Four Worlds

Posted on by HannahWaldron

The work Four Worlds displays four tapestries of artist and designer Hannah Waldron on paper. It was published on the occasion of her solo exhibition Solmania at the Studio Fotokino, Marseille—which took place from October 10th, 2020 until November 22nd, 2020. Each tapestry is reproduced as a leporello, and is accompanied by a text written by the artist. The female weavers featured in these artworks represent four examples of the craftsperson as worldmaker, and relate to tales from classical Greece, the Tang dynasty in China, ancient Japan, and the Hopi tribe in Northeastern Arizona.

About the artist
Hannah Waldron is a British artist and designer who discovered the technique of weaving ten years ago and thus found her own graphic language. Since then she no longer works as an illustrator but rather explores the possibilities of the textile medium. Hannah Waldron studio specializes in designing and creating research-led unique printed and woven textiles that have an emphasis on storytelling.

Four Worlds

Title: Four Worlds
Author and Designer: Hannah Waldron
Volume: four Leporellos, a booklet and a yellow postcard with metallic Ink
Format: 12.5 × 15.5 cm
Language: English and French
Binding: Leporello
ISBN: 9782902565078
Retail price: £ 10.–
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Have a look at this video of Hannah Waldron in her studio creating works for her solo exhibition at Fotokino. Video made by Tim Laing.

Systematic Book Design?

Posted on by Éditions B42

Systematic Book Design? was written for a lecture the Swiss typographer and graphic designer Jost Hochuli gave for the first time in Munich in 2007, and then at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris in 2011 on the initiative of F7. The text has been first published in Back Cover magazine in 2011. John Morgan’s foreword was especially written for the present edition.

Does designing a book follow a logical and well-thought-out process? Jost Hochuli studies the crucial role played by instinct throughout the various stages of planning a book, from selecting a typeface and its size to determining the layout of the blocks of text.

Drawing on his own experience and examples taken from various books he created, Jost Hochuli considers the questions which arose while they were being designed and the importance of intuition in rational thought.

The Paris-based graphic design studio deValence designed the book.

Systematic Book Design?

Author: Jost Hochuli 
Publisher: Édition B42
Release: November 2020
Designer: deValence
Volume: 80 Pages
Format: 200 × 300 mm
Language: English
Translation: Charles Whitehouse
ISBN: 9782490077441
Price: 19.– Euro
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Diode

Posted on by Paul McNeil

Diode is a modular geometric type system developed by MuirMcNeil, a London-based graphic design studio working in visual identity, brand communications, and typography, in collaboration with Natasha Lucas.

The Diode project began as one of a series of visual experiments examining the interdependence of positive and negative spaces in typographic forms, a feature that Lucas had first begun to investigate in her Bisect type system, published by MuirMcNeil in 2018. These explorations are a part of a larger body of work: the design of a coordinated visual system to promote a series of dramas by Harold Pinter known as his memory plays. Natasha’s Bisect and Diode alphabets are intended, she says, “to express the progressive fragmentation of language as it is eroded by the selective, faulty nature of memory.”

Using only three different geometric modules to build the Diode alphabet, Lucas explored the ways in which form and counterform could operate reciprocally, each defining the boundaries of the other, in the construction of letters and words that are playfully ambiguous while always remaining true to their alphabetic origins. The result is a type system that is structurally incomplete but that maintains its visual integrity and legibility by optimizing the use of space.

MuirMcNeil has developed Diode in three matching versions, one positive and two negative, and in three sets of individual letter component fonts designed to register precisely with one another in layers, offering a huge range of visual possibilities.

Diode

Designers: MuirMcNeil in collaboration with Natasha Lucas
Release: September 2020
Style: A positive / negative geometric type system in six different styles
Price: £ 45.– 
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Now, please follow me

Posted on by Laura Nadvornik

The publication Now, please follow me – Eine kritische Designforschung is now available at Slanted Shop.

Critical design is a form of design research in which the designer has a fundamentally critical attitude towards society as well as with regards to his or her own discipline. The resulting design objects are supposed to stimulate reflection and create a critical awareness, but also corresponding changes in current social practices are intended. Critical design is able to solve social problems instead of just aestheticizing or reflecting on them. That this critical attitude is necessary is shown by the designer Susan Karrais on the basis of information graphics in their function of general knowledge transfer. Information is omnipresent, so information graphics are an indispensable instrument to process the flood of data in the contemporary “knowledge society.” The previously often unpopular task among designers has become a real trend in recent years. However, this only rarely led to a real qualitative improvement. Besides the still mostly missing theoretical reference framework, the conventional approach to simplification is the main criticism.

Now, please follow me – Eine kritische Designforschung (Eng. Now, please follow me—A critical design research) equally pursues the questions of orientation in the complexity of the world and its representability. In terms of critical design, the goal is not to find solutions but the identification of problems.

Now, please follow me – Eine kritische Designforschung

Author: Susan Karrais
Publisher: Merz Akademie
Format: 16 × 22 × 8 cm
Volume: 88 pages
Language: German
Release: 2013
ISBN: 978-3-937982-34-2
Price: 10.– Euro
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If you have an interesting book or magazine you have designed or published and would like to see in our shop, get in touch. Our marketplace is a growing spot for beautiful publications around the field of design, photography, art, illustration, and culture.

Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: The Society of Signs

Posted on by Edgar Walthert

This event is a digital evening of lectures in conjunction with the exhibition Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: The Society of Signs at Leopold-Hoesch-Museum in Düren and Museum of Modern Art Freiburg. The digital lecture evening starts with an introduction to the content and design of the exhibition and publication project Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: The Society of Signs. All lectures will be held in German for free on Zoom. In the planned lectures, five designers and artists will provide insight into their work and research on the pictorial sign languages on display. At the end, questions can be asked and the exchange about the project can turn into an open dialog with all participants.

About Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: The Society of Signs
The exhibition Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: The Society of Signs compiles a rich variety of visual languages, starting with Köln Progressiv, a socially engaged group of artists including Gerd Arntz. Arntz would later become an important member of Otto Neurath’s ISOTYPE collective. This introductory part of the exhibition mainly focusses on this team that created an influential body of work starting in Red Vienna around 1925 as the Viennese method of image statistics and that later becomes the International System of Typographic Picture Education.

The second part of the exhibition explores the development and reorientation of signs, starting with an artistic work of Harun Farocki and the infamous pictograms by Otl Aicher for the Summer Olympics Munich in 1972. These infographics and pictograms communicate without written language, a more radical attempt is to fully replace written language with an image language. The LoCoS language by Yukio Ota is easy to learn and has the goal to bridge global communication, while the artistic work of Pati Hill, Proposal for a Universal Language of Symbols, is inspired by pictographs invented by her bilingual daughter who, as a child, struggled with the grammar of English and French. Warja Lavater transformed fairy-tales into symbolic landscapes and Wolfgang Schmidt’s Signs of Life anchor the exhibition with a gigantic figure looking over the scene.

A third section of the exhibition contains different research and artistic positions including the Genesis of Juli Gudehus and Timothée Ingen-Housz’ Elephant’s Memory. This Open Emoji Research is separated from the rest of the exhibition by DOCOMO’s basic set of Emoji designed by Shigetaka Kurita in 1999 and is reflected with a voting-booth for Lilian Stolk’s Emoji-Voter. Ilka Helmig and Johannes Bergerhausen present a rich table of their own works and some highlights of their collection. Edgar Walthert compiled a “memory” of symbol-fonts, pictograms and icon-systems, that invites visitors to play and build sentences with. Next to this are two folders which include his comparative symbol research. In an extra room, the visitor is invited to take a seat inside the palm of a gigantic yellow hand and play around with the Signs of Life by Wolfgang Schmidt. This multimedia installation is created by the artists collective Gruppo-Due, consisting of Mortiz Appich, Jonas Grünwald, and Bruno Jacoby.

A Digital Evening of Lectures

What?
A digital evening of lectures in conjunction with the exhibition Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: The Society of Signs at Leopold-Hoesch-Museum in Düren and Museum of Modern Art Freiburg.
All lectures will be held in German. Free admission. On the Platform: Zoom.
More information

When?
Friday, January 22nd, 2021, 6 p.m. to 11 p.m.
6 p.m.; Anja Dorn, Maxim Weirich; Pictograms, Signs of Life, Emojis: A virtual tour through the exhibition.
7 p.m.; Eva-Maria Offermann; Graphics in between Graphics … about the graphic design inside the exhibition.
7:30 p.m.; Break
8 p.m.; Edgar Walthert; Visual Grammar
8:30 p.m.; Juli Gudehus; »Icon spell« & swarm intelligence
9 p.m.; Break
9:30 p.m.; Johannes Bergerhausen, Ilka Helmig; picto-, ideo-
10 p.m.; Timothée Ingen-Housz; Elephant’s Memory: Welcome Global Baby!
10:30 p.m.; Project prospects & Q & A

Exhibition

After this event, the virtual exhibition will be launched at Die Gesellschaft der Zeichen

The exhibition takes place at Leopold-Hoesch-Museum, Düren until April 11th, 2021, and from May 6th, 2021, at Museum of Modern Art, Freiburg.

Co-curation: Dr. Michaela Stoffels, Maxim Weirich, and Anja Dorn.
Animation: Paul Zink Yi
Graphic-Design: Eva-Maria Offermann
Photos: Peter Hinschläger

Online Exhibition “Like Fish in the Sea”

Posted on by Balka

Nearly 40 Hungarian artists, graphic designers, illustrators, and animation directors displayed how they perceive the freelancing lifestyle in the online exhibition Like Fish in the Sea. The event was organized by Balka and was presented at Budapest Design Week. The title of the project derives from a Hungarian proverb which roughly translates to “sound as a roach” meaning someone feels alright and lives a carefree life.

Being a freelancer or having a small company in the cultural and creative sector can feel like swimming against the current. Big fish eats the small fish or at least leaves no ‘project crumbs’ for the rookie. All home office days are like squirming on the beach not to mention that it’s not only the client who sees the speck in the artists’ eyes but vice versa. And what is more it seems to pay day never comes, but sometimes contracting doesn’t either. Business is hard to come by but hope dies last that someday, we will be the goldfish from whom only three modifications are requested.

The goal of the project is to create an online exhibition that reflects the phenomena of the creative scene with the cooperation of artists, to start a discourse on the daily struggles of freelancing, to bring the members of different areas closer together as well as to shed light on how cultural project management can aid designers. The challenges are very real and can take many shapes but they can also be mended, if the general patterns become visible and part of the public discourse. And maybe one day, freelancers can live like fish in the sea.

Online exhibition “Like Fish in the Sea”

Initiator and Organizer: Balka
Exhibitors: Zsófia Bányai, Tamara Bella, Atos Bencsik, Aliz Borsa, Kinga Covaciuné Czuczor, Zoltán Debreczeni, Gita Elek,Szandra Farkas, Hanga Fejős, Saci Gázmár, Áron Huszlicska, Hajnalka Illés, Csenge Kalmár, Zóra Kondor, Adél Kovács, Zsófia Láposi, Mátyás Locsmándi, Petra Lilla Marjai, Dániel Marton, Gábor Mészáros—game4d, Nikoletta Mihalik, Alíz Moldovan and Tamara Dózsa—Studio Oneperone, Kata Moravszki, Péter Morvai, Bence Musinszky, Máté Gergő Muszka, Aliz Nagy, Anna Prakfalvi, Alíz Stocker, Izabella Szabó, Réka Anna Szakály, Bernadett Tihon, Eszter Szőcs and Kriszti Szepes—Slag Kollektíva, Rita Vándor, Dóra Visky, Zoltán Visnyai, and Judit Zengővári

Have a look at all the fantastic work in this exhibition! 

