Graphic Journey Blog

Anyone interested?

Some of you may know that I have been recording interviews with designers from different disciplines for the past seven years. They are called RDInsight and are available to listen to or download on the Royal Society of Art’s website. I now intend to not only bring all of those RDInsight recordings onto this site but I also want to expand the idea into Graphic Journey Radio exploring wider areas of interest for the design community. But I don’t want to, and can’t, do it all alone. That’s where you, dear readers, just might be able to help.
 
But let’s get one thing out of the way first. There’s no money. OK, so I’ve lost 75% of my readers already. For the remaining 25%, I need a handful of enthusiastic creatives who are into sound design, audio recording and editing. And thinking longer term budding producers, writers and even presenters. I know it all sounds a bit grand. But with help I think we could create something really special that doesn’t currently exist.

So if you, or someone you know, has experience, energy and enthusiasm in any of the areas above, I’d love to hear from you. mike@studiodempsey.co.uk

Michael (Bernie) Bernard: Graphic wisdom: No1

Above: Bernard's isolated home on Fraoch-Eilean

The highly talented, but little known designer of the early 1960's, Michael Bernard ('Bernie' to his friends) has spent a large part of his life on Fraoch-Eilean, the smallest of the Outer Hebridian Islands (population 55).

Bernie moved away from London in 1969 after completing work on his book A Life in Colour. It was to be the definitive work on the theory and emotional value of colour in design. However, due to a fire at his publishers Hamish Hamilton, the manuscript was destroyed and Bernie was unable to locate his only carbon copy. It had taken him seven years to write.

This event was a catastrophic blow for Bernie, he descended into a deep depression and became disillusioned with the creative world. He travelled to India and then on to Tibet, finally ending up in Scotland.

Above Bernie's caravan home at the Findhorn Community

Living at the Findhorn Community he became close friends of founders Peter and Eileen Caddy. While there he helped build some of the very early eco houses, and in the process, rediscovered his love of colour. An unconventional figure – he was a vegan, committed naturist and an experimenter and advocate of mind altering substances - he started to teach conceptual colour theory and analysis during his stay at Findhorn.

Bernie (far right) with naturist friends in Scotland

Bernie left the Findhorn Community in 1979 after 2 failed relationships. He finally settled on the beautiful Island of Fraoch-Eilean where he has remained ever since, leading an almost monastic life.

I had the privilege of meeting him earlier this year when I was visiting the Outer Hebrides, he allowed me to make a series of short recordings. Now in his late 70’s he felt it time to share some of his inspiring wisdom, to help make us all more thoughtful and sympathetic designers in these challenging times.

                                                

Bernie today, still a sensationally colourful figure

Fragmented vision

Kurt Schwitters. Mz.601,1923.

The use of collage along with cut and torn paper has long had its place in creative circles. Kurt Schwitters was just one of many artists whose principle elements were found items: photos, print, metal, fabric and wood. With this disparate array of ingredients he expressed himself in a highly individual way, as in the above piece. 
 
But how did it start? For that we need to wind back to 12th century Japan, where master calligraphers would prepare their paper backgrounds with fragments of patterns and textures to give depth and visual interest. Onto this they would add their expressive brush flourishes to make their poetic marks. 

12th century Japanese calligraphy on collaged paper

These collage techniques developed in other cultures during the 15th and 16th centuries with the proliferation of bookbinding. They became some of the many tools used by the Renaissance artists and craftsmen to embellish their work.

With the advancements in print and publishing techniques during the Industrial Revolution, a culture of hobbyists was born. Photo albums were often decorated with many mass-produced scraps, along with family photos, postcards and postage stamps. The age of the scrapbook had begun and was to become part of family and school life.

Victorian scrapbook

But it wasn’t until the 20th century that collage became a catalyst for artistic expression during the dawn of modernism. In 1912, Braque and Picasso, whose infant cubist paintings already expressed a fragmented quality, trail-blazed the use of collaged elements directly into their painted canvases.

