History of Graphic Design Timeline by DasTrystan

HISTORY OF GRAPHIC

DESIGN TIMELINE

EARLY

WRITING SYSTEMS

EARLY

WRITING SYSTEMS

Cuneiform tablet of Drehem , 2040 BCE.

Clay and writing tool

Papyrus and writing tool

Detail from the Papyrus of Hunefer, c. 1370 BCE.

Around the time of early writing it developed quite significantly fast due to the fact that the Mesopotamian people needed to keep records more often. These records could include a large deal of topics, such as answers to question or the amount of food and storage left. It was made on these tablets that people inscribed pictographs into for record keeping; the reason why they used so many tablets of clay was because in their area at the time there was so much of it to go around. It evolved very rapidly in many ways one of the ways being how they were writing which was horizontal and vertical spatial divisions it would smear their handwriting so they starting writing in horizontal rows (left to right). Something very important that this early writing allowed was the The Code of Hammurabi, which contained 282 laws in a series of 21 columns. Many other things happened with early handwriting during this period like marking if someone was home or not, or cattle brands and what not. Hieroglyphs did not rapidly change like cuneiform did but instead it lasted almost three and a half millennia. The earliest hieroglyphs dated from 3100 BCE, and last known hieroglyphs were 394 CE. Egyptians basically developed the visual symbols that had sounds to them that we now know in western culture today, and the Greek culture used this visual system for themselves and developed it further.

ALPHABETS

ALPHA

BETS Greek wooden tablet with uncials, 326 CE.

Etruscan Bucchero vase, seventeenth or sixth century BCE.

Capitalis quadrata (square capitals) from a manuscript, Vergil, c. 400 CE.

Sans serif and Serif

Greek culture paved our way to what we know today and what we have discovered was laid out for accomplishment by them. The alphabet that Greeks adopted and adapted was originally made by the Phoenicians and they spread it within the Greek culture everywhere. They took 5 consonants and changed them to vowels. Up until about 400 BCE they used the alphabet to their own needs, and then Athens adopted the alphabet to officially be used within all of Greece as a standard for their people. Romans came to know the Greece alphabet through the ancient Etruscans. During this time a lot of the lettering was changed within the Greece alphabet by the Romans to suffice for them. Rome then created very beautiful monumental types of letterforms for their huge achievements. These letterforms were thick and thin, bold strokes and had this majestic look to them, but yet simple and well crafted. After many years of letterform production and new developments they started making new formats for their writing like Codex始s which basically overtook the scroll form. Greece and Rome adapted to an original alphabet and developed it into a very well-known form for many to adopt and use.

ASIAN CONTRIBUTION

ASIAN CONTRIBUTION Korean woodblock book translation, c. eighteenth century, of The Intepretation of Menciusʼs Theory by Liu Chunji.

Li Fangying (1696 – 1755) from Album of Eight Leaves, ink on Paper, Qing Dynasty, 1744.

In 1446, Hangul, the Korean alphabet was introduced and is known for being one of the most scientific alphabets known. They were using their own developed very complex characters for their language. Hangul is not written like the Roman and Greek alphabet but instead letters are combined inside a rectangle to form a syllabic block. These syllabic blocks are read horizontally from left to right; the ones that contain a horizontal vowel are read vertically from top to bottom. In this alphabet the twenty-four letters are used to make over two thousands syllables. Right as printing was invented it kind of launched a revolution, because they started writing on papyrus and that helped the Western society. The discovery of printing was made through the Chinese. The first form of printing was relief printing which is where something is cut out in a solid space and inked and whatever remains is pressed onto a surface. After that there were many different forms of printing and it was developed fast once people caught onto it. Block printing was made available by cutting away a negative area surrounding the characters so they would appear in red surrounded by the color of the paper. 105 CE is when paper was apparently developed by Tsʼai Lun, but nobody knows for sure whether he actually invented paper or not but he is known as the god of the papermakers.

ILLUMINATED

MANUSCRIPST

ILLUMINATED

MANU The Vatican Vergil, the death of Laocoon, early fifth century CE.

The Book of Durrow, the man, symbol of Matthew, 680 CE.

The multitude worshipping God, from the Douce Apocalypse, 1265 CE.

The Pauline Epistles, from the mid twelfth century, is a supreme example of Gothic Style.

