights: Thin, XLight, Light, Regular, Medium, SemiBold, Bold, XBold, Black
Widths: XXCondensed, XCondensed, Condensed, SemiCondensed, Normal, SemiWide, Wide, XWide, XXWide
File Formats: woff2, otf, Variable Fonts (ttf, woff2) included in the Family package at no extra cost (2 axes: weight, width), Trial fonts
Prices: € 50.– Single Style, € 500.– Family (Introductory price, later € 750)
Specimen PDF
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19th Pictoplasma Festival 2023

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

This May, the Pictoplasma Festival returns to Berlin to present an all-new selection of trailblazing, trendsetting character design, and art. Now in its 19th edition, the festival expands on giving its community opportunities to actively participate and introduces a brand new section, the Games and Media Lab in collaboration with A MAZE., Berlin’s International Games and Playful Media Festival.

Slanted raffles a ticket for the Pictoplasma Festival! To participate, simply write an email to [email protected] with the subject “19th Pictoplasma Festival 2023” until 02/27/2023, 11 a.m. (UTC +1). The winner will be drawn after the deadline and contacted by email. Who participates in the raffle, agrees to receive news from Slanted and accepts the privacy policy. Legal recourse is excluded. We wish you good luck!

Central to the Pictoplasma Festival, the conference provides a platform for 20+ international artists from illustration and animation, design and interactive, urban and graphic arts. In focused artist lectures, they will present personal strategies for the future of figurative aesthetics, sharing ideation processes and working methodologies. With its Character Lab, the conference is building on last year’s success and provides manifold opportunities for attendees to shape and participate in the programme. Daily creative workshops allow them to channel inspiration and get hands-on with a multitude of materials and analogue media; panel discussions and portfolio reviews will enhance networking with peers and the industry; collective art activities and a bustling marketplace atmosphere will encourage the sharing of projects; and PechaKucha sessions will give many of the attendees the chance to present their projects themselves. The conference will also host four programmes of Character in Motion, screening seventy selected short films. This will include the latest works by Felix Colgrave, Eoin Duffy, and Britt Raes, with many of the film makers in attendance to discuss their work in Q&A sessions.

The 19th Pictoplasma Festival reaches out to the broader audience with two exhibitions in the central Mitte district, presenting works by some of the conference speakers. Further art installations at the main venue, Silent Green, will make this an attraction for everyone to attend. Here, the adjacent transmediale studio will present the special Games and Media Lab, a collaboration between A MAZE., Berlin’s International Games and Playful Media Festival, and Pictoplasma. An arcade will showcase recent playable projects and display information and material on how they stand out in terms of concept and character design.

For the glorious finale, everyone’s welcome at the special Character Market on Sunday—when the conference’s artists and attendees trade all things character, from editions, prints and originals, sculptures, multiples and garments, zines, publications, and games! The Character Market will open up the contemporary landscape of illustration and graphic arts to our Berlin audience. This public visitors’ day will also feature panel discussions and conversations, performances, and a replay of all the animated shorts featured in Character in Motion.

The festival’s main location is Silent Green, a former crematorium now turned vibrant cultural centre. Its fascinating architecture includes the historic cupola building, which will host the participatory formats of the character lab and visitors’ day. The conference presentations and screenings will happen in the vast underground hall, which will also open its doors for the character market. Also underground, the transmediale studio with the Games and Media Lab connects both areas, and further art installations will be placed throughout the venue, including the outside green.

In Mitte, the former caretaker building in the central cemetery provides a special atmosphere for a dense group show, further enhancing the immersive and world building qualities of the characters on display. A second show takes place at the bright showroom of design agency Rainbow Unicorn.

19th Pictoplasma Festival 2023

When?
May 3rd–7th, 2023, daily from 12–8 p.m.

Where?
Silent Green
Gerichtstraße 35
13347 Berlin
Germany

Registration:
Participation in the three-day Pictoplasma Conference requires prior online registration, available for € 320.– here!