Georges Braque 1912

Pablo Picasso 1912

Pablo Picasso 1912

Pablo Picasso 1912

Juan Gris 1914

From that moment, the technique was officially ordained as a bona fide element in the artist’s tool kit. There followed a stream of imitators and innovators across the creative spectrum. Here are some examples broken down into their disciplines:
 
Hannah Höch, the German Dadaist, produced this paper collage in 1919:

Hannah Höch 1919  Cut with the Kitchen Knife through the Beer-Belly of the Weimar Republic

Raoul Hausmann: ABCD, 1923 Acrylic Print By Granger 

The very nature of film editing (or ‘montage’ in French) requires the piecing together of visual elements to create or enhance the mood of a story. Sergei Eisenstein became an early master of cinematic collage, most notably in Battleship Potemkin (1925). 

And to greater shophistication in Ivan the Terrible, 1944:

 
Orson Welles was another film director who used the technique to great effect in Citizen Kane (1941).

And one of cinema’s most dramatic collaged sequences can be seen in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, 1960 storyboarded and supervised by Saul Bass:

Above: Saul Bass's storyboard

And Bass also used a torn paper technique in a number of his film title sequences, like this one for Bunny Lake Is Missing, 1965:

The film Se7en, 1995, about a serial killer who took pleasure in collaging details of his perverted mind and vision, was also featured collage in the title sequence designed by Kyle Cooper:

The photographer William Klein experimented with fragmented block san serif type and recreated it in his painting experiments, inspiring many graphic designers.

Above: William Klein text paintings 1963

The American artist Cecil Touchon in his studio, Touchon's visual poetry work from 2006 (above) echos that of William  Klein from the 60's. Touchon  also founded  the International Society of Assemblage and Collage Artists

Comp0sites: Nude, negatives 1966, prints 1984 by photographer Ray K. Metzker

Photo-exposed montage by Francois Kollar Les Lumieres  dans la ville, Paris 1932

Eduardo Paolozzi, Real Gold, 1949

Richard Hamilton, 1956, Just What Is It that Makes Today’s Homes So Different, So Appealing?

Peter Blake, Girlie Door, 1959

Tom Wesselmann, Still Life # 20, 1962

Probably the most famous collage construction, Peter Blake's 1967, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover

Robert Rauschenberg, Retroactive, 1964

David Hockney, Pearblossom Highway, 1986 made using Polaroid snapshots

The bedridden Henri Matisse at work in the mid-1940's

When Henri Matisse picked up his scissors late in his life and created his astonishing collages, with their vivid colours and graphic simplicity, the graphic world got excited.

Matisse created book Jazz, 1947

Blue Nude 1952

The Snail, 1952-3

Matisse became a major inspiration for many graphic designers working in the 1950s and 60s. Over the decades they have continued to embrace collage as their own to great effect.

Saul Bass, 1955

 

Saul Bass, 1959

Book cover for Psycho, design by Tony Palladino, 1959

Above: Paul Rand, 1970

Ivan Chermayeff posters, 1993

Alan Fletcher poster, 1982

Alan Fletcher paper collage, 2000

Alan Fletcher's last collage for Wallpaper cover, 2007

The late 1970s saw an anarchic reaction to an overblown, over-produced music industry in the shape of punk, the ultimate DIY. It was expressed in a very hand made way using the old faithful collage as its prime graphic vehicle...

Jamie Reid poster, 1976

Jamie Reid posters, 1977

Collage in the 21^st century shows no sign of abating. The work below is from Lisbon based designer Cristiana Couceiro, who puts a new twist on the genre by cannibalising familiar 20^th century graphics in her work, with lifts from Penguin book covers to Blue Note album sleeves and everything between.

In the 1980s the design collective Memphis produce a kind of collaged furniture.

^{Chair designed by Peter Shire in 1982 while with the Memphis group}

One could say that post-modernist architecture is a form of collage, with its myriad of eclectic details bolted together.