Picture credits:
1: Kata Moravszki
2: Adél Kovács
3: Zsófia Láposi
4: Bence Musinszky
5: Máté Gergő Muszka
6: Aliz Nagy
7: Alíz Stocker
8: Izabella Szabó
9: Judit Zengővári
10: Tamara Bella

DISRUPTIVE TYPE

Posted on by jonasbaun

Disruptive Type is a new virtual exhibition space showcasing the amazing variety of letterforms within the disruptive culture amongst contemporary type designers. The work of eleven contemporary (collaborative) typefaces of talented type designers is shown. Because of his deep fascination for letterforms and their variety, Copenhagen based designer Jonas Baun Andersen initiated the project in order to create a new community amongst designers highlighting the disruptive nature of contemporary type design. “I felt this urge to do something different,” says Jonas, who currently works as a designer for the Danish type foundry Playtype, “I noticed all this great work being produced by contemporary type designers. All of them working hard to push the boundaries, to be innovative and re-define what type design could be.” The exhibition is meant to be an open creative playground to collaborate and connect with other designers. Hopefully the start of a new community based platform.

To make the exhibition accessible for everyone around the globe, the exhibition takes place virtually in an abstract, almost surreal setting. The different letters of the presented typefaces were extruded into big iron 3D sculptures, celebrating them as artistic artifacts. When approaching a sculpture, a tag with more information about the typeface and the designer appears. “Exploring the exhibition almost feels like a shadow-play. The huge windows light up the space, the light reflects onto the sculptures casting shadows. When moving amongst the sculptures their appearance changes depending from which angle you look at it,” Jonas explains, “It’s possible to jump higher than usual, giving the user yet another perspective and way of interacting with the shapes.”

DISRUPTIVE TYPE

Initiator & Designer: Jonas Baun Andersen
Typefaces and Type designers you will see in the exhibition so far: Pilowlava by Anton Moglia & Jérémy Landes, BWWB & BWWW by Bureau Brut & Julien Priez, Predator by Enrico Gisana, Sonic by Fazekas Istva, Asfen by Ines Davodeau, Poster Mono by Lena Weber, Cemer by Michele Galuzzo, Cascadeur & Strikt by Peter Bushuev, and Eskos by Viktor Pesotsky  

Visit the virtual exhibition and if your interested in the project or in collaborating contact Jonas

Focus Ex

Posted on by Slanted editors

Focus Ex is a tool that helps users to read digital texts. It was primarily designed based on the needs of people with ADHD. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is the collective term for a group of neurological symptoms causing much difficulty in everyday functioning. One of the most characteristic symptoms of ADHD is the difficulty to maintain focus, especially during reading.

The new extension helps filter out distracting factors, divides the textual content and replaces the font settings of the target text with personalized ones, thus enhancing concentration. In this way, instead of fast input, the reader is fed the text gradually, which facilitates a deeper understanding of the content.

The font helps the reader thanks to its form, while also providing a new kind of reading experience through its interactivity at the touch of a button. It was developed especially for this project. The variable technology allows the customization of the font size, width, thickness, and even focus intensity. In addition, words in the selected text section can be enlarged with a magnifier, thus further enhancing the quality of remembering content.

This project serves as Vatány Szabolcs’ master thesis or diploma at Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest (MOME). It has not yet come to the realization of the project. If you believe in it and its help for many people, then donate here.

Focus Ex

Idea & Design: Vatány Szabolcs
Typeface: Focus Sans 
Check out a video about the project and the Focus Ex website

Feel free to contact the creator with further questions, and if you can, help the project come to life! 

SOCIAL AWARENESS POSTERS

Posted on by Laura Nadvornik

The project SOCIAL AWARENESS POSTERS started in April 2020, during the first world wide wave of Corona Virus. Besides a few other designers, artist Mirko Ilić showed his work to raise awareness about the Corona Virus. Messages of safety guidelines, messages of support and generalized encouragement where shown on digital billboards around New York.

After the images were prominently displayed, Ilić wanted his Awareness Poster to appear in less official settings, so they could get more attention from the New York citizens. He decided to let the poster be printed and distributed throughout Manhattan, Bronx, and Queens. But it didn’t stop with New York. With the help of different designers and facilities, the poster has been shown in ten different locations around the world so far: New York (USA), Ljubljana (Slovenia), Zagreb (Croatia), Breda (Holland), Belgrade (Serbia), Madrid (Spain), Skopje (North Macedonia), Lisbon (Portugal), and the latest was Timișoara (Romania).

The artist
Mirko Ilić is a comic artist, illustrator and art-director from Bosnia, who is living in New York. When he arrived in the U.S. he became the art director of Time Magazine International Edition. Later he became art director of the Op-Ed pages of the New York Times. In 1995 he established his firm Mirko Ilić Corp. His company designs for a wide range of clients, from pro bono organizations to the high luxury hospitality clients.

TOLERANCE POSTERS 
This project is another great project initiated by Mirko Ilić. THE TOLERANCE PROJECT has brought a message of social acceptance to over 200,000 people in 34 countries. Founded by artist-activist Mirko Ilić, this initiative showcases posters designed by artists from around the world. THE TOLERANCE PROJECT starts a conversation about inclusion, which can only begin with a foundation of tolerance. In a world increasingly split by race, religion, sexuality, and national origin the show utilizes the unique power of design to remind us what we all have in common.

