2 p r i n t 7 1 .

2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

The Top 25
20 Century
th

Typographers
by Steven Heller

“Letters of the alphabet that are the typographer is not always an excellent type designer, even

cast or founded for the purpose though computer programs have made it possible to more
easily create faces.
of impressing upon paper are A typographer is, in my opinion, one who makes type and let-

known as type. … The precise ters come alive on a page (or screen) through aesthetic manipu-
lation and organization—otherwise known as composition.
form of the ‘types’ and the exact For the average person, the distinction between a typographer

position they need to occupy the and graphic designer may be fairly arcane. A typographer and
graphic designer do almost the same exact thing to an extent.
selected paper involve skill in the Yet specifying or setting a line of Helvetica is not typography, just

art that is called typography.” as drawing an alphabet is not type design. Compare a violinist
to a fiddle player. Both can play their parts, but one is a virtuoso.
—Stanley Morrison, British type adviser to Monotype and For this issue, Print asked me to name 25 of the most signifi-
designer of such key typefaces as Times New Roman cant typographers of the past 100-plus years. In their minds the
focus would be on designers like Robert Hunter Middleton and
Matthew Carter, both great exponents—but not typographers.
I further wanted to narrow down the list: American or inter-
Those reading this magazine should know the difference national? Living or dead? Latin or non-Latin typography? I
between type design and typography. Right? decided on American, living and dead, Latin letters. Now, I rec-
“Learning to draw letters is hard enough,” wrote type designer ognize that my selection is probably different than yours. While
Jonathan Hoefler, “but learning to create typefaces is some- there are some names we can all agree upon, there will be the
thing else.” Type design is the creation of a typeface family, from inevitable where’s so and so? Or why is this person included? If you
drawing the letters to developing all of its various components. have a complaint, letters, tweets and text messages will be read.
Typography is the application of typefaces, some that already So, here—from my perspective, and arranged chronologically
exist, and others that are drawn for specific projects. Each by birth—are the top 25 typographers active during the 20th
demands fluency in the craft, design and grammar of type, century who have made powerful and lasting contributions to
but the type designer is not always a great typographer, and the American typographic language today.
 printmag.com 3

2.
Bruce Rogers (1870–1957), the father
of 20th-century book design, was inspired
by William Morris. Rogers designed the
Centaur typeface in 1914 for the Metro-
politan Museum of Art in New York City, and was
known as a classical typographer with literary flair
in his output. In 1916 Rogers moved to England to
work with Arts and Crafts advocate Emery Walker,
hoping to establish a press for fine editions. How-
ever, because of the outbreak of World War I, they
only produced one book, and Rogers soon sought
employment with the Cambridge University Press.
After returning to the U.S., Rogers met William Ed-
win Rudge (original publisher of Print), who began
to use Rogers extensively as a book designer for his
Mount Vernon Press. This was Rogers’ most pro-
ductive and remunerative period, as he worked three
days a week designing for Rudge, designed books
for Harvard University Press (from 1920–1936) and
served as typographic adviser to Lanston Monotype.
Starting in 1928 he took six years to oversee the ty-
pography and printing of The Oxford Lectern Bible,
which Joseph Blumenthal called “the most impor-
tant and notable typographic achievement of the
20th century.”

1.
Will H. Bradley (1868–1962) was America’s first
graphic designer and an American Art Nouveau and
Arts and Crafts pioneer. Under his Wayside Press he
served as illustrator, designer and editor of Bradley:
His Book—making him one of graphic design’s earliest self-
branded entrepreneurs. His privately printed chapbooks and
keepsakes were precursors to the self-promotion journals that
led to, among others, The Push Pin Graphic and Pentagram Pa-
pers. He was also a consultant for the American Type Found-
ers, where he designed various faces, including Wayside Ro-
man, Missal Initials, Bewick Roman and Vanity Initials, as well
as type specimen books. As art editor for Colliers Weekly, he
made certain that its typography was up to a high standard. For
Victoria Bicycles and other advertisements he integrated his
sinuous lettering throughout the floriated iconography that
was a hallmark of his early output.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b. Book cover by
Will... 2a. ...”)
4 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