Post-Modern architecture in downtown Tehran  

Since the 1950s, experimenters in music and sound design have woven sonic fragments together by cutting and looping recording tape to create a new world in sound, and this has encroached upon almost every area of musical composition and the use of sound.
 
John Heartfield used photomontage to great effect to lampoon the Nazi regime. 

John Hartfield, 1932

And taking a more humorous approach, the playwright Joe Orton whiled away his non-writing days by defacing book jackets from the local library, for which he was later prosecuted.

Joe Orton 1962, in his Islington bedroom with a collaged wall backdrop, with images taken from books from his local library

Above: some examples of  book jackets defaced by Joe Orton

So if you ever get bored well, the local library seem like a good place to unleash that creative spirit. Actually, on second thoughts, I didn't say that.

Welsh idyl

At the end of an oak lined road in deepest Wales you’ll come across this bespotted car...

It announces the arrival at my brother’s house. Musician, woodsman, sculptor and dreamer. He has created an eccentric, magical garden populated by many of his carvings...

I spent a long weekend with him and my younger brother to catch up on our respective lives. Much laughter and conversation was had by all. And as usual I zeroed in on a pile of dusty magazines lurking in the corner of a room. This was a good find because they were art periodicals from the 1960s and 70s.

This was particularly interesting…

From 1963 the Studio International magazine was art directed by David Pelham. He was also responsible for the cover design and later became the art director of Penguin Books in the 1970s.

Here are some other covers when the format was enlarged post Pelham’s period.

The above 3 from 1967. And very beautiful too

Above from 1968

And this one from 1970

Also these other  mags from the period...

Art and Artists from 1967

Above two from 1971.

Note on the above front cover. Even in 1970 David Gentleman was a major figure.

Brand off

I have never understood why anyone would want to wear clothes or goods displaying brand logos.

But I am clearly in the minority (especially after the Olympics), as many people, including ones I know, seem to be unphased by the idea. Fine if you are publicising a particular cause.
To freely advertise a global brand to my mind is just plain crazy.

No mater how discreet the logos are, be they Ralph Lauren’s Polo player or Fred Perry’s laurel, I don’t want them. 

Now, if a fee was paid by the manufacturers well, that’s a different matter. 

V&A British Design 1948 - 2012

Image showing part of the exhibition design by Ben Kelly RDI

For those keen followers of design history among you, the new V&A exhibition British Design 1948-2012: Innovation in the Modern Age is a must, even though there are some major omissions.

Better still is a special daylong event organised by the Society for Environmental Graphic Design on Friday April 27th.

Among lots of lovely activities yours truly, along with a band of merry designers, will be talking about classic British design.

Why not come along? To find out more about the day’s events and cost click here.

 

A question...

D&AD, one step forward, two steps back.

I went along to the D&AD annual launch recently and amidst the bustling twenty somethings was a large, wall-mounted diagram plotting the carbon footprint and the environmental credentials of the new annual. It was hailed as “most sustainably produced title to date. Its carbon footprint is 82% less than the 2010 edition.”

Very good I thought, as I had been an outspoken critic of last year’s annual.

Driving back home I thought well, at last D&AD seem to be not just listening to its critics, but more importantly, doing something about it. But then this happened…

Door buzzer…

‘Hello’.

‘Oh hi, Postman here. Is that Mike Dempsey?’

‘Yes’.

 ‘I have a package for you, but it doesn’t have your flat number on it’.

 ‘Number 1, first floor, come up.’

 I sign for an oversized A4, white jiffy bag…

Open it. A black box…

 Inside the box this…

A 'Slice'

I read the contents of the accompanying letter. It informs me that this is a D&AD pencil ‘slice’ and I have received it for being ‘in book’.  Then my brain starts to calculate how many projects are included in the book. A hell of a lot.

Let’s say the approximate number of creative companies mentioned in the book, and therefore qualifying for a ‘slice’, is 1000.  If you were to put these beautiful hand made little boxes end to end, they would rise 93 feet above St Paul’s Cathedral.