Parchment and writing tool

Codex

SCRIPTS

There are many different styles covered in this and many of them are very unique in their own. The classical style was very antique, once again they were mainly made by Greeks and Roman designs but many of the didnʼt survive the age. There were also some influences from the Egyptians, but a lot of these were destroyed and didnʼt survive, but enough survived that we could study the form and figure out the layout and many other things. Celtic designs are also unique in their own way; it started right at about the down fall of Rome and the time of migration in Europe. When many of the Celts got converted to Christian many things started to change and some places were converted to churches and designed by the Celts with the Celtic known style which was very abstract and very complex within its own it had lots of linear patterns and twist very abstract designs within a space that held a very complex visual experience. The Spanish side was very isolated from Europe and developed their own pictorial style. It held lots of Islamic influenced styles, and had flat styles with very intense coloring and was often decorated with many things; it also had a very intense feel of illusion or a slight feel of actual atmosphere. The Romanesque and Gothic period lay between 1000 – 1150 CE. Lots of books and scriptures were made during these periods and had a very unique style that was influenced by many others. Also these were periods of great growth and expansion from money and many other things. They had a flow of actuality and very realistic settling, also within the books had many illustrated pages with illustrations that showed great texture and form with vibrant coloring.

RISE OF PRINTING IN

EUROPE RENAISSANCE GRAPHIC DESIGN

RISE OF PRINTING IN

EUROPE RENAISSANCE GRAPHIC DESIGN

Early 19th century movable engravings for Gutenbergʼs press

The Three of Birds, C. 1450

A broadside from 1515 by Albrecht Durer of a Rhino

A Woodcut from 1532 by Albrecht Durer: Treatise on Human Proportions

A page from Juvenal and Persius an Opera in 1501 by Aldus Manutius

The reconstruction of Q, V and R by Geoffroy Tory in 1529

Repertorium Morale by Anton Koberger in 1489.

Title page from Ciceronianum Lexicon in 1557 by Henri Estienne the Younger

The late 1400ʼs to the 1600ʼs was a time of great development and change. The development of Gutenbergʼs printing press made type able to travel very rapidly and be produced rapidly and precise. This invention was HUGE just because it made us be able to have movable and reusable type. Everyone was so use to either handwriting or any other methods and nobody was use to the thought of having reusable type and that every letter would look the exact same if you were to put it on another piece of paper. This wasnʼt the only thing that happened during this time period, but many other developments happened during this time period like the reconstruction of the alphabet by Albrecht Durer. Everything in this time period in one way or another influenced each other, but the major contribution was reusable and moveable type. Also books started to become hugely illustrated and having very different page layouts, also Broadsides were introduced which is basically just a poster from modern day. The late 1400ʼs – 1600ʼs were fulfilled with great exploration into type and illustrations and paved the way for many things to come like new typefaces and many designs for printing presses which would eventually lead to the development of printing firms around England and other places so that prints could be produced massively and transported quickly. Also newspapers are a huge deal in this era because of the print press and the fact that paper could get transported quickly and people could read the news and learn what was happening near them. Once again the late 1400ʼs – 1600ʼs was an amazing period of discovery and development that changed the way people looked at many thing.

TYPOGRAPHY

IN18TH CENTURY

TYPOGRAPHY

IN18TH Construction of the letters G and H by Louis Simonneau in 1700

CENTURY

Romain du Roi master alphabet by Louis Simonneau in 1770

Title Page of the first Specimen book by Pierre Simon Fournier in 1742

Broadside type specimen in 1734 by William Caslon in his typeface

Manuel typographique, volume 1ʼs Title page by Pierre Simon in 1764

Vergilʼs Bucolicaʼs title page by John Baskerville in 1757 in his typeface

Mauala tipografico in 1818 by Giambattista Bodoni

Petit Careme de Massilon in 1812 by Pierre Didot

Chart #3 in Our Agricultural Distresses in 1822 by William Playfair

The 1700ʼs and 1800ʼs was an amazing time period and many great things happened during these times like the development of many beautiful type faces. Rococo was the start of it all from changing many things like literature and the way people look at type. Not too long after Rococo was introduced into the same a huge revolution developed in England throughout France after the death of King Louis XVI. This revolution started the change of many things and the development of some of the most famous typefaces people will recognize like Baskerville and Bodoni. Baskerville and Bodoni are some of the most famous but by far the one that blew up the quickest had to be Caslon made by William Caslon just because of its thick to thin and very unique gestures, not to mention the Declaration of Independence was written in Caslon. The development of these typefaces were by far one of the most amazing achievements in this era just because of how unique they were and how legible they were from their amazing serifs to their thick to thin ratios. Everything about these typefaces were beautiful and they paved the way for most of the typefaces today and they are still very widely used in the modern day.