More information on the speakers, artists, and the schedule can be found here!

Stiftung Buchkunst: Call for Entries 2023

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

The Stiftung Buchkunst: Call for Entries 2023 has started! The Stiftung Buchkunst (German Foundation for Book Design) invites you to participate in two of their competitions Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher 2023 (The Best German Book Design 2023) and Förderpreis für junge Buchgestaltung 2023 (Sponsorship Prize for Young Book Design 2023). The deadline for both competitions is March 31st, 2023.

Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher 2023 (The Best German Book Design 2023)

In the competition of Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher by Stiftung Buchkunst, 25 books are selected for award by an independent interdisciplinary jury of editorial design experts. The books chosen are outstanding examples of design, concept, and finish. There are five prize winners in each of the five categories: General Literature, Academic Works/Educational Textbooks, Guides/Non-Fiction, Art and Photography/Exhibition Catalogs, and Children’s and Young People’s Books. The selection also takes account of the more minimalistic, well-typed reading book.

All 25 books which gain an honorary award in the competition are automatically nominated for the Award of the Stiftung Buchkunst. Endowed by the German Government’s Representative for Culture and Media and with a total value of 10,000 Euros. This remunerative award is intended for books which show an exceptionally high degree of commitment on the part of their publishers and of all those involved in their production, and which through their overall design and finish provide new impulses to modern book design.

Förderpreis für junge Buchgestaltung 2023 (Sponsorship Prize for Young Book Design 2023)

Since 1989 the Stiftung Buchkunst has annually awarded the Sponsorship Prize for Young Book Design. Design Students, book designers, typographers, and those in production are invited to participate. The award is intended to promote innovative book design. The prize aims to recognize innovative ideas surrounding printed books as well as hybrid book forms. As a prize for innovation, it can thus provide a stimulative arena for the books of tomorrow. The prize is endowed by the German Government’s Representative for Culture and Media with a total value of 6,000 Euros and is divided equally between three up and-coming book designers, 2,000 Euros each.

In addition, the winning book projects will be honored with their own exhibition in Berlin’s einBuch.haus. The exhibition will run from July 13th to August 26th, 2023.

Stiftung Buchkunst: Call for Entries 2023

Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher 2023
Deadline: March 31st, 2023
Prize: 10,000 Euros
Participate!

Förderpreis für junge Buchgestaltung 2023
Deadline: March 31st, 2023
Prize: 6,000 Euros in total (2,000 Euros for three up and-coming book designers)
Participate!

Stiftung Buchkunst: Website, Instagram, Facebook

FARANG

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

Each image tells a story of darkness and light. Abyss and beauty exist so close to each other. Poetry in images that can tell us so much about life.

Francesco Merlini writes about his project FARANG: “In the time span of three years I’ve taken pictures in Italy, France, Turkey, Thailand, and Kosovo. I took pictures of unfamiliar places, pictures of strangers. The flash of the camera has consecrated my epiphanies, impressing the shroud that lies on the subjects whose truth I’ve discarded. These images are relics of the invisible. Every picture has an undeniable subject, no space left to distraction. Every picture becomes a tarot card, a singular representation of a collective perception.”

FARANG

© Francesco Merlini
Website
Instagram

Kapitol

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

Kapitol is a sans serif type family characterized by robust practicality, clean utility and concrete geometry. Inspired by the unique materiality found in 1980s screen aesthetics, it expands on the memory of the single weight Chicago, re-imagining the style with more traditionally legible forms, while retaining much of the original unique contrast and feel. The Kapitol family utilizes robust geometry to create a practical and diverse set of types that can be used equally well for text and display purposes.

The first drawings for Kapitol began in pure gridded geometry and were then evolved to also utilize more balanced and organic forms. Where necessary it discards the grid and utilises letterforms that have strong connections to the history of grotesque typefaces, all the while maintaining a unique contrast and purely vertical stresses.

