Try this one. It should have some good stuff.

-Addison

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0881790346/qid=1093448196/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl/202-3248986-2704615

plus his first book, in German only, with great pictures
http://www.typographie.de/verlagsverzeichnis/typografie/129-9.html

Hi Stephen --

Is there any particular reason you chose Tschichold and Saville? There's an interestingly stark contrast in their design philosophies. I'm sure you're aware the direct influence Tschichold had on particular Saville poster, designed for The Factory in '78.

http://www.designmuseum.org/designersimg/69_2Lg.jpg

I can't find an example online, but the inspiration is very clearly taken from a publicity leaflet of Tschischold's Die Neue Typographie. Perhaps it's in the book already linked?

Cheers Luke

Deliberatley chose Tschichold and Saville because of their different design philosophies. Covering the ideals of Modernism with Tshichold and Postmodernism with Saville. Tschichold initially came to my attention because of Saviles appropriation of his work in several pieces for Factory.

Have you read Tschicholds' The New Typography? I would strongly reccomend it. Written in 1928, but still very fresh.

I thought you might have picked them for those reasons Stephen :o)

I've yet to read The New Typography other than a few small chunks. It's one of those illusive books I keep meaning to get round to sooner rather than later. There are only so many hours in the day for reading. Currently burning through back issues of Idea and Emigr�, and a few Brockman books.

Incidentally, the Saville Associates website has just launched: http://www.saville-associates.com

It is a fun read� I've read it in both the original German and the English translation (the other way around, actually�). But, other than to offer further knowledge of history (always good), it is not relevant to today's designer. Many of the points in the book are offensive, and borderline fascist (as Tschichold himslef later reported), espectialy the idea that everyone should give up their scripts for the modern (i.e., German) sans serif! Imagine, one and a half billion Chinese should give up their writing system, because as he wrote, it = nationalism! Yet the sans serifs that he proported using (Akzidenz and the like) are full of cultural baggae themselves� Tschichold later became an amateur historian on chinese porcelians, which hints that he must have later taken the time to examine their culture. Just goes to show you that everyone can change for the better!

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy looking at German Geometric Modernist art, and love its historical contribution� I've made two pilgrimages to Dessau and everything� but the work has a place: in the past, and in museums.

Awfull navigation on saville site. Why Shockwave? why loose everthing on screen on each click?

Yes - it has to be taken in its historical and cultural context, something that I am trying to examine in my disssertation. I know what you mean about the offensive - there's a particularly racist section that tells designers not to lower themselve to the level of indians. Tschichold dismissing the cultural heritage of an entire peoples at the drop of a hat. I can realte to other parts of the book though, I find his ideas, if sometimes wayward, brimming with enthusiasm. His idealist approach is a far cry from the 'laizze faire' attitude of many contemporary designers.

I might E-Mail you Dan, Luke and anyone else! - at some point to ask you a couple of questions for my dissertation if that would be okay?

Cheers, Stephen

knock yourself out

You can e-mail me whenever you want� dan@typeoff.de

You should include this in your dissertation.

farkin classic brian :o)

Piet Zwart (1885-1977)
http://demo.sfgb-b.ch/TG/20erJahre/Bibliothek/DeStijl/ZwartWerk.htm

Speaking of Tschichold. Does any of you know what caused him to switch from his progressive modernist ways to the later serifed and centered-classical-design stuff he did for Penguin Book? ( I think it was Penguin..)

He had an Epiphany :-)

And what's about "The form of the book"? Is it valuable to read now a days?

The Second World War no doubt was a big part of it.

In Tschichold's 1967 revision of Die Neue Typographie, he appologizes for the overly fascist tone that he took when originally writing it. Germany during the 1920s was a maelstrom of political activities, ideologies, and false righteousness. Tschichold was just as adamant about the new typography as the NSDAP was about their socio-political issues. In 1933, when Tschichold himself became a victim of government imposed backlashes again the avant garde (suspected of communist sympathy), he got a taste of doctrinal rigidity first hand.

Plus, while he was working in Britain (during the war), he had the chance to work with traditional subject matters, and I think he personally fell in love with the seeped-in tradition of Monotype typography that was popular among book-printers of the day there. Maybe it just felt safe.

After the war, Max Bill (Dessau Bauhaus, then Zürich, then the HfG Ulm) accused Tschichold of apostasy for breaking with modernism, and Tschichold accused Bill of being too rigid for holding on so tightly. Paul Rand covers this nicely in one of his books.

War and being pursecuted have a way of messing up your mind. Maybe Tschichold was just longing for a gentler time.
While some here seem to protest against modernism for being too dogmatic, I think it is funny how there are posts here on Typophile which are dogmatically anti modernist.
All of these labels are just academic distinctions which we make for the convenience of discussion. We should just take the entirety of Tschichold's work and enjoy it. I wish he could have had the luxury of enjoying that difficult part of his life, perhaps he would have made an even different inroad into typography which we qould now have a new label for.

ChrisL

From Norman Potter's What is a designer

"As Walter Gropius often explained, the modern movement was not some matter of dogma, fashion, or taste, but a profoundly wide-ranging attempt to encompass the nature of the twentieth-century experience and to meet its physical demands with a constructive response." (p. 36)

Speaking of 'presentism', this is an interesting way to view a movement that's been sliced, diced, regurgitated and reinvented a million times, particularly by the Swiss-Modernist fetishism that hangs around some academic institutions in the US. There are many layers to examining modernist thought and work. And understanding some of the motives can lead to solutions and approaches that aren't set in Akzidenz Grotesk and bland as hell and don't seek to piggy-back on a pale echo of the modernist style.

Tschichold was a very talented man, and he did what's being suggested in the Breaking into the industry thread: he was being bold. I know much less about Saville, but I imagine there's a theme that could be explored along those lines.