INDUSTRIAL

REVOLUTION

AND TYPOGRAPHIC

EXPLOSION

INDUSTRIAL

REVOLUTION

AND TYPOGRAPHIC

Factory Smoke stacks from the Industrial Revolution over a city

two lines pica Antique by Vincent Figgins in 1815

fat-face type, 1821 by Robert Thorne

EXPLOSION

Sixteen-line pica, Antique by Vincent Figgins in 1840

five lines pica, In Shade by Vincent Figgins in 1815

Egyptian Type Designs by Robert Thorne in 1821

Reversed Egyptian Type Italic by William Thorowgood in 1833

English Egyptian, Sans-serif by William Caslon IV in 1816

Tuscan Style with ornamental Serifs

INDUSTRIAL

REVOLUTION

AND TYPOGRAPHIC

EXPLOSION First Steam powered cylinder press in 1814 made by Koenig

Printing Press made by all iron parts by Charles Stanhope in 1800 was able to double the size of paper

The Optical Principles of Photography

A Complete Course of Lithography by Aloys Senefelder in 1819

The Model 5 Linotype,

CONTINUED

The Industrial Revolution was a booming time in history because of all the developments it allowed to happen from factories to presses becoming more complex. It developed a huge cycle of supply and demand. Iron and Steel was becoming a known force and many things were becoming more complex. Many, many, many typefaces were developed during this time and nobody expected it to happen as quickly as it did. A lot of things increased like education and more people were becoming able to read and write, most of the majority developed more human values and there was more equality among people. One of the major developments of the industrial revolution was the invention of the new presses and equipment that was coming out, like the William Cowper press, or the Linotype 5 that allowed an increase in size of paper like an unending sheet of paper, also the mechanizing of typography became a huge development. Photography was also a huge discovery during this time and it developed very rapidly throughout the time.

VICTORIAN ERA

Typeface designs by Herman Ihlenburg to show victorian complexity

Victorian Advertisements

1880-90

The Victorian era was a huge time of strong moral and religious belief with optimistic attitudes and bold designs. Lots of very distinct designs and advertisements were becoming popular. Designers during the Victorian era had absolute freedom to do whatever they pleased. This time period didn始t have as many developments as the industrial revolution had but it did contribute quite a bit of quality things like the Pictorial Magazine. Harper and Brothers had a firm opened and by the mid-1800始s it was the largest printing and publishing firm in the world. The Great Exhibition of 1851 was a huge exhibition with very many important and rich people who attended to celebrate the great increase in technology and industrial design during the era they were in. It was held in The Crystal Palace in London in 1851. Also some like to say the development of the Harper and Brothers firm paved the way for the modern day firm as we know it.

ARTS & CRAFTS

MOVEMENT

ARTS & CRAFTS

MOVEMENT

Design Element for the Hobby Horse in 1884 by Arthur H. Mackmurdo

Trademark for the Kelmscott Press in 1892 by William Morris

Title page for The Century Guild Hobby Horse in 1884 by Selwyn

Booklet Cover by Frederic W. Goudy in 1911.

This is the era immediately following the Victorian Era where Victorian produced items was declared “cheap and nasty” and people didnʼt really give the Victorian era credit. This era made beautiful things more valuable just because they were beautiful and precise. People also started to worry more about their peers with social justice and helping the elderly. William Morris was a huge name during this era just because he had a huge fascination with medieval history and poetry, he also was an artisan and didnʼt mass produce anything but took his time and made beautiful things. This era also presented The Century Guild Hobby Horse and was handmade paper with intricate woodblock illustrations. It was disbanded in 1888 but influenced many others. Doves Press was also created during this time by Charles R. Ashbee and T.J. Cobden-Sanderson to establish it. Also an American Frederic W. Goudy introduced 122 typefaces plus his own typeface Goudy. This Arts and Crafts movement introduced many new things and even changed how some people viewed things but it more importantly made many things prestigious in peopleʼs eyes and it actually influenced many people and had many legacies.

ART

NOUVEAU

ART

NOUVEAU

Kitagawa Utamaro, portrait of a courtesan, latte 1700s

Aubrey Beardsley, illustration for Oscar Wildeʼs Salome, 1894

Alphonse Mucha, poster for Job cigarette papers, 1898 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, poster “La Goulue au Moulin Rouge”, 1891

ART

NOUVEAU CONTINUED Henri van de Velde, poster for Tropon food concentrate, 1899

Peter Behrens, The Kiss, 1898

Hans Christiansen, Jugend cover, 1899

MODERNISM

Robie House designed by Frank Lloyd Wright built in between1908-1910

Margaret Macdonald, bookplate design, 1896

Margaret and Frances Macdonald with J. Herbert McNair, poster for Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts, 1895

Peter Behrens, AEG trademark and collateral using Behrens-Antiqua, 1907-8

Pablo Picasso, Guernica, 1937 Ver Sacrum cover designs, Alfred Roller (1898), Koloman Moser (1899), Josef Hoffman (1898)

MODERNISM CONTINUED

Carlo Carra, “Parole in Liberta”, 1914

Max Ernst, collage from Une Semaine de Bonte, 1934

Marcel Duchamp, The Fountain, 1917

Kathe Schmidt Kollwitz, “The Survivors Make War on War!” poster, 1923

MODERNISM CONTINUED...

