ah yes, real artists and the sell outs...

I had a professor that could create interesting relationships out of any combination of elements. Her masters thesis dealt with Graphic Design and Japanese Tea Ceremony.

Ceramics is my other love, along with design; seemingly completely opposite though. 3D vs 2D, hands on vs computerized, messy and emotional vs precise and rational... I see those as broad differences, yet generalizations, between the two disciplines. However, if you take one area out of context and replicate it in another environment there can be interesting results. This is nothing new, there have been nearly every kind of typeface designed: refined, proportional perfect faces, gritty, spontaneous ones, trompe l'oeil... obviously not everything though.

Basically what I am trying to get at is this: I am hoping to discover new things about letterforms by working three dimensionally with them, and with my hands. I see this also as the perfect opportunity to help bring together artists and designers with this body of work. There should be something for everyone, both groups of audiences at least. Hopefully, ideally, it will be somewhat educational as well.

A major difference between what I hope to do and what Zuzana is working on is that she is going somewhat farther with her comparison of pots and letters. She is finding similarities with her thrown pieces that relate to characteristics of individual letters. My focus is more literal, actual letterforms, in various incarnation, produced in clay.

In regards to ceramics though, I had not yet thought about one of her points. She states:
"not be worked and reworked for very long, as the clay becomes water logged and stressed. A piece of ceramics ultimately exists as a static entity, whereas each letter in a typeface is designed to work in conjunction with the other letters, in virtually any combination, and so, the appearance of the typeface in use will differ, depending on the particular letter combinations and typographic setting."

I will have to figure out how my work of individual letters fits in with this very important concept of type design- it IS about the sum of the whole. However, in my case, I think it the individual letter ARE more important because they are what goes unnoticed so often. If I was to start stringing together letter people would look at it more for what it says than for what it is. This is about the appreciation of a well designed letter, and the subtle differences between different faces. How many peopler can identify Times, Baskerville, Caslon, Garamond, or Hoefler if you typed it out for them? Many see a serif face and call it Times New Roman.

Rob, Welcome!

> I always walked the line between the two groups.

Good for you.

I think sculpture and type are strongly related! Although I do agree about the dimensional difference issue. But the bit about sculpture being unlike type in that it's a "static entity" doesn't sound right, because people put stuff in their pots, and they put those pots in rooms!

I would recommend taking a deep look at the work of Takenobu Igarashi.

hhp

Hi Rob,

Glad your chiming in! I recall from an early Typecon that Miles Newlyn had a pension for dimensional type whereby creating type to work dimensionally. I hope he reads this post and replies with some examples of his thoughts . . .

As for me when I read your post I instantly thought of a point in my type design career when I had spent so much time designing fonts (virtual software) that I needed to gratify my need for something tactile and built a drink machine . . .

:D

> Miles Newlyn had a pension for dimensional type

Indeed - you just reminded me of something from back then! He was working on this logo for a Spanish company, and he had the basis -or at least an instance- of it in his pocket: a set of small amorphous metallic blobs! It immediately struck me as very Iberian, in its earthy reality.

hhp

The essay from Zuzana Licko makes a connection I have long been aware of, thanks to a late relative who was a master potter.

I once had the great pleasure of visiting a museum's ceramics collection with her, and the commentary was amazing. Not only could she discuss just from the pot the personality and working conditions of the potterer-sometimes hundreds of years gone-but also would comment on the curves of the sillouette, and on how it was 'weak' or proud, or whatever. And when she said it, you could see it.

In pottery the material and glaze is of course very important, but to a great extent pottery is, like type 'about the curves'.

They are so close that, as Licko says, the differences are also fascinating. On of the differences is that in type the relationships between shapes is paramount, whereas in the pot, its single shape is the thing.

Hrant, thanks for pointing me towards Takenobu Igarashi. I have been looking around for whatever I can scrounge up on him, hopefully I can get my hands on a book or two...

In the process of all this I came across a couple interesting old posts. It seems like art and design seem to come together once a year.

2002 - http://www.typophile.com/cgibin/discus.pl?pg=next&topic=29&page=1331

2003 - http://www.typophile.com/forums/messages/4100/21442.html?1070556629



So here is the next question... How important are individual letters? What is the significance of a letterform outside the context of writing? When designing typefaces you have to create one letter at a time, and when doing so (I assume) you attempt to give it a beautiful or unique form. However, when using these beautiful or unique letters it is more important that they work together than how look alone (this is all aside from pure decoration). I have read about several typefaces that have been created solely for their legibility characteristics; I would not expect those individual letters to be the most elegant.

this is great...
r.k

I studied both ceramics and graphic design in college and I always thought there was a very deep connection between them. I still recommend design students take a ceramics class. Throwing pots is entirely about negative space since the potter ultimately shapes the interior of the pot, not the exterior. All the force used to shape the pot is applied from the inside out. The outer form arrives only as a result of the interior form.

As for Licko's "static" refernce she's absolutely right. You can put stuff in pots and put pots in a room, but that's meaningless to the pots. They don't need the room or the stuff, they exist on their own. Letters, ultimately need each other in order to function. Alone they're just as "static" as the pot.

Alone a letter is only an aesthetic object. It may be readable as a letter, but it doesn't need to be. It's just a shape. A typeface requires that a group of letters exist as a functional unit so their shapes are determined as much by the other letters as anything else.

george

There's a strong tradition of ceramic letters being mass produced in the nineteenth century for shop signage an the like.
You can find some reference to them in Nicolette Gray's writings, can't remember which book though, although I like all of it.
I've spent a lot of time doing three dimensional letters (have you also seen the book 'dimensional typography') for logos.
I should be able to launch my website within the next week, you'll find reference to them there if you are interested.