SOCIAL AWARENESS POSTERS

Designer: Mirco Ilić
Have a look at Mirco’s Blog for more information about the project

Picture captions and credits:
1: the poster as part of the project “Stay-Sane-Stay-Safe” in Breda (Photos by Joost van Asch and Rosa Menkman)
2: the poster in the streets of New York
3: the original design
4: the design on a Billboard in Zagreb (Photos by Slaven Jandjel)
5: the poster as part of the Covid exit poster exhibition in Madrid
6: the poster in the streets of Lisbon (Photos by Tiago Krusse and Armindo Ribeiro/CML)
7: Tolerance Poster Show in Seongnam, South Korea
8: Tolerance Poster Show in Bucharest, Romania

Kunst im öffentlichen Raum in Stuttgart

Posted on by Matter Of

What counts as art in public space and what does not? To what extent does this influence or change our social life? Who may exhibit when and where? These question are becoming evermore relevant, in times when museums and galleries are closed and  exhibited art changes to different places. Stuttgart already has an extraordinarily high number of publicly accessible works of art by regional, national, and international artists. However, these works are only insufficiently accessible to the public. The publication Kunst im öffentlichen Raum in Stuttgart changes that. By summarizing as many works as possible, it documents for the first time art in public spaces in Stuttgart and presents it in an accessible way in order to counteract its disappearance. More topical than ever, the contemporary presentation encourages a new and conscious approach to the works as well as to the public urban space.

On 528 pages the book Kunst im öffentlichen Raum in Stuttgart presents 435 works by 212 artists. As a catalog raisonné, it is the first adequately catalogued collection of the public artworks of Stuttgart. Using color illustrations, cartography, and an extensive index, together with a wide range of text contributions, it creates the opportunity for a new and critical approach to the works and their social context.

Kunst im öffentlichen Raum in Stuttgart

Editor, Photography, Concept, and Design: Matter Of
Publisher: Kerber Verlag
Essays and Text: Fabian Kassner, Sebastian Schneider, Winfried Stürzl, Andrea Welz, Georg Winter, and Matter Of
Volume: 528 pages
Format: 15.5 × 24 cm
Language: German
Binding: Softcover
ISBN: 978-3-7356-0710-2
Price: € 35.–
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A is A is A

Posted on by Marcello Jacopo Biffi

When it comes to analyzing typography it is not only about serif or sans serif, alternating strokes, their widths, proportionality or equal thickness, round or angular shape parts (e.g. or the axial position of single letters, it is also about taking a closer look into the DNA of a typeface. The exhibition A is A is A shows such visual research projects concentrating on even the smallest but also most interesting parts of typography.

Marcello Jacopo Biffi teamed with Marsèll Paradise in Milan to produce the exhibition A is A is A to present a selection of his alphabets. The exhibition comprises an installation designed by From outer Space, and a 16 mm film titled Détour directed by Nicola Pietromarchi and Filippo Castellano and produced by Olympìque. BRACE BRACE curated the project supporting its development and writing along with Michele Galluzzo the curatorial texts. Lastly, Gabriele Donini developed the website.

Alphabets is a visual research project by Marcello Jacopo Biffi in the field of typography and the key piece exhibited in A is A is A. As the title suggests, it consists of a group of related alphabets, which share the same DNA but look considerably different. They are all developed from an elementary pixel matrix—the lowest form of the alphabet—which undergoes many digital transformations leading to atypical results. Within the design process, the order of execution, the intensity of distortion, and the number of different steps are some of the variables that determine the result, which is never final.

For the exhibition, Marcello Jacopo Biffi designed a booklet that unfolds to a double-sided A1 poster showing all the letters on display and contains the texts and technical drawings printed on loose sheets of paper. He also published a limited edition catalog collecting in an envelope a replica set of the sheets of paper used to build the exhibition. A double grid system—a combination of square units and the ISO 216 standard—guided the positioning of the letters in the page. All the single page artworks have been generated by simply scaling and cropping one bigger artboard.

A is A is A

Alphabet: Marcello Jacopo Biffi
Directors: Nicola Pietromarchi & Filippo Castellano
Production: Olympìque
Director of Photography: Gianluca Oliva
Sound design: Mara Miccichè
Set design: Stella Porta
Hands Model: Lucrezia Cuccagna
Gaffer: Paolo Pastaccini
Assistant Camera: Michele Porcari
Editing: Filippo Castellano
Colorist: Leonardo Masoero
Location: Marsèll Paradise
Print: Tipografia Valdostana

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Troptical

Posted on by michubenaim

Just like in music, great rhythm of typefaces is essential. Great rhythm feels tight and professional, while bad rhythm appears too bad for readability. Rhythm does not have to be rigid and just like any rule can be bent or broken. Great examples of odd rhythms would be how The Beatles used shifting meters in Strawberry Fields, and quintuple meters in Within You, Without You. You can dive into music theory later, for now let’s just stick to typography.

Troptical is a hypnotic, energetic multilinear typeface that’s all rhythm and movement. Featuring concentric lines and angular construction, Troptical borrows from the dazzling illusions of op-art and the clever geometry of Latin American design, plus a hint of 8-bit video game vibes, just for fun. The result is a new take on the multilinear display genre, with fully self-contained glyphs and no open terminals.

Beneath all its art-party razzle dazzle, this typeface is really practical to use. Troptical’s modular, building-block characters are standard-sized and made for stacking. The typeface features 45 unique weights across regular, rounded and square styles. And glyphs include eñes and lowercase diacritics to make it easy to use all that kinetic opticality en Español.

Troptical was designed at In-House International by Alexander Wright and is available on YouWorkForThem and MyFonts in Opentype format (.otf), and as a Variable type (.ttf) for designers using compatible platforms.

Troptical

Foundry: In-House International
Designer: Alexander Wright, In-House International
Release: October 2020
Weights: Light, Regular, Bold
Widths: 10, 15, 20, 25, 30
Styles: Regular, Rounded, Square
File formats: .otf (for the 45 individual fonts) and .ttf (variable, one per style)
Prices: $ 10.– (Single weight),  $ 100.– (Style bundle),  $ 100.– (Variable font), $ 200.– (Family (45 fonts)
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Bureau Populaire

Posted on by christian_vukomanovic

When in May 1968, art students, painters from outside the university and striking workers decided to permanently occupy the art school in order to produce posters that would “give concrete support to the great movement of the workers on strike who are occupying their factories in defiance of the Gaullist government,” the posters of the Atelier Populaire started a revolution. With the fictitiously founded Bureau Populaire—for indirect democracy through online petitions—graphic designer and art director Christian Vukomanovic pays tribute to the student protest in the sixties.