3.
Oswald Bruce Cooper (1879–1940), a progenitor of the Chicago Design Style dur-
ing the 1920s and ’30s, combined calligraphic skill with typographic expertise to cre-
ate mass periodical advertisements that were modern in character and classic in form.
But as a prodigious typographer he may be overshadowed by his emblematic type
design, Cooper Black, the most imposing of the so-called fat faces and leader of the so-called
fat face market (or “black blitz”) of the mid-1920s. Cooper’s layouts were unfettered by decora-
tion; he was skilled at the art of arranging type for maximum effect without the flowers, ding-
bats and borders that junked up many press advertisements.
He often complained that he was beholden to public tastes: “We lose hundreds of years of
taking seriously every inane suggestion from anybody anywhere,” he once said.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b.
Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)
 printmag.com 5

4.
William Addison Dwiggins (1880–1956)—cred-
ited with coining the term graphic design—was a type
designer, calligrapher, book designer, letterer and
typographer, among his other arts. Dwiggins began
his practice as a letterer in Chicago with prolific type designer
Frederic Goudy; together they moved to Hingham, MA. He
spent the rest of his life there, designing, printing, writing, ed-
iting and performing with his homemade marionettes (really).
The typefaces he designed, Electra, Caledonia, Metro, Eldorado,
Winchester and more, as well as his book on typography, may
outlast his more commercial lettering work. Still, it can be ar-
gued that his book, advertisement and magazine typography
loom large in the stylistic pantheon of his era. Whether it was
the handlettering for the spines and jackets of Alfred A. Knopf
books—such as the exquisitely decorated Autobiography of a
Super Tramp by William H. Davies—or the smartly fragmented
(schizophrenic) cover type and art for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,
Dwiggins worked on letterforms with thematic, harmonic and
tonal precision.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b. Book cover by
Will... 2a. ...”)
6 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

5.
Frederick G. cooper (1883–1962), better known
as F. G. Cooper, helped develop the commercial
American poster. He was known particularly for his
lettering, and noted for his interest in using lower-
case rather than capital roman letters. Also a cartoonist and
typographer, his lettering set a tone for the semi-comic/serious
work of his day; neither Modern nor classical, it had a witty
quality. According to Leslie Cabarga in The Lettering and Graph-
ic Design of F. G. Cooper, by 1905 Cooper (not to be confused
with No. 3 on our list, Oswald Cooper) was entrenched in work
for the New York Edison Company, including their corporate
character icon. As time passed, his lettering became more ty-

6.
pographic than cartoony, and he became best-known for his
illustrated typographic magazine covers for Life and others. Merle Armitage (1893–1975), an art di-
“Being printed from wooden blocks, these very modern creations rector, book designer and theater set and
had the air of primitivity,” noted The Poster #13. And although costume designer in New York City, had a
it may not have always looked like it, his strength was “his com- fixation on modern artists like Picasso,
plete and utter simplicity.” Klee and Kandinsky, which inspired his total immer-
sion into typography for books—often books he wrote,
edited or published about progressive artists of his
time. Armitage’s notable books epitomized the Art
Moderne sensibility. Paul Rand once grumbled that
Armitage “overdid it,” referring to his signature mam-
moth type treatments, usually on two-page title
spreads (a form he claimed to have invented). He was
also extremely fond of generous margins and widely
leaded serif body texts. His unorthodox treatments
were the result of a mission to demolish antiquated
tenets and reflect his time. He angrily described the
books of his era as “anonymous among their fellows
… becoming comparatively impotent as a means of
communication.” Critiquing the publishing field at
large, he noted, “the grand escalator that has brought
us all up from darkness and slavery into light and
freedom has, in our time, lost its leadership, and is
uncertain of its function and its direction.” He de-
plored ersatz William Morris and other classical
graphic forms, and replaced antiquarian aesthetics
with modern sans serif typefaces, custom-made let-
ters and bold pictorial images. Armitage imbued in
each book a certain monumentality that underscored
the words and enhanced the pictures.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster

from Will... 1b. Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)
 printmag.com 7

