Joshua Heriot - Ikko Tanaka: Minimalism in the East

一田 中光 Minimalism in the East

IKKO TANAKA 1930 - 2002 1

biography Ikko Tanaka (January 13, 1930 – January 10, 2002) was a Japanese graphic designer born in Nara City, Nara Prefecture, Japan.

Tanaka graduated from the Kyoto City College of Fine Arts (now known as the Kyoto City University of Arts) in 1950. Two years later, he joined the Kanegafuchi Spinning Mills, where he worked as a textile designer until 1957. During his time at the Spinning Mills, he began his independent career of designing posters. His first work came in the form of a commission for an Argentinian orchestra concert advertisement. In 1961, he created the first of his 30 year-series of iconic Noh-themed posters.

Tanaka has received several awards, including the JAAC Special Selection, Mainichi Design Award, Minister of Education Newcomer Prize, Tokyo ADC Members' Grand Prize, Mainichi Art Award, Purple Ribbon Medal, and the New York ADC Hall of Fame Prize. Tanaka has exhibitions in New York, Los Angeles, Paris, and Mexico.

田 中 一 光

Ikko Tanaka (January 13, 1930 – January 10, 2002) was a Japanese graphic designer born in Nara City, Nara Prefecture, Japan.

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eastern inspirations

Three posters by Ikko Tanaka, and the subject matter related to traditional Japanese culture and art.

IKKO TANAKA, 1972

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“I was born in Nara, an ancient city where the most ancient traditions of Japan are sustained. I studied in Kyoto, another center of the oldest thought. So I have never been able to detach myself from the old traditions. By the time I moved to Tokyo in 1957 — an international place by then — I brought everything these traditions had taught me.”“I was born in Nara, an ancient city where the most ancient traditions of Japan are sustained. I studied in Kyoto, another center of the oldest thought. So I have never been able to detach myself from the old traditions. By the time I moved to Tokyo in 1957 — an international place by then — I brought everything these traditions had taught me.”

swiss design principles

3rd International Biennial Exhibition of Prints in Tokyo Poster, 1962.

Creative

Forum

Poster,

1979

Even when travelling across Japan to attend the Kyoto City School of Fine Arts, the inspiration of traditional japanese graphics followed Tanaka. It was in Kyoto that Tanaka was trained in Swiss design, learning the basics and building up from there.

It was soon after this that he was working for the Sankei Shinbun, Nippon Design Center, and eventually going on to found his own design studio.

Ikko Tanaka’s work includes the Expo ‘85 in Tsukuba and World City Expo Tokyo ‘96 logos. Amongst others he has worked for the Seibu Saison Group, The International Garden and Greenery Exposition, Hanae Mori, Issey Miyake, and the Mazda Corporation.

World City Expo Tokyo ‘96

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muji

Prior to 2001, Tanaka worked as Japanese retail store MUJI’s art director, and is credited with developing the brand’s no-brand design philosohopy with the help of Kazuko Koike (marketing consultant), and Takashi Sugimoto (interior designer).Tanaka articulated the Muji brand identity, and provided ideas and prototypes that visualized the design strategy.

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Ikko Tanaka died on January 11th, 2002. In September 2012 there was a retrospective of his work at 21 21 Design Sight in Tokyo, curated by one of his closest collaborators, Kazuko Koike.

The series IKKO TANAKA x ISSEY MIYAKE was launched in 2016 as an expression of Issey Miyake’s respect for Tanaka’s works and gratitude for all that they have inspired.

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Designed and written by Joshua Heriot GD102 Design Basics: Typography and Image, BFA Spring 2020, Charles Melcher.

Composed in: Aktiv Grotesk by Berthold Type Foundry Neue Haas Grotesk by Max Miedinger, Eduard Hoffmann Alternate Gothic no. 2 by URW Type Foundry Published to issuu.com.

Copyright: Š2020 Joshua Heriot, Maine College of Art, Portland, Maine