With climate crisis, refugees in need, social inequality, emerging right-wing extremism, proxy wars Vukomanovic asks: “Where is the critical majority that generated countless strong protest movements a good 60 years ago? Despite the urgency of past, present and future problems facing society as a whole, it only takes a small group of people to the streets to draw attention to necessary transformation processes. Too few? Hardly, if one takes a closer look at the newly won possibilities of the countless desk protests: online petitions.”

In his three-week performance Bureau Populaire, Christian Vukomanovic transformed the rooms of the konnektor into a forum for typographic protest posters. Up to 300 A3 posters were designed live in a gallery space, printed on site and displayed in the room to examine the right of all citizens to have a say and what effect online protest can actually have. Up to 40 demands from online petitions were designed, printed, and placarded on a daily basis. The protest-cultural and commercial adaptations of the posters question the plurality of demands as well as the traditional role of visual communication.

Uncommented and without evaluation, but in brilliance of an underscoring aesthetic, all positions were presented continuously, creating a up-to-date social voice poll. This process was intended to give all petitions a visual identity so that they would not have to remain unseen in the course of digital mass communication. Nevertheless, the question of social responsibility of the platforms themselves arises: to what extent does grassroots democracy in the digital age even contribute to a division of society?

Bureau Populaire

Concept and Design: Christian Vukomanovic
Photos: StudioTusch
Exhibition Space: konnektor—Forum für Künste

TDC Launches TDC67 and 24TDC Awards

Posted on by JAM

Established in 1946 in New York, The Type Directors Club—the world’s leading typography organization—celebrates and amplifies the power of typography and serves as a global community united by the shared belief that type drives culture and culture drives type. This year marks the first editions of  typography awards competitions since the announcement of TDC’s merger with The One Club for Creativity, the world’s foremost nonprofit organization whose mission is to support and celebrate the global creative community.

The TDC has opened the call for entries and announced diverse juries for its two premiere global awards programs: TDC67 Communication Design and 24TDC Typeface Design competitions in support of emerging, early career, and world-renowned typographic talent. “This year’s competitions will be more exciting due to the wider audience reach as a result of the merger,” said Carol Wahler, TDC executive director. “We expect to see many new, creative and innovative uses of typography.”

This year’s competition of the TDC67, now in its 67th year, is all about how letterforms are used, recognizing typographic excellence and innovation along with the art and craft of typography and design. 24TDC, in its 24th year, focuses on how letterforms are drawn, and celebrates new typeface designs in all global languages. Both competitions have professional and student categories, and receive entries from more than 60 countries.

To be eligible, work must have been produced or published in the 2020 calendar year. Early bird deadline for entry is November 20th, 2020, with final deadline January 8th, 2021. More details on both competitions can be found on the entry site. TDC67 and 24TDC winners receive a Certificate of Typographic Excellence and digital tag certifying their work is among the world’s best of the year. Winning work will be featured in the highly respected TDC Annual, The World’s Best Typography and showcased in an exhibition that is displayed at The Cooper Union in New York. In the student categories, three students for TDC67 and one for 24TDC will win monetary awards.

“For 74 years, TDC has been the world’s leading typography organization with a rich heritage of fostering and celebrating excellence in the field,” said Kevin Swanepoel, CEO, The One Club. “We are thrilled to now be a part of these prestigious awards competitions, and will provide the resources and infrastructure to broaden and grow their visibility in the global creative community.”

This year’s awards competitions reflect TDC’s commitment to ensure diversity within its juries and Board. The launch is supported by a captivating branding campaign designed by TDC67 jury chair Juan Carlos Pagan and his team at Sunday Afternoon. He and his team developed a design system, and a quirky custom typeface with letter-forms that embrace each other in fun, unconventional ways. They paired it with Geograph, a geometric sans serif from Klim Type Foundry. Pagan, who currently works out of Valencia, Spain and is a past winner of both TDC’s Ascenders and The One Club’s Young Guns eleven competitions recognizing young creatives.

TDC Launches TDC67 and 24TDC Awards

Deadlines: January 8th, 2021 (Regular Deadline),  February 5th, 2021 (Extended Deadline plus Late Fees Apply)
TDC67 Communication Design Jury: Juan Carlos Pagan (Chair), Marta Cerda Alimbau, Leandro Assis, Joyce N. Ho, Leland Maschmeyer, Jason Ramirez, Penguin Publishing Group, Jason Sfetko
24TDC Typeface Design Jury: Ksenya Samarsakya (Chair), Agyei Archer, Peter Bil’ak, Nadine Chahine, Sandra Garcia, Noel Leu, Ryoko Nishizuka
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Catalog of Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher 2020

Posted on by Lara Zettl

Although the end of the year 2020 is turbulent, book lovers in Germany are lucky that the most beautiful German books were once again chosen by the Stiftung Buchkunst (Book Art Foundation). This year’s award ceremony also saw the presentation of the annual catalog of Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher 2020 (The Most Beautiful German Books), designed and implemented by the team from Bureau Est, based in Leipzig and Paris, in collaboration with the film and photography duo Choreo. In order to create greater visibility for the award winners despite the current circumstances, the idea was born to link the catalog to an app, thus making video footage available for all 28 award-winning books.

Alexandra Stender (head of production at Suhrkamp) says of the catalogs of the Stiftung Buchkunst, “Each new catalog is a real treasure trove for book lovers and a reliable source for people with an interest in book production: who printed what, on what, and how much? What materials were used? What was the coloring of the paper and what grammage was used? Which suppliers were involved in the production? All details are conscientiously listed in the catalogs. Anyone who wants to trace the development of book production in this high-quality field cannot avoid the most beautiful books as the most important source.”

A must for anyone interested in book design, a treat for anyone who likes to buy beautiful books!