The fourteen style Kapitol family consists of a broad range of weights that vary progressively in their aesthetic, due to the strong contrast in combination with its vertical stress. At text sizes it feels utilitarian and sets in efficient, structural galleys. At larger sizes the finish is clean and strong, almost brutalist, making for combinations of crisp geometry and solid forms.

The range of Kapitol weights are dynamic exponents of the family’s geometry. As the type weights get lighter or heavier toward the family’s extremities, their structural requirements change, but the overall geometric tone is maintained. Ultimately, the weights at the lighter and bolder ends of the spectrum look less and less like their visual origins, but always feel like they are part of the greater family. The thin and black weights in particular stretch their inherent contrast to the limits, creating unique and characterful outcomes that are subtly familiar, yet always original.

To celebrate the release of this new typefamily, a limited edition box-set, the Kapitol Typeface Companion is available exclusively at formistfoundry.co. This special specimen box set, limited to 50 editions, comes complete with a Kapitol family pack font license. Designed by Mark Gowing, the Kapitol Typeface Companion is a visually expressive collector’s item created to playfully link the conceptual elements that underpin the design and creation of the typefamily.

Kapitol

Designer: Mark Gowing & Dave Foster
Foundry: Formist
Price: Essentials Pack: $ 120.–
Family Pack: $ 360.–
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Kapitol Typeface Companion

Design: Mark Gowing
Dimensions: 245 × 325 × 60 mm
Workmanship: Magnetic-close box
Inside: Kapitol font family, 160 page paperback, Merino wool scarf, Kapitol pencil, 2 posters
Price: $ 400.–
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Graphic Design Lab

Posted on by Tessa Breuer
Graphic Design Lab is an online training platform for Ukrainian graphic designers and illustrators, which aims to help young creators develop their careers in the European design community.
 
The Graphic Design Lab platform provides a set of video courses featuring prominent male and female designers from various countries, including Ukraine, Poland, France, The Netherlands, and the United States. Experts answer questions on various aspects of design, beginning from style and inspiration, illustration history and copyright, to portfolio building, working with agencies, and working abroad.
 
Graphic Design Lab enables you to obtain support and professional knowledge from the best graphic designers and illustrators in Europe. Lecturers include the following: Agata Nowicka, Gosia Herba, Hedof, Ines Alpha, Krzysiek Iwanski, Marlena Torzecka from Marlena Agency, Ola Niepsuj, Anna Sarvira, Ola Szmid, Patrycja Podkoscielny, Patryk Hardziej, Romana Romanyshyn and Andriy Lesiv from Agrafka studio, Przemek Adamski from KijekAdamski studio, Dawid Gawel and Wojtek Siejak from Pigeon studio, Yonk Studio, Zosia Dzierzawska, and others.
 
Access to the platform is free of charge upon registration and the content is successively expanded with more courses and recordings.
 

The project has been implemented by Polish Graphic Design and the Pictoric Association with the support of the European Union under the House of Europe program.

Graphic Design Lab

Visit the Platform here

© Illustrations by Anna Sarvira

Posters Can Help

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

We are very pleased to announce the release of a heartfelt project, the importance of which was amplified by the start of the Ukraine war almost exactly a year ago: Posters Can Help. 

With a global call, we invited the design community to contribute with a piece of work and a donation. 434 people from all over the world participated in this project and almost 700 posters were submitted, which resulted in a colorful potpourri of posters, each one a compassionate outreach and act of charity—literally. 

All the proceeds gained through the submissions have been donated to two selected organizations that we appreciate for their work: ARTHELPS and MSF—Médecins Sans Frontières. Any profits beyond covering the costs of printing the book will also be donated to those organizations. So let’s hope that soon there will be no more books left!  

The thread-stitched softcover book is completed by a special section: Three interviews with the Ukrainian designers Olga Andrieieva, Jakub Stepień, and Anton Bukoros, where they tell something about their personal current situation. In 2017 they were part of the international poster project Poster Rex, which took place in Kyiv and also dealt with the war at that time. Their answers can be found in the book, along with a selection of the posters created back then. 