7.
alexey brodovitch (1898–1971) was
best-known as a magazine designer who
exquisitely mastered pacing photography
and type in a cinematic manner. He was
a typographic narrator, so to speak, echoing the con-
tours and moods of photographs with the fluidity of
type. His favorite face in the late 1930s was Didot,
which he used while working in Paris on Cahiers
d’Art in the 1920s. During his time at Harper’s Ba-
zaar, Didot with its lights and darks, poise and bal-
ance, became Brodovitch’s veritable signature that
defined the essential qualities of fashion of the pe-
riod. In the 1950s Bodoni shared the stage.
Typographically speaking, Brodovitch did incred-
ibly modern things with classical aesthetics. Port-
folio, published between 1949 and 1951, was a case
in point, a 20th-century graphic and industrial arts
magazine that elevated design and set the standard
of magazine layout that few publications then or
now can equal. The key to success was dynamic jux-
tapositions: big and small, bold and quiet, type and
pictorial. Brodovitch splayed comps out on the floor,
mixing and matching, moving pages and entire sto-
ries around as needed. He used a Photostat machine
like a notepad; he would get stats of every photo, and
as he put them down all of a sudden a spread would
materialize beautifully proportioned, everything in
scale, with just the right amount of white space, type
and picture mass.

credits for images can go here (e.g.

“1a. Poster from Will... 1b. Book
cover by Will... 2a. ...”)
8 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

8.
bradbury thompson (1911–1995) was a
maestro of the grand typographic symphony,
especially the turning of pages. He so mas-
tered the rhythmic tenor of his typography
that one couldn’t help but hear music while seeing the
letterforms. His opus was the orchestration of the com-
pany magazine Westvaco Inspirations, which he edited
and designed for more than 60 issues (1939–1962).
Among these issues were some design and typographic
history milestones, but my my favorites were two issues
produced on photography in 1954 and 1956, which
showed Thompson’s genius for integrating photos, ty-
pography and painting together as essential elements
of design. This was not his only typographic feat, how-
ever: He designed Alphabet 26, a simplified English
alphabet system to help readers learn letters faster.

9.
Otto storch (1913–1999) was one of a handful of
graphic designers in the 1950s who helped modern-
ize the visual content of staid old American maga-
zines—in part, by returning to the past. He belonged
to what the graphic design historian Philip B. Meggs called “the
New York School,” a group of editorial and advertising design-
ers who based layouts on unified visual ideas rather than merely
embellishing the page with ornamentation. As art director of
the women’s lifestyle magazine McCall’s for 14 years starting in
1955, Storch wed stylish typefaces and studio photography into
word-pictures, so that a headline or text type was an integrated
component of the illustration rather than separated from it, as
was the common practice.
Typical of this approach was a 1961 McCall’s layout for “The
credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b.
Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”) Forty-Winks Reducing Plan,” in which a picture of a sleeping
woman lying on top of the text distorts it to simulate a sagging
mattress. Storch used a variety of photographic processes to
make type twist, turn and vibrate in the days before computers
made such special effects commonplace in magazine layouts. He
also helped revive late 19th-century Victorian wood typefaces,
which had been passé for decades, to add graphic impact and
contrast to the printed page—a style embraced to this day.
 printmag.com 9

10.
Paul Rand (1914–1996)
credits for images can go
would not single him-
here (e.g. “1a. Poster from self out as a typogra-
Will... 1b. Book cover by
pher; he was a “com-
Will... 2a. ...”)
mercial artist” or “graphic designer,” and
typography was part of the mandatory
job skillset. But there would be no Rand
design if typography was simply included
as part of a larger patchwork. He had a
lot to say about typography: “I know peo-
ple who have religiously used only sans
serif, who suddenly switched to Times
Roman. Now, the reason they switched
to Times Roman is for the same reasons
they used sans serif. They considered sans
serif very functional, devoid of doodads
and ringlets and hair curlers. … There is
no typeface that is more reasonable than
Times Roman. But let’s face it, Times Ro-
man is ugly, especially in big sizes.” Like
many of his Modern contemporaries,
Rand used only certain faces but not for
their looks alone. The real difference is,
he said, “the way ‘space’ is interpreted:
that is, the way an image is placed on a
sheet of paper.”
10 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