Die Schönsten Deutschen Bücher 2020

Publisher: Katharina Hesse, Stiftung Buchkunst
Concept and Design: Bureau Est (Ondine Pannet, Lisa Petersen, Sebastian A. Schmitt, Marie Schuster, David Voss)
Photography and Video/Reproduction and Lithography: Choreo (Roman Häbler, Lars-Ole Bastar)
Editors: Katharina Hesse, Carolin Blöink, Jana Mayer-Stoltz, Albrecht Dobelstein
Texts of the Jury: Elmar Lixenfeld
Translation: Iain Reynolds
Typeface: Suisse BP Serif, Riposte Medium
ISBN: 978-3-9814291-9-0
Paper: Invercote G, IGEPA, Opakal brillance white, IGEPA, Salzer Touch, 1.2 white, IGEPA; Maschinengraukarton, IGEPA
Printing: Friedrich Pöge e.K.
Binding: G.Fr.Wanner, Leipzig, Georg Kaffenberger OHG
App Provider: visionar GmbH
Pice: € 20.–

Pre-order in bookstores

Clementine Journal Calls for Submissions

Posted on by Clara Weinreich

Clementine is a bi-annual journal circulating ideas for future perspectives. Each issue offers a proposition that invites to be considered, shared, and adopted. Clementine provides a record of ideas and inspirations guided by a specific proposition in each issue. It is personal, inspirational, and positive. The idea is to bring people together and share their varied and unique perspectives. We pull together diverse perceptions and aspire to spark new experiences.

Eutopia
This year offered an array of turmoil and deep soul searching. There has been a lot of confusion, negativity, and fear. Eutopia is the happy place. A place that might only exist in memory but inspires future intentions. It sends an invite to share and connect. You may use it as a guide or set new objectives. Be inspired to change and improve.

We are closing in on 2020 and can transform our intentions to be guided by interpretations of hope. What is our ideal place of well-being? Where do we find our place of least resistance? This project was created to survey ourselves and replicate that feeling. An invitation to see the world through someone else’s eyes. Inspire others and find common ground. Maybe, just maybe this will offer a glimpse of unity. What does paradise look like after all?

Our days consist of accumulated small moments as well as an array of big ones. We take joy in the delicious bites of food we take. In the sun rays playing on a wall. The sound of leaves moving in the wind. And then there are the stories of families coming together and friends offering support. These are Eutopia’s from daily journeys that shine a bright light and transform our lives to perfection. Even if it is just for a moment. Even if it is just within this journal.

How to submit
Per definition, Eutopia is a place of “ideal well-being” as a practical aspiration. Compared with Utopia as an impossible concept. This is a very personal and intimate proposition. It connects to memory and relates to private moments. Stories that warm your heart and inspire. And yes, it might stem from a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time. But time has multiple dimensions. It means yesterday or many moons ago. You decide. 

Please send an item, a photograph, a memory, an objet trouvé, something dear to your heart, an art piece, a song—whatever it may be that gives you the sensation, the vision of a happy place. It can be something very small or seemingly „unimportant“ to the world. The only thing that counts is why it is important for YOU. And then share your story about it. We would love to hear details, feelings, and deeper thoughts. Anonymous submissions are welcome.

Clementine Journal Calls for Submissions

Your post will be shared on clementinejournal.com and @clementine.journal
Let us know any URLs/accounts you would like to include
Submission deadline: January 6th, 2021
Submit

Slanted Winter Break 20/21

Posted on by Clara Weinreich

From December 23rd we will be taking our annual winter break to recharge our batteries and tackle many new projects in the new year full of energy! From January 7th, 2021 we will be back in person for you.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank our readers, media partners, supporters, cooperation partners, friends, editorial staff, and all contributors who make Slanted in all its facets possible. This year was a great challenge for us and we are proud to have mastered it despite the difficult circumstances. A big thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

Scrolling through our social media channels regularly warms our hearts because we see that our work is appreciated by creative people from all over the world. That’s why we’ve collected some impressions of the past year here.

Please note that from now until January 7th, 2021, there will be no shipping from the Slanted Shop (not even subscriptions) and therefore longer delivery times. In the meantime, we will be happy to take your orders—and this is especially worthwhile, because we are clearing out our warehouse and offering you many Slanted magazines, special editions and books at killer prices with up to 85% off! We will process all orders as soon as possible after our return. We thank you for your understanding.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Your Slanted Team

Photos: © Instagram

Stock Clearance at Slanted Publishers

Posted on by Julia Kahl

We are clearing our warehouse making room for new publications in the coming year. That’s why you can buy many Slanted magazines, limited special editions and books at super prices in the online store from now until 01/06/2021. Shipping will take place only after our return from the winter break from 01/07/2021. Below you can find a list of all publications with up to 85% discount! Have fun shopping 🙂

Books

Mags + Special Editions

DOCKS

Posted on by Lara Zettl

The young photography collective DOCKS recently published their second newspaper. Two years ago they teamed up to create a common platform for committed humanistic documentary photography. The newspaper shows five photographic essays by the authors, who deal with various socially relevant topics in Germany and abroad.

In his work The Dream of the Poets, Ingmar Björn Nolting deals with Solamiland, located in the horn of Africa. With surprising photographs he tells a story away from the clichés of and stereotypes of a country not recognized under international law and its peaceful state formation. “My photo-essay is a journey through this region that investigates and visualizes the collective dream of recognized statehood. The project tells of a region where traditional tribal structures and male prerogatives are as much part of the political system as a parliamentary democracy and peacefully executed changes of power. With a mixture of portraits and documentary images, I try to convey a surprising look at a region whose visual representation often struggles with the stereotypes of an East African crisis region.”

Another member of the DOCKS collective, Fabian Ritter, went to the south of Portugal for his photographic essay horizonte de calor, to document the long-term consequences of a devastating forest fire for people and nature in the region of Monchique. For Anecdotes from an unfamiliar Land Arne Piepke travelled through Germany and shows an alternative and personal view of Germany away from the metropolitan areas. With his essay, he questions the existence of a collective identity. With the work Russlanddeutsch Aliona Kardash deals with a population group that is strongly influenced by its migration history and often has habits and rituals outside the German majority society. For Road of Kolyma Maximilian Mann and Ingmar Björn Nolting travelled 2,000 kilometers across the so called Road of Bones to document the everyday life at one of the coldest populated regions in the world.

