In 1928, Die Neue Typographie was printed by the German typographer Jan Tschichold, a founding textual content of Modernism in printing. Anticipated by his “Elementare Typographie” of 1925, the amount presents a choice of historic references within the work of artists and writers – from Apollinaire to the Futurists, from Russian Constructivism to Dadaism – and collects examples of latest typography by a great variety of European and Soviet designers.
DNT demonstrates Tschichold’s capacity to catalyze tensions and modifications happening in several nations. By his personal admission “the motion would by no means have loved the diffusion it undoubtedly present in Central Europe if it had not corresponded to the sensible wants of the current”. These are the wants of a brand new typography that breaks with the previous and is aware of find out how to interpret the wants – to start with the communicative one linked to the manufacturing of latest industrial printed supplies – and the aesthetics of the time: “Energetic literature, as a substitute of passive leather-based bindings” .
Tschichold’s tireless journalistic work, dedicated to selling the e-book and the rules of modernity, had a notable impression all through Europe and subsequently, after the emigration of many designers throughout the struggle, to the USA. His texts are republished in quite a few commerce magazines – in Italy due to the Turin-based Graphicus – and the brand new typography penetrates all ranges of typographic design.
A venture and an exhibition promoted by ECAL College of Arts and Design of Lausanne, curated by Davide Fornari and Matthieu Cortat, discover the worldwide impression of Tschichold’s work by observing instances of mediation and dissemination of the rules he promoted in addition to the methods wherein his concepts have been integrated into the each day observe of many printers.
The venture reconstructs the bibliographic corpus of sources utilized by the writer to jot down the textual content and presents it once more in a touring exhibition supposed as a pedagogical device.
The worth of DNT, usually interpreted as a easy watershed between classicism and modernity, is a number of; it systematizes, amplifies, evangelizes. It’s the tip of the iceberg, the repeater and the probe.
At a time when fashionable expertise is being questioned as an lively half within the building of the paradigm of capitalist growth and manufacturing, it’s extra crucial than ever to query and problematize manifesto texts reminiscent of DNT, to grasp one thing greater than the historic scope of recent design and, on the identical time, of the strategies of building of modernist ideology.
Highlighting idiosyncrasies, contradictions and limits doesn’t imply denying historic relevance, however slightly totally understanding the contextual causes in addition to the consequences of an ideology that has univocally united financial system and standardization, democracy and rejection of individuality.
A number of years in the past, when Ursula von der Leyen introduced the concept of a New European Bauhaus that will put ecological and sustainable dwelling on the middle of the venture, many consultants spoke out in opposition to the uncritical restoration of a historic expertise linked to that very same growth mannequin which brought on the vital problems with the current.
But for a lot of in the present day, design continues to be usually understood within the phrases outlined by twentieth-century modernism and demodernization initiatives have a restricted impression. It’s maybe the time for a brand new evangelization, which as a substitute of proposing yet one more ultra-modern design, begins from questioning the linearity of historic experiences.
Texts and picture credit
Unpacking