11.
alex steinweiss
(1917–2011) often goes
down in history as the
first graphic designer to
put original art on 78 rpm album covers—
however, this claim must be modified to
say he was the first to make typographi-
cally illustrated posters for records. The
distinction is essential; art was used on
some RCA albums before he introduced
his original designs in 1938, but these in-
stances were usually existing paintings
by great masters. As an illustrator and
typographer, Steinweiss was profoundly
influenced by the French, German, Eng-
lish and Italian poster artists of the 1920s
and ’30s—most importantly, A.M. Cas-
sandre, who hand-drew letterforms and
made typefaces for a range of advertising
clients. Steinweiss’ eclectic typographic
palette, which included 19th-century
wood and electrotype cuts that he wed to
more modern scripts and sans serifs,
helped define the modern record cover
aesthetic. These albums were sometimes
raucous like theater bills and other times
subdued like book pages, but in total
changed the way records were displayed
and sold as individual typographical
entities.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from

Will... 1b. Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)
 printmag.com 11

credits for im-

ages can go here
(e.g. “1a. Poster
from Will... 1b.
Book cover by
Will... 2a. ...”)

12.
herb lubalin (1918–1981) amplified
the voice of typography. Although his
expressive work began prior to the ad-
vent of phototype, he anticipated its
wonders, as well as other technological advances—and
not just in how to set type, but in how to extract emo-
tion from it. Lubalin’s typography was sometimes like
a building block in which paragraphs, words and punc-
tuation fit seamlessly together in a pattern that both
symbolized and stated the idea it was communicating.
Curiously, however, he was offended at being called a
typographer. “What I do is not really typography, which
I think of as an essentially mechanical means of put-
ting characters down on a page. It’s designing with let-
ters.” His friend and business partner, the type impre-
sario Aaron Burns, called his work typographics, which
implies a kind of acrobatic skill that was clear from the
moment Lubalin left New York’s Cooper Union and
became an advertising art director. Lubalin also de-
signed alphabets, his most famous being Avant Garde,
a tip of the hat to the future of type. But most charac-
teristic of his body of work was his playful approach to
design; he was amazed at how the shape and the weight
of each symbol could change the meaning of words.
12 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

13.
corita kent (1918–1986), aka Sis-
ter Mary Corita Kent (born Frances
Elizabeth Kent), used typography
as a means to an end. She was not
a commercial graphic designer, but type was a com-
ponent of her art, and art was a tool of her social ac-
tivism. She joined a Catholic convent in 1936—right
after she completed high school—and served in the
Immaculate Heart of Mary order in Los Angeles for
three decades as a “rebel nun” and head of the art
department. (She ultimately left the order to pursue
art in Boston, feeling stifled by an archdiocese that
did not always stand by her politicized service.) Kent
was mostly a silkscreen printer, although she also
published offset books because she wanted her art
to be affordable and widely distributed. Her designs
combined handlettering and vintage display letter-
forms printed in bright fluorescent colors. She prac-
ticed during the heyday of Pop Art, and many of her
posters borrowed from this language. Damn Every-
thing But the Circus was one of her most gaily orna-
mented typographic assemblages, illustrating the 26
letters of the alphabet. On the whole, her circus-
themed prints drew on materials she saw at the Ring-
ling Museum of the American Circus, as well as in
19th-century American advertisements.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b.
Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)
 printmag.com 13

14.
Saul Bass (1920–1996)
was the pioneer of motion
typography. While he was
not the first graphic de-
signer to make type dance on screen, he was
the most demonstrative, indeed ingenious,
to do so. Part of his strategy was to brand or
identify a film from the get-go, the advertise-
ments, then follow through with consistent
title sequences. Using pictorial devices wed
to expressive lettering and type, as he did
for The Man With the Golden Arm and Bon-
jour Tristesse, among his many campaigns,
he developed a system emphasizing that
“creativity is indivisible.” In the May/June
1958 issue of Print, the editors acclaimed
that since trade requirements demanded
extensive credits on movie titles, “It seems
that this usually rather dull interlude should
be converted into a positive introduction to
the film. Saul Bass’ objective is to make the
titles sufficiently provocative and entertain-
ing, to force movie-goers to remain in their
seats.” While Bass did not completely
achieve this with type, it was his typography
that revolutionized the movie industry.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a.