The newspaper was designed by Lea Szramek and Dr. Felix Koltermann reflects in a text contribution the presented works, as well as the importance of collective action in photography and the newspaper medium. The publication can be ordered free of charge on the collective’s website, only the postage costs must be paid. The collective also started a print sale, by ordering a print, customers also receive a free copy of the newspaper.

DOCKS

Designer: Lea Szmarek
Photography and Text: Arne Piepke, Maximilian Mann, Aliona Kardash, Ingmar Björn Nolting, Fabian Ritter
Text: Dr. Felix Koltermann
Release: Autumn 2020
Volume: 56 pages
Format:  25.7 cm × 35 cm
Language: English
Production/Finishing: Rheinisch-Bergische Druckerei, Düsseldorf
Price: € 2.30
Buy

Photo credit header: Zuhaib (16) and Zakiriye (16) pose on the training grounds of the New Somaliland Circus in Hargeisa, Somaliland. Since there is no circus culture in Somaliland, the shows of the young artists attract a lot of attention, especially in rural areas. The circus group performs in all regions of the country and uses the audience’s attention to educate about HIV, malaria, female genital mutilation and the risks of migration to Europe. Every year, young men die on the way, in the Mediterranean or are kidnapped in Libya. The circus thus becomes a tool of education and gives the young artists self-esteem and a mission. The Dream of the Poets, Ingmar Björn Nolting

 

Typoteka.pl

Posted on by Lara Zettl

Script is inherently international. An essential element of civilisation, script is as much a result of culture as it is its carrier. The Latin alphabet alone is a communicative bond for citizens of many countries, for followers of different religions, for representatives of various cultures. Typoteka.pl is an index of typefaces created by authors associated with Poland.

Various authors—like type designers, artists, letterers, engravers, punchcutters—design forms of script (letters and signs), so that others can use these letters and signs to create inscriptions and to compose texts. Typoteka.pl focuses on forms of script created for the needs of typography: typefaces. Typefaces are letters and signs created for automated setting of texts (typesetting), and are reproduced as metal fonts, matrices, transfer media, and finally as digital fonts. This Index is the first of—hopefully many other similar indexes—that catalog other, equally important, forms of script: inscriptions made in stone, lettering, calligraphy.

The term “authors associated with Poland” does not prejudge what constitutes a “Polish typeface.” Typoteka.pl lists typefaces made for different alphabets and for different users. You will find here typefaces cast, drawn, or published by people born in Poland, but also by those who came to Poland at some point—today or throughout history. Those people are Polish, German, Jewish, Dutch, Ukrainian, and Czech. Most of the typefaces listed in Typoteka.pl are for the Latin alphabet. They often, but not always, contain Polish diacritics. Included are also typefaces for many other alphabets and writing systems. You will find fonts with Cyrillic, Greek, Hebrew, or Arabic characters, created today by Polish digital type designers, often in cooperation with authors from other countries. You will also find metal fonts designed to compose texts in various languages, produced by foundries that operated in areas that are today part of Poland.

Typefaces were once industrial products. To use them, they had to be cast as metal fonts or produced on some other physical medium. This process required the involvement of a team of people, who today are often nameless. Contemporary digital fonts can be created at home, on a portable computer equipped with the appropriate software. Whenever possible, Typoteka.pl lists the names of people who designed a given typeface, or who were named as its author. But remember that the final form of a typeface was usually created with the participation of a group of people.

Typoteka.pl lists typefaces implemented for production in the form of metal or digital fonts, matrices and other media, as unpublished typeface designs. The authors listed in Typoteka.pl are professional type designers, graphic designers for whom type design was a one-time adventure, printers and punchcutters from years ago, and contemporary students. A typeface is a tool. And with Typoteka.pl there arises the wish that beautiful typefaces are used for beautiful communication.

Typoteka.pl

Originator and coordinator: Mateusz Machalski, Michał Jarociński
Historic editor: Andrzej Tomaszewski
Substantive support: Adam Twardoch, Ania Wieluńska, Borys Kosmynka

Typeface: Galle by Konrad Łukasiak, Cobra by Patryk Gmerek

Hamburg Alphabet

Posted on by Chris Campe

You walked past this corner shop for years. Its gorgeous neon sign was probably from when the business first started in the 1950s. But one day the shop was gone and the weird little building was empty for a while. And then it got torn down and replaced by architecture, all smooth and shiny—a pity. Signs and facade lettering characterize the cityscape. They advertise, designate, mark, they are visible from afar and serve orientation. Without lettering there is no city, and so a city can also be portrayed through its neon signs and lettering. The portrait that emerges is multi-layered. It is composed of common, typical, and unique names and designations, of the special relationship to their places, and of the design. And last but not least, it allows conclusions to be drawn about the transformation of a city.

In 2010, the designer Chris Campe took photos of over a 1,000 different shop signs in Hamburg and published the most remarkable ones in the book Hamburg Alphabet, as a typographic portrait of Hamburg. But like any portrait, the Hamburg Alphabet captured only a moment in the every changing city. So ten years after the first edition of the book, Chris Campe went back, took new photos of the signs and published an updated version of Hamburg Alphabet.

More than 40% of the signs documented in 2010 are gone by now. Sometimes they were replaced by more contemporary signage, sometimes an empty wall is all that is left and in some cases not only the sign is gone, but the whole building, too.

Shop signs are only a detail of a cityscape. But the changes in Hamburg’s typographic surface point towards underlying structural transformations. And the “before-and-after photos” in the two editions of the Hamburg Alphabet highlight these changes—and they’re also a great resource of lettering inspiration.