We would like to sincerely thank everyone who participated in this project and made it possible through their donations and contributions. A special thanks also to those who have worked cheaper or even volunteered their efforts.

We believe in the problem-solving power of design. We want to work every day towards a vision of the world that is sustainable, inclusive, equitable, and safe. This book is an effort to bring the global creative community together to take a small but valuable step towards solving the big problems of our time.

And to round it off with the words from Steven Heller’s introduction: “[…] The golden age of poster has long been considered the pioneering turn of the century, then the modern mid-century, then the psychedelic sixties, and so on through decades […] Today is another golden age. It is the digital golden age. Can posters help? They still help? They will help issues, causes, and most important they help people be aware of the world in its present state.”

Posters Can Help

Publisher: Slanted Publishers
Managing Editor: Vicky Blake
Preface: Steven Heller
Design: Lars Harmsen (CD), Viola Dessin (AD), Juliane Nöst
Publishing Direction: Lars Harmsen, Julia Kahl
Format: 17 × 24 cm
Volume: 256 pages
Language: English
Printer: KOPA, Lithuania
Workmanship: Softcover, thread-stitching, full-color
ISBN: 978-3-948440-43-5
Price: € 30.–
Release: February 2023
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European Design Awards 2023

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

Last chance to submit! It is the last week of submissions for the European Design Awards 2023. Designers from around Europe are invited to submit their projects by Friday, February 17th.

A European Community of Excellence

Since 2007 a group of people, consisting of publishers, journalists, editors and academics, come together on a yearly basis, to gather, evaluate and acknowledge the best examples of communication design in our continent.

It is a very special and unique set up, in the sense that it involves the people who curate similar content on an every day basis. As such it also provides participants with an opportunity to make their work visible to a wider audience (through the media that the jury members represent).

The European Design Awards wraps up with a festival in a different city every year, leading up to the awards ceremony. This creates an ideal opportunity for the most creative people of our community to come together, benchmark, be inspired and celebrate.

European Design Awards 2023

Submission deadline: Friday, February 17th
More information: How to submit work, Rules, Categories, Submission Fees

Jerusalem Design Week 2023

Posted on by trinawickenden

Jerusalem Design Week returns for its 12th edition from June 22nd to 29th 2023 at the historic Hansen House Center for Design, Media and Technology. The flagship event of Hansen House and Israel’s leading design event Jerusalem Design Week 2023 will build on its previous successful editions. Showcasing a wide range of unique exhibitions, installations, and projects, the event welcomes the participation of both Israeli and international designers.

Inviting a range of creative interpretations from designers, architects, artists, and tech-savvy experts, the theme Lies and Falsehoods seeks to examine design’s manipulative tools and the realities they shape. During Jerusalem Design Week, the aim is to present a series of works that capture the meaning of illusion, works that knowingly conceal, deceive, or give rise to an alternative reality, and works that attempt to uncover and explore truth and authenticity, in the face of lies and falsehoods.

Nowadays it seems that both lies and indeed truth are engineered to play tricks on us. We experience reality through a multitude of translations, adaptations, and artificial phenomena. We navigate the built environment using GPS systems. On social media platforms we mask our appearance with filters and on Zoom calls we disguise our background with images of faraway locations. So much of what we do is impacted by cutting-edge technology, hidden in “black boxes” whose internal workings are not readily understood. The lie has its own appeal: the illusion is mesmerizing, satisfying, and comforting, allowing us to dream.

In the battle between truth and lies, between that which is aesthetically pleasing and that which is not, we ask is design, by its very essence, merely trickery? We wonder if the designer is no more than an illusionist?