Poster from Will... 1b. Book cover by Will...
2a. ...”)
14 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

15.
Push Pin Studios—Milton Glaser, born 1929, and Seymour Chwast, born 1931—created a ty-
pographic and language revival of past for present. In 1953 when the first Push Pin Almanack was pub-
lished, it launched a graphic style challenging the prevailing ethic of functionalism, the International
Style, imported from the Swiss and adopted by leading American corporate and advertising designers.
A bimonthly promotional piece, the Almanack led the way of emerging historicist design trends. A taste for all things
old fashioned was returning, perhaps as a reaction to what was perceived as cold, humorless Modernism. “It was called
the Push Pin Almanack,” Chwast explained in a 1990 interview, “because it was a quaint name—and quaintness was
popular in those days.” Chwast and co. published six issues of the Almanack before Push Pin Studios officially opened,
and two after. The Almanack evolved into the Push Pin Monthly Graphic, which began as a broadside, printed in black
and white on one sheet (usually newsprint). The elegant and emblematic logo was designed by Glaser in a variant of
German Fraktur. In all, 86 issues were published from 1953 to 1980, and they ran the gamut from the silly to the profound.
The Graphic had an incalculable influence on the conceptualization of graphic design, and its evolution eclecticized
American design but also changed the style and content of American typography and illustration.

M !!!

C PERSTOWN
credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b.
MUSIC FESTIVAL Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)
18TH SEASON
www.cooperstownmusicfest.org

2O16

1 877 666 7421

The Cooperstown Summer Music Festival is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. Poster Designed by Milton Glaser 2016. Mohawk Superfine Ultrawhite Smooth 65# Cover.
 printmag.com 15

16.
credits for images can go
here (e.g. “1a. Poster from
Massimo Vignelli (1931–2014) believed everything could be designed better
Will... 1b. Book cover by through the correct use of typefaces. In The Vignelli Canon, he wrote, “Most
Will... 2a. ...”) typefaces are designed for commercial reasons, just to make money or for iden-
tity purposes. In reality the number of good typefaces is rather limited and
most of the new ones are elaborations on pre-existing faces.” His essentials: Bodoni, Helvetica,
Times Roman, Century, Futura, Optima, Univers, Caslon and Baskerveille. “As you can see, my
list is pretty basic but the great advantage is that it can assure better results. … It is also true that
in recent years the work of some talented type designers has produced some remarkable results
to offset the lack of purpose and quality of most of the other typefaces.” Vignelli was a typo-
graphic minimalist; he favored clear hierarchy and dramatic contrasts, which allowed him to
achieve the maximum impact using economical means; he knew how to make a few typefaces
or images dramatic and expressive. While he admired “classic” typefaces, he avoided typeset-
ting traditions that created fussy complexity, such as paragraph indents and hyphenation. His
control made clarity look simple, when in reality it was difficult to copy his work unless one
shared his ideology. Merely using a few typefaces or cropping full-bleed images tightly wasn’t
enough; his process involved finding the perfect balance of joy, surprise and consistency.
16 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

17.
victor moscoso (born
1936) was a fallen Modern-
ist in the San Francis-
co psychedelic countercul-
ture. The Brooklyn-raised, Spanish-born
artist/designer stumbled into this milieu and
became a defining force in the distinctly
American typography introduced through
psychedelic rock posters. The style was note-
worthy for its illegible typefaces, electric col-
ors and antique illustrations—a conjoining
of 19th-century slab serif wood types and
Vienna Secession/Art Nouveau naturalistic
letterforms. Moscoso created some of the
most emblematic posters of the 1960s; the
Blues Project poster is one classic for which
he used a vintage photograph of a nude Sa-
lomé. Following her contour, he arranged
the concert information in a typeface that
he called Psychedelic Playbill (an adapta-
tion of a Victorian woodtype). But he did not
just set the type, he drew the letters out of
negative space (whiting out all the areas be-
tween the bodies of the letterforms, rather
than drawing them directly). The figure was
credits for images can go
printed in bright orange against an acid-
here (e.g. “1a. Poster from
green background; the lettering was printed Will... 1b. Book cover by
in process blue. The slightly off-register trap- Will... 2a. ...”)

ping gave the letters a three-dimensional

look in addition to the vibrating sensation
produced by the juxtaposition of similar
chromatic values.

