Josef muller brockmann publication

The The Face Face behind behind Swiss Design Design Swiss Josef Muller Brockmann

Above Image; Image 1 - Josef Muller Brockmann’s piece - The Film

Left to right; Images 3, 4 & 5 - Josef Muller Brockmann’s advertising pieces for Zurich Town Hall

“Branded the leading practitioner and theorist of Swiss Style” Josef Muller Brockmann is a well renowned typographic legend, who’s work has inspired and developed typography to this day. He was a ‘designer who found calmness and serenity in great reductive and constructivist design’ (Medium, 2017) Through his understanding of the grid system, his use of lines and space Muller Brockmann was able to create pieces that defined Swiss International Style. Being majorly influenced by Constructivism, De Stijl, Suprematism and the Bauhaus he was

branded the ‘leading practitioner and theorist of swiss style’ (Blogs.wayne.edu, 2017) this gained him many achievements throughout history. It was his use of tyepfaces such as Akzidenz-Grotesk and Helvetica that allowed him to express the simplicity of Swiss Design. The ideal behind the designs created by Muller Brockmann within the 1950’s are just as current and vital today, without his influence of Swiss design typography would be extremely different today.

Swiss Design always favoured simplicity, legibility and objectivity and Muller Brockmann was the leader in this design movement. His love of the grid system saw to him be a master of intricate lines and easily readable substance. However it was his ability to utilize the grid system along with specific design fundamentals such as colour, contrast, space and harmony that made him the master of Swiss design. Image 2 showcases one of the many designs in which he utilizes the grid system. The piece is visually intriguing as the lines are so perfectly parallel to one another, this is then further enhanced by the contrast of the bold black background and the strong white lines and type. Another example of his incredible way of utilizing design fundamentals in

the most simplistic of forms is through the advertising posters he designed for Zurich Town Hall (Images 3,4&5). These posters were arguable his most famous designs and were so controversially different from any other designs of the time. The posters were graphic rather then illustrative, and create somewhat of a mathematical harmony which reflected the content of each poster.

It was the obsession with structure and simplicity that allowed Muller Brockmann to create pieces that were always visually powerful and had the ability to move his audience in ways that other typographers weren’t able to.