As participating witnesses of the information revolution, the subversion of trust, authenticity, and truth is a daily occurrence. Fake news, deepfake videos, false images, and disinformation are prevalent in everyday life; moreover, they often prove to be beneficial financially, socially, and politically. While lies and falsehoods prevail in the digital sphere, they are also part of an analogue reality. Jerusalem Design Week’s theme, in a way, offers a meta look at society from a philosophical point of view, and will ask pertinent questions, including: Has the search for truth been abandoned and even if it is found, what is its actual worth? When/why do we take pleasure in the comforting beauty of well-designed illusions and when/why do we seek to uncover the truth?

The work of the designer oscillates between fiction (that which dazzles in a bid to maximize profit) and actuality (that which prioritizes transparency and taking responsibility). In either case, designers will harness their manipulative tools for the task, for example, with simulations and models that convincingly demonstrate messages and concepts. In a world where augmented reality, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence are in an increasingly dominant position, to what extent will designers succumb to the promise of hi-tech wizardry versus the continued practice of craftsmanship and artisanship? And in truth, are lies and falsehoods the new normal?

Jerusalem Design Week 2023

When?
June 22nd until June 29th, 2023

Where?
Hansen House
14 Gedalyahu Alon St
Jerusalem, Israel

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FZ

Posted on by Yannick Nuss

On the occasion of the exhibition Fetishizing the Future. Utopias of the Third Dimension at the Zeppelin Museum Friedrichshafen (December 16th, 2022 until April 16th, 2023), the museum published the artist book FZ. The exhibition as well as the publication examine the social mechanisms behind visions of the future based on the human striving for speed, freedom, peace, immortality, and sustainability.

Over the last 120 years, numerous ideas and visions of navigating the skies or traveling through space have emerged in response to focal points of earthly life. In our cosmos, characterized by fragile ecosystems, overpopulation, lack of space, scarcity of resources, and war, innovative technologies awaken promises of a better future, a world more worth living in. Can technology save the world and fulfill these human longings, or is it rather an instrument of power and marketing promise?

Conceived and designed by graphic designer Yannick Nuss, the 256-page publication unleashes a subjective approach to the exhibition themes. Readers move through the five chapters in the midst of an associative stream of images that challenge them to form their own opinions about the subject areas being discussed. The excessive image collages allow for ever new contexts of meaning and cross-references without losing sight of an overall narrative. Silver as an additional spot color allows individual elements to appear and disappear in light reflections in order to add a performative, three-dimensional level to the reading.

FZ

Concept & Design: Studio Yannick Nuss, Instagram 
Publisher: Zeppelin Museum Friedrichshafen GmbH
Printing: Druckhaus Köthen GmbH & Co. KG
Edition: 750 Copies
Volume: 256 pages
Size: 21 x 29.7 cm
Price: € 20.–
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Pedro

Posted on by Karsten Rohrbeck

Freshly served by Andreas Blindert and Karsten Rohrbeck, Pedro is your new friendly type for messages that ask for size. It’s ideal for wayfinding systems, posters, and magazine headlines. With lots of Stylistic Alternates, OpenType Features, and sunny Icons, it does not only meet modern demands in text setting but presents new and interesting options for typographic layouts. Along with its deep roots in universal geometry come simplicity, understatement, and clarity, while slightly rounded corners take the edges off and make Pedro very approachable.

Pedro is inspired by old weathered train station signs around Lisbon that Karsten discovered while travelling the portuguese shore in the summer. It reminds of Art Deco-ish Sans Serifs from the early 20th century paired with an obviously engineered backstory.