18.
bea feitler (1938–1982) learned magazine design, fash-
ion photography and typography from Marvin Israel, one
of her teachers from Parsons who, in 1961, became art
director of Harper’s Bazaar. That same year, Feitler and
Ruth Ansel (born 1938) joined the magazine as art assistants. When Is-
rael left Bazaar in 1963 to devote himself to painting, Feitler and Ansel,
then in their mid-20s, were named co art-directors and at once channeled
the energy emerging from pop culture: street fashion, rock music, pop and
op art. Each had their respective typographic preferences, which was a
touch of the modern, a bit of the classical and a dose of the spectacular.
They followed Alexey Brodovitch’s tradition of designing magazines as a
harmonious and cinematic whole. “They were open to accidents, material
around the studio and events surrounding them,” Philip B. Meggs noted
in an AIGA profile. They maintained an inspirational wall—something
like a mood board—that would offer them (and anyone who laid eyes on
it) a resource for invention. Making type carry the weight of expression
was one such outcome. Feitler once summed up her editorial design phi-
losophy as thus: “A magazine should flow. It should have rhythm. You can’t
look at one page alone; you have to visualize what comes before and after.
Good editorial design is all about creating a harmonic flow.”
19.
printmag.com 17
katherine mccoy (born 1945) was as much a catalytic force in
late 20th-century American typography as she was a practitioner.
Originally an adherent of clean Swiss Modernism and a “problem
solver” through modern objectivity, she was exposed to an alterna-
tive method of experimental expression, notably by Edward Fella, who launched his
own rejection of Swiss-ness.
In the early 1970s McCoy co-founded a multidisciplinary partnership with her
husband, Michael, and eventually both accepted roles as co-chairs of Cranbrook
Academy’s graduate design departments. The school’s Avant Garde legacy inspired her
to look differently at design and typography through a linguistic lens. She encouraged
students to play more fluidly and expressively with typography, teaching by example
with the Cranbrook materials she and Michael produced as McCoy & McCoy. Her
critiques at Cranbrook frequently addressed disrupting the norms of everyday practice.
She required students to read about both historical and contemporary design and
theory, to really understand the context in which they were communicating. What
she founded became a Postmodern style but began as an intellectual conversation
on the pre- and post-digital age.

20.
April Greiman (born 1948) was for a while
the American incarnation of Wolfgang Wein-
gart. But then she was reborn in 1984 when
the Macintosh inched its way into the design
field. She recognized the huge potential of this new medium
and quickly threw herself into it. “The digital landscape fasci-
nates me in the same way as the desert,” she said in an AIGA
essay. Greiman’s formal design education began at the Kansas
City Art Institute, where she was introduced to the principles
of Modernism by Inge Druckrey, Hans Allemann and Chris Ze-
linsky, all of whom had been educated at the Basel School of
Design in Switzerland. Inspired, she too went to Basel for grad-
uate school. As a student of Armin Hoffman and Weingart in
the early 1970s, Greiman explored the International Style in
depth, as well as Weingart’s personal experiments in develop-
ing an aesthetic that was less reflective of the Modernist heri-
tage and more representative of a changing, post-industrial
society. Weingart introduced his students to what is now called
the New Wave, a more intuitive, eclectic departure from the
stark organization and neutral objectivity of the grid, which
sent shockwaves through the design community. Wide letter-
spacing, changing type weights or styles within a single word,
and the use of type set on an angle were explored not as mere
stylistic indulgences but in an effort to expand typographic
communication more meaningfully. After moving to Los An-
geles, Greiman collaborated with photographer Jayme Odgers,
which led to two experiences that would greatly influence the
direction her life would take—he introduced her to the desert
and, shortly after, they formed a creative partnership that was
to last for four years and produce some highly visible typograph-
ic/photographic work that would define the digital ’80s.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b. Book cover by
Will... 2a. ...”)
18 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