Hamburg Alphabet

Author and Designer: Chris Campe
2010 Edition: Junius Verlag
ISBN 2010 Edition: 978-3-88506-466-4
2020 Edition: Self Published
Run: limited edition of 250 copies
Format: 17 × 12 cm
Volume: 96 pages, 220 color photos
Language: Introduction in German and English
Price: € 14.90 plus shipping (Germany € 3.– , Europe € 5.–, World € 9.–)
Buy

Slanted in L.A.: CalArts and Michael Worthington

Posted on by Lara Zettl

In a town like L.A. and on a production like Slanted’s, which brings together the material for a magazine, not everything has to work out. Often, the best things happen when they’re not planned, just as they did when we went to this gleaming city in fall 2019. We were happy to meet the luminaries from the local creative scene and we are thrilled to share our inspiring encounters with you.

Michael Worthington teaches in the Graphic Design Program at the California Institute of the Arts, and was Co-director from 1998 through 2005 and from 2008 through 2015. His design studio Counterspace was formed in 2000 working primarily with cultural clients. In 2018 he set up MW Books to publish short run art and design publications. His second book Inside Out & Upside Down: Posters From CalArts 1980 to 2019 has been released in late 2019.

CalArts—California Institute of the Arts is renowned internationally as a game-changer in the education of professional artists. The transformative cultural impact of our alumni shows why: We bring out visionary creative talent unlike any other university, school or conservatory. An all-inclusive community for a diversity of authentic voices, CalArts offers comprehensive degree programs across the full range of the visual, performing, media, and literary arts through its six schools. Admissions are decided primarily on artistic merit and creative promise.

The work of Michael Worthington can be found in the Slanted Magazine #35—L.A.. Additionally we shot a video interview to talk about his attitude and view of things. Take a look at our new issue and the video platform to encounter new ways of design thinking!

Little People, BIG DREAMS

Posted on by Julia Kahl

Had enough of fictional stories about firefighters, dinos, pink pigs and princesses? Instead, real stories from real life that give children courage and at the same time convey sometimes complex situations in a simple and child-friendly way? Then the children’s book series Little People, BIG DREAMS from Insel Verlag is just the thing, now translated from Spanish and English for the first time and thus also made accessible to a German-speaking audience.

Each book tells of an impressive life story of great people: Each of these personalities, whether artist, pilot or scientist, has achieved the unimaginable. And it all began when they were still small: with big dreams.

The press release says: “For babies, the perfect gift to welcome them into a world full of dreams! And parents will be encouraged by these books on sleepless nights to make reading aloud a natural part of life. Toddlers will be enchanted by the illustrations—they will discover numerous things. Also, the books are great vocabulary trainers! three- to five-year-olds will just soak it all up, illustrations and text alike! six-, eight-, and ten-year-olds will have a more sophisticated understanding of the illustrations and the meaning of the story—it’s not just about accepting yourself and realizing your dreams for the future, but also about accepting others for who they are. Later books make good gifts for any occasion, because childhood dreams can become realities throughout life.”

I particularly like the fact that the books are drawn by different illustrators, so that they are quite varied in style, but still fit into the series. It is about people who have made history because of their behavior, famous artists, musicians, writers, but also current figures such as Greta Thunberg has already been dedicated a title. Finally, in the back of the book there is a chart of the protagonists’ lives, a nice moment that bridges the gap to reality.

Little People, BIG DREAMS

Publisher: Insel Verlag
Author: María Isabel Sánchez Vegara
Format: 20 × 25 cm
Size: 32 pages each
Version: Hardcover
Price: 13.95 Euro

More information here

100 beste Plakate 20 Deutschland Österreich Schweiz

Posted on by Lara Zettl

Who hasn’t already heard from one of the most important competitions for graphic designers with a passion for extraordinary posters, shouldn’t miss the following information, which were published only recently. The competition of the 100 beste Plakate 20 Deutschland Österreich Schweiz starts today on December 14th, 2020, and we can’t wait to see all the fantastic plays with color and typography artistry, the visionary illustrations and stunning graphic design. When graphic worlds of ideas in a wide variety of formal languages, student poster projects and commissioned work by established graphic designers come together, then it is in the exhibition for the competition 100 beste Plakate 20 Deutschland Österreich Schweiz.

Every year, the entries to the largest annual poster competition in the German-speaking world are selected. Only the hundred best make it into the highly regarded traveling exhibition, where the masterpieces can be viewed. Last year the jury had 695 posters in their final selection with 294 individual posters and 117 series with 401 posters from a total of 251 applicants. The jury, chaired by Julia Kahl (Slanted), Michel Bouvet, Benjamin Buchegger (Beton), Götz Gramlich and Isabel Seiffert (Offshore Studio), made their preselection online. Of the 100 winning posters and series, 45 came from Germany, 52 from Switzerland and three from Austria. Last year the 100 beste Plakate 20 Deutschland Österreich Schweiz shined unsurprisingly with bright gems from artists and designers like Eric Andersen, Zoe Barceló and many others.

The procedure is the same as in previous years: Eligible to enter are designers, clients and printers from the three countries with posters of all themes, formats and printing techniques designed and printed in 2020. Practice shows that the requirements and objectives for posters can vary widely. To create some clarity, a classification of the submissions according to categories is to be made, while the number of awards per category is not determined in advance. The decision in favor of one of the three categories must be made in the process of registration per poster or poster series. This year’s selection will be made amongst others by Xavier Erni, Andrea Gassner, Na Kim, Franziska Morlok, and Markus Weisbeck.

100 beste Plakate 20 Deutschland Österreich Schweiz

Registration: online
Deadline: January 20th, 2021
Selection: Online preselection with a final jury session at March 4th/5th, 2021
Categories: (A) Posters as advertising media for business, culture and social affairs, commissioned works with posting in semi-public or public space
(B) Posters as self-advertisement, as author graphics or as experiment
(C) Posters by students, realized with school accompaniment
Fee: Participation is subject to a fee (from 50.– Euro, graded according to the number of posters), students and members of 100 Beste Plakate e. V. receive a 50% discount.

All those interested in participating will find the information in the following days here or in this pdf

Visual by Bueronardin
Photography by Niko Havranek
Poster by Michele Forzano