Othmar Motter – Meister der Extrabold

“I think that the publication Meister der Extrabold about designer Othmar Motter is absolutely indispensable.”
(Stefan Sagmeister)

→ The first comprehensive biography on the life and oeuvre of the grand Austrian pioneer of graphic design

→ Including 5 digital Motter fonts

Tektura, Ombra, Corpus and Femina. While these fonts are world famous and widely popular, the man behind them, Othmar Motter (1927–2010), is only known to a few. By and large, his great international reputation—according to Anita Kern, “probably the Austrian graphic designer with the strongest international presence worldwide”—has been restricted to specialist circles, and even within those, his designs are better known than the graphic designer and person himself.

Motter was a graphic design pioneer from Vorarlberg, a passionate typeface designer and co-founder of the Vorarlberger Graphik studio in Hard, which can be regarded as a precursor of modern co-working space. His Motter Tektura would long define the brand design of Apple and Reebok. He also designed logos for Vorarlberg’s industry which are still present in the streetscape today. In the post-war years, important assignments came, above all, from the regional textile industry. His career as a typeface designer reached an all-time high when his Motter Corpus was issued by the International Typeface Corporation in New York.

Essentially, the teachings of Swiss typographer Adrian Frutiger and Günter Gerhard Lange were a major source of inspiration for Motter’s work. The latter once told Motter that it was a waste of creative time to draw all the letters himself … however, working by hand can rather be seen as a sign of quality. Being ever modest, Othmar Motter preferred to work at night when the hectic bustle of big business subsided.