21.
Paula scher (born 1948) began her typo-
graphic journey as an archeological anthro-
pologist. One of her most well-known “digs”
included the Best of Jazz poster that was the
result of uncovering the much-forgotten Russian Avant Gard-
ists’ visual vocabulary, but she ended up with a distinctive tap-
estry woven of personal affinities, problem-solving pragmatism
and New York derring-do. The letterforms are not Russian Cy-
rillic, but 19th-century American sans serif woodtypes savored
from old Victorian type catalogs. Yet Scher also borrowed the
constructivist’s strong geometric composition, thrusting diago-
nals and signature colors: red and black. High contrast is ap-
parent between the bold, black capitals that spell out Best and
the smaller, busier typography. Overlapping colors, surprints
and knockouts make the most of the limited color palette. There
is an unmistakable resemblance to Victoriana in the tightly
packed, nearly cluttered arrangement of type, the woodtype
typography itself, and the slant toward ornamentation. Al-
though it was a hybrid of two historical forms, the result was
fresh-faced, decidedly contemporary yet eerily familiar, much
like a child whose genetic code spawns from—but ultimately
transcends—that of its parents. Scher’s work is never entirely
based on typography but it does play a central role in commu-
nicating her ideas. While the selection of typefaces may origi-
nate in the history of design as inspiration, influence, homage,
credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b. Book cover by
quotation and parody, the results are clear interpretations held Will... 2a. ...”)
together by the glue of knowledge and imagination.
 printmag.com 19

22.
Louise Fili (born 1951) is the paradigm of ty-
pographic elegance. Hired by the legendary
type maestro Herb Lubalin, a formative expe-
rience to be sure, she was already working on
expressive ways of retooling vintage and historical typefaces
from all over the world. As art director of Pantheon Books, she
had an extraordinary opportunity to experiment daily with many
different periods of design history, and produced close to 2,000
jackets and covers, including the now-classic The Lover, in which
she introduced a form of nuanced shadow lettering that influ-
enced many other typographers (Editor’s Note: See page TK).
Design historian Philip B. Meggs wrote in Print that Fili was
one of “The Women Who Saved New York,” a reference to the
revival of revivalist (or retro) graphic design emanating from the
city. Yet Fili’s work never slavishly referenced the past but rather
incorporates its virtues. She later left Pantheon to diversify and
pursue another passion: food. Fili invariably began making ty-
pographic logos that were elegant, witty and memorable. From
there, she produced distinct package designs with an intense
focus on type and typography. Typefaces that exist yet are re-
drawn are her driving design force, but type that expresses ideas,
if not moods, is what distinguishes her typography.

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b. Book cover by
Will... 2a. ...”)
20 p r i n t 7 1 . 2 s u m m e r 20 1 7