Pedro

Foundry: Büro Gestalten, Köln
Designers: Andreas Blindert & Karsten Rohrbeck
Release date: August 2022
Weights: Regular
Styles: Regular, Slanted
File formats: OTF, TTF, WOFF, WOFF2
Price: starting from 25 € (per bundle), student discount possible
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Riccardo Miotto—Tents

Posted on by feder23

Riccardo Miotto (b. 1982 in Treviso; lives and works between Treviso and Venice) studied architecture at the Iuav University of Venice. He participated in the 15th Venice Architecture Biennale and his graphic work deals with built structures. Riccardo Miotto’s graphic gestures are overtly two-dimensional and emphasize how a form created in the mind’s eye is only possible and present when an imaginary tension is generated. His book Riccardo Miotto—Tents tell of a hypothetical land, imaginary yet plausible, one that viewers might fall into, like a sinkhole of unfathomable depths. A space in-between, full of matter. Tents is Miotto’s first artist book. The essay is written by Sara Marini.

Riccardo Miotto—Tents

Publisher: Distanz
Artist: Riccardo Miotto, Instagram
Design: Federico Barbon
Essay: Sara Marini
Release: September 2022
Language: English / Italian
Format: 23 × 27 cm
Volume / Workmanship: 64 pages, numerous color images, softcover
ISBN: 978-3-95476-505-8
PRICE: € 28.–
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Photos by Giulio Boem

Tag der Schrift 2023

Posted on by Tessa Breuer

The Tag der Schrift 2023 is an educational event that focuses on typeface design. Jointly organized by the School of Design Zurich and the union Syndicom it already takes place for the twentieth time. To celebrate the anniversary appropriately the event lasts two days this year. Therefore, the program is even more abundant than usual. The Swiss and German speakers offer exciting insights into their work and the topic of type design.

Slanted raffles a ticket for the whole day + workshops! To participate, simply write an email to [email protected] with the subject “Tag der Schrift 23” until 02/13/2023 (UTC +1). The winner will be drawn after the deadline and contacted by email. Who participates in the raffle, agrees to receive news from Slanted and accepts the privacy policy. Legal recourse is excluded. We wish you good luck!

In his lecture Renan Rosatti shows the ways variable fonts influence the creative process at Dinamo Typefaces. Mischa Senn discusses legal options for protecting fonts. Marco Ganz explains the difference between Veto Sans and Helvetica. Merle Michaelis offers insights into her search for perfection and spontaneity in lettering. Felix Pfäffli from Studio Feixen considers how to focus specifically on nothing in particular. At Miriam Reichensperger’s workshop we experiment with spatial implementation possibilities of 3D letters. A panel discussion on font licensing and various networking opportunities complement the two day event. In short, an interesting and instructive program is awaiting you.

Tag der Schrift 2023

When?
Friday, March 31st and Saturday, April 1st, 2023

Where?
Ausstellungsstrasse 104
8005 Zurich
Switzerland

Registration and information here!

UPGRADE

Posted on by Xuyen Dam

The incessant trend to throw away rather than to repair, demolish rather than refurbish has been a topic of discussion and criticism for years—at the same time, resource consumption, and the waste continue to increase. To counteract this trend, students at the University of Applied Sciences in Munich and ETH Zurich have been developing sustainable and imaginative concepts for repairing a wide variety of objects, applying them both manually and by using digital techniques such as 3D printing. Beyond restoration, many projects aim to further develop and improve the repaired objects constructively, materially, or even in terms of design, lending them new value. The publication UPGRADE presents a wide variety of approaches and projects, complemented by essays by notable personalities from the fields of architecture, preservation, design, manufacturing, and craftsmanship.

Silke Langenberg (*1974) is professor of Construction Heritage and Preservation at ETH Zurich. Previously, she was professor for Design and Construction in Existing Contexts, Conservation and Building Research at the University of Applied Sciences in Munich, where she initiated a Repair Class.

UPGRADE

Editor: Prof. Silke Langenberg
Text: Arno Brandlhuber, Felix Lehner, Freek Persyn, Eva Prats, Daniel Stockhammer, Thomas Will, Adam Caruso and Helen Thomas
Typography: Monument Grotesk @abcdinamo
Editorial: Hatje Cantz
Release: 2022
Volume: 512 pages
Format: 11 × 17 cm
Language: English
Workmanship: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-3-7757-5334-0
Price: € 44.–
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