The Beggarstaffs, poster for Kassama Corn Flour, 1894

Vilmos Huszar, cover design for De Stijl, 1917

This was the time when design changed the way we thought about what we call art. Modernism was filled with many different kinds of mindsets, which sets the tone of the piece. This was a time that changed what we think of art and what actually is challenged the whole idea of art. The movement influenced all kind of designers, from architect to graphic designers, to studio artist and many others. The inner movements that were brought up during this time changed the way people thought about themselves and what other were trying to say or feel. Each of these movements had their own significant influence in the world of art. The way each artist approached his or her style was with long-lasting values, and challenged the role of art and design within society. When the artist始s started experimenting with placing their designs on a grind, to help them see the relation of the space between the words and the art. This way of thinking was also applied to architect and furniture design along with other artist. So the modernism movement had its great and permanent lasting affects on the world of design and art.

BAUHAUS

Title page for Broom, 1923.

Herbert Bayer -Cover design Stattliches Bauhaus in Weimar 1919-1923

Bauhaus Letter Set. Josef Albers.1926-1931

Schmidt, Bauhaus magazine cover, 1929.

Herbert Bayer, exhibition poster, 1926

BAUHAUS

CONTINUED

Paul Klee – Einst dem Grau der Nacht enttaucht 1918

Composition with Yellow, Blue, and Red. 1937-42.

Gropius, Dessau Bauhaus building, 1925–26

La Section d'Or 1920 65 × 62,5 cm Design for an exhibition poster

Bauhaus changed the way people looked at graphic design for the years to come. They may have only been open for 14 years but their legacy carried on much longer than that. Bauhaus and its employees changed many things in the design world from the layout and space integration to color and type. The broke the standard way of design and started to experiment with many different types of forms to really establish themselves and let themselves be known from their practices. Just the pure designs and advertisements that came out of Bauhaus I thought were all amazing. Sadly Bauhaus was shut down due to Nazi control in Germany. After Bauhaus was closed in 1933 most of the students and employeeʼs just moved on to other places because of Nazi control, but Moholy-Nagy decided to come to America and he ultimately established The New Bauhaus or the School of Design in Chicago which was a very big deal considering Bauhaus made a HUGE impact on the design world during the short time they were open.

THE NEW

TYPOGRAPHY

THE NEW

TYPOGRAPHY

Jan Tschichold, cover for “Elementare Typographie” made in 1925.

Paul Renner, Futura typefaces, 1927-1930.

Stanley Morison, The London Times, 3 October 1932

Eric Gill, the Gill Sans type family. 1928-1930.

Rudolf Koch, Kabel Light, c. 1928

Gerd Arntz and Otto Neurath, “Gesellschaftsgliederung in Wien” 1930.

New Typography was a fantastic development in the world of design. Jan Tschichold redesigned the way people viewed type and how type was supposed to be laid out. He changed the layout and development of Typography so drastically that he was arrested by Naziʼs, but ultimately escaped Nazi Germany and fleed to Swizterland. but all of his word was confiscated by germany military police. A lot of SansSerif typefaces followed New Typography and were very elegant for SansSerif typefaces. Lots of new faces started to breach the surface with many fantastic typefaces being laid out by them with very different concepts of structure. New Typography made it possible for people to advance their designs further then what they would have normally been able to without some of the new typefaces or layouts.