Suddenly all that ‘the most sustainable ever’ philosophy evaporated. And just as that D&AD flappy flag project of a few years ago got up my nose, so too has this ‘slices’ extravaganza.

I am all for celebrating achievements. But an award for being in the book, at such a wasteful price? Am I alone on this?

Next I’ll be getting an award for being listed in Yellow Pages.

D&AD are being completely inconsistent in their newfound environmental policy. They should forget all this wasteful nonsense and get their basic communications sorted. A human being at the other end of the phone when you call, and accurate information on the website would be a great start.

 

 

 

Sign of the times: Epilogue

My recent Sign of the times post turned out to be the most controversial I have experienced since this blog started in 2008. Over a 7-day period some 8,000 people visited to check out the post. Many added well-considered and thought provoking comments. What they highlighted was a deeply held passion and clear views about the current state of British editorial design.
 
Grazing through the comments has hardened my view even more.
 
The heyday of brilliant British editorial design ran from the 1960s to the late 1980s. There was a real spirit of adventure and courage, couple with a healthy rivalry and mutual respects between the art directors working at the various magazines during that period; Tom Wolsey, Dennis Bailey, Michael Rand, Max Maxwell, Barry Trengrove, Roy Carruthers, Geoffrey Axbey, Tony Mullins, Romek Marber, Harri Peccinotti, David Hillman, David Driver Pearce Marchbank and David King. A stellar roll call of exceptional talent, all responsible for some stunningly original work.  Yes, it is true to say, and as pointed out in the comments, that they were less demanding times with far fewer distractions – The digital world had yet to arrive.  But when it did, things changed forever.
 
The web gave us an alternative portal through which to view the world, out of that came DIY programming, the explosion of YouTube and a myriad of alternatives to open up new ways of delivering entertainment, information or just plain stimulation.  Meanwhile the newspapers and magazines came under increasing pressure to hold onto their readers. The cult of ‘celebrity’ reared its head, I’m not talking about real stars here, they were always newsworthy, I mean the B and D listers who have become famous for well, being famous and contributing very little. Like an insidious cancer they permeated the pages of many of our newspapers and magazines at an alarming rate.

The depressing visual template for 21st century magazines
 
The advent of publications like Hello, OK, Garcia, Nuts, Closer and Heat etc started to influence their near neighbours and over a relatively short period all covers at the popular end of the market became identical. The inside pages filled with Twitter sized articles about shallow people.

The young and impressionable latched on to them. And these days it is not unusual for kids to say that their ambition is to become ‘famous’, but with little to offer. No talent. No passion.  This ambition now plays a major part in our media, especially television. We see cheaply produced reality shows, hyped up karaoke styled talent contests, or the combative scenarios, where constants are exposed to cruel ridicule for the voyeuristic public to lap up, a formula dished up every which way. It is this unpleasant menu that has taken up a large part of airtime.
 
What has saddened me most about some of the responses to Sign of the times is the acceptance and defence of mediocrity. ‘It’s the way it is’, I hear them say, ‘It can’t be changed’. The old adage, ‘Don’t give people what they want, give them what they didn’t know they wanted’ seems a surreal concept from another time, another place.

 Spot the difference.

Thank you for the Days

This is Robin and Lucienne Day...

They spent a lifetime together helping to shape the design of post war Britain. Robin did these…

and much, more.  Meanwhile Lucienne did these…

They became the ‘it’ couple of the 1950s and 60s and lived the contemporary lifestyle that many of the young creatively minded of the day were searching for. Much of their work is still being made, which is testament to the timelessness and the mark of great design.

I had the pleasure of knowing them a little, for a decade or so before they both died, within a short time of each other. Last week Wayne Hemingway presented a fascinating programme about the Days on BBC Radio 4. Well worth a listen if you don’t know much about this influential British design duo. To listen, click here.