23. 24.
rudy vanderlans (born 1955) co- David carson (born 1955) defined the zeit-
founded Emigre, the clarion of the new geist of his epoch. In 1990, the magazine Beach
graphic design, with his wife, type de- Culture, devoted to West Coast watersports,
signer Zuzana Licko. The magazine was a perplexing yet enviable radical design
knocked the typographic establishment for a loop and object when it landed in competitions and annuals nationwide.
helped forever change visual communication and graphic Surfers were its target audience, yet it was also followed by de-
design. Emigre was a laboratory for the new-new digital sign practitioners and scholars. It was a turning point in pub-
typography that VanderLans’ digital type foundry was lication design. David Carson, its designer, created a vehicle
putting into the world, and a trailblazer in those uncer- rooted in raucous typography and design tomfoolery that broke
tain early days when fonts became part of the ambient the same rules that Futurists and Dadaists had attacked in the
vocabulary. “Most designers were telling us the Macin- teens and ’20s. With its deliberate design indulgences and com-
tosh was a fad without any use for serious graphic design,” puter-driven trickery, Beach Culture made a statement that
VanderLans has recalled. “So at the time we felt very iso- graphic design should not be simply a neutral frame for con-
lated within the design community. We weren’t taken se- tent—design tropes should be integrated into the content or
riously at all. We enjoyed the challenge and opportunities even be the content. Carson catered to an audience that was
this tool offered, but we had no idea how big it would be- presumed literate enough to navigate through the chaotic visu-
come, and that it would solidify our place within it.” Emi- als and text. Although there were no rules about how a surfing
gre issues were often designed in radically different styles magazine should look, one would still not have expected this
from one another, some by guest designers, showing al- to be a wellspring of typographic revolution, or that its distinct
ternative ways of making typography using the Mac. Older style would wash up on the shores of mainstream culture. Car-
Modern designers went nuts because the tenets of bal- son seized the opportunity; following in the footsteps of con-
ance, hierarchy and elegance were turned on their ear. In temporary design experimenters, including Wolfgang Weingart,
2005 the magazine ceased publication, in large part be- Rudy VanderLans and Neville Brody, he began an expedition
cause of the tremendous production expense, financed into new realms of visual presentation. But Carson’s spin on
by type sales that declined when the economy dipped. typographic anarchy was different: He not only infused his
But there were other reasons to discontinue Emigre, pages with wit and irony, he accepted that a magazine page is
VanderLans says. “The world of graphic design was chang- destined to be pulped, and should not be taken so seriously.
ing, the focus became the internet and blogs, and I felt Comically, it was taken seriously by designers and design
disconnected from much of it. It was too geeky for me.” historians.
The legacy of Emigre’s typography was the so-called de-
sign-culture wars of the ’90s, in which he and Licko fought
with traditionalists over legibility and illegibility, classical
versus experimental. VanderLans concludes, “Our type
designs often responded to the larger conversations that
were circulating around design in general. Now our work
is far more inward-looking.”

credits for images can go here

(e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b.
Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)

E M I GR E
No.70
The Look Back Issue
SELEC T IONS FROM EMIGRE MAGA ZINE # 1 ~ #69

19 84 ~ 2009
C E L E B R AT I N G 2 5 Y E AR S
In Graphic Design
Rr
j
 printmag.com 21

credits for images can go here (e.g. “1a. Poster from Will... 1b.
Book cover by Will... 2a. ...”)

25.
gail anderson (born 1962) is the quintes-
sential pot type masher. Her typography is
either pitch-perfect pastiche or a hybridized
version of Victorian, Deco and Futurist ap-
proaches. She fine-tuned her approach working with art direc-
tor Fred Woodward at Rolling Stone. Like actors on a stage, An-
derson directed letterforms to perform dramatic and comic
feats. In just two dimensions they emoted, expressed and ex-
uded energy that projected them off the page. In 2002, after a
move to SpotCo, her typography switched from the intimacy of
a magazine page to work that competes for the attention of the-
ater-goers. She is “always looking for that little visual wink or
tiny gesture of extra care,” Anderson says. “I’m all about the
wood-type bits and pieces. I love making those crunchy little
objects into other things, like faces.” A fancy border and de-
tailed extras are always part of her repertoire. “I’d ask the de-
signers I work with to put them on everything,” Anderson says,
“but I like being employed.”
For its human dimension, the art for The Good Body, the Eve
Ensler show about women and body image, struck just the
right chord with its curvy Isabelle Dervaux line drawing and
two ice-cream scoops for breasts. But Anderson may be best
known for the Avenue Q subway-inspired, puppet-fur logo, a
delightful image that became an indelible brand for the play.
“I’m definitely wittier on paper than in real life,” she laments. “I
think I approach the work looking for a little wink where I can,
because deep down, I hope people associate clever with smart.” ▪

Steven Heller is the co-chair of the MFA Design/Designer as Author + Entre-

preneur program at School of Visual Arts, and the author of more than 170
books. He is an AIGA medalist and received the 2011 Smithsonian Institution
National Design Award for “Design Mind.”