AMERICAN

MODERNISM

AMERICAN

MODERNISM Pages from Harper’s Bazaar by Alexey Brodovitch. 1934

Poster for the Rural Electrification Admin. By Lester Beall. 1937

Cover for Harper’s Bazaar by A.M. Cassandre. 1939

Advertisement for CCA by Herbert Matter. 1943

It took America many years to finally catch up with the Modernist movement, and it seemed odd and provoking. In the 30ʼs migration was a very big deal and most of the people migrating to America were artist bringing new ideals and artistic stylizations. Erte, Dr. Mehemed Fehmy Agha, Alexey Brodovitch, Alexander Liberman. Also happening during the 1930ʼs was the great depression, which impacted a lot of people and put several people out of work. Which is where the WPA comes in hand from The New Deal because it offered people a lot of jobs. As for the designing aspect of it a lot of people werenʼt ready for the modernist movement due to everyone was so use to the traditional style used within America and then it just took off. It became very minimal and wasnʼt the traditional style due to they put provoking images odd stylization they used rather than just illustrating them. The CCA also opened in 1926 opened by Walter P. Paepke and they manufactured containers. The CCA hired many designers to create their advertisements, which were fantastic and very different from what people were usually seeing.

INTERNATIONAL

TYPOGRAPHIC

STYLE

INTERNATIONAL

TYPOGRAPHIC

Schematic diagram of the twenty-one Univers fonts by Adrian Frutiger. 1954

Helvetica typeface designed by Edouard Hoffman and Max Miedinger. 1961

Poster for the Basel theater production of Gisells by Armin Hofmann. 1959

Der Film exhibition poster by Josef MullerBrockmann. 1960

STYLE International Typographic Style or the Swiss Style was a pretty big deal to be honest. During this time they developed one of the most famous and hated typefaces, which was called Neue Haas Grotesk but was renamed to Helvetica to be more marketable internationally. This typeface blew up in New York and almost everything at the time was using Helvetica in advertisements and etc. The reason this was designed was because during this time it was all about clarity and order. It was meant to be nice, clean, and precise. This time also introduced many new ideas like accepting design as very important in society for being able to communicate.The Swiss style had a unique design to it and used the grid very efficeiently and it really changed the way we looked at layout.Not only was Helvetica designed but many more sans serif typefaces that were clean and precise were also created during this time.

NEW YORK SCHOOL CORPORATE IDENTITY

& VISUAL SYSTEMS

ADVERTISING

NEW YORK SCHOOL CORPORATE IDENTITY

& VISUAL SYSTEMS

ADVERTISING

Poster for AIGA designed by Paul Rand. 1968

Advertising campaign designed by Doyle Dane Bernbach. 1959

Poster for Exodus designed by Saul Bass. 1960

Proposed Magazine logo designed by Herb Lubalin. 1967

From the 1930始s to 1950始s Paul Rand was one of the most influential graphic designers. The reason why he so good was he was able to establish himself into any field, he went from doing logos, advertisements, children books, etc. Paul Rand was a very big deal and one of the best; he helped put graphic designers on the map. Him and many others were pioneers of the New York school, but Paul Rand was definitely the godfather of this whole era just because he used very clean sans serif but he signed all of his work with his handwriting which was uncommon for the time. Each of the pioneers of the New York school had their own styles especially Saul Bass which had a very hand crafted style and showed simplicity, but each other them were fantastic designers and artist.

POSTMODERN GRAPHIC DESIGN IN THE GLOBAL VILLAGE

NEW YORK SCHOOL CORPORATE IDENTITY

& VISUAL SYSTEMS

ADVERTISING

Jamie Reid. “God Save the Queen.” UK. 1977.

Paula Scher. Swatch. USA. 1980s.

April Greiman. “Does it Make Sense?” Greiman’s Design Quarterly #133. 1986

NEW YORK SCHOOL CORPORATE IDENTITY

& VISUAL SYSTEMS

ADVERTISING CONTINUED

David Carson. Legibility.

Stefan Sagmeister. AIGA poster. 1999. Knife, Bandages, photography, computer.

Art Chantry. The Night Gallery (Performance Art Poster) USA. 1991.

During this time people were starting to come out of their comfort zones and started producing art that was shocking to the world. Postmodernism started taking off fast because everyone was starting to push the boundaries of what they were viewing at this time. They started making more provoking imagery and distorting other pieces of art and this unsatisfied some people. Postmodernism was not being straightforward and letting people know what the message the designers were trying to convey, but it made everyone think about it, which drew people in, because it was not straightforward. PostModernism made people really concentrate and use their brains to really convey what the artist was trying to say, but they never fully got the message they were stating. In the 80s people started to deconstruct pieces and re-assemble pieces, so they seemed unfinished, and distorted. Postmodernism pushed many boundaries and made people feel uncomfortable with some of the imagery, like Stefan Sagmeisterʼs AIGA poster, it was him posing naked with the actually poster information carved into his flesh. Nobody had ever seen anything like this and that is what postmodernism was all about, pushing people out of their comfort zones and making art that was not “new,” but just different and reconstructed from past influences.

? POST-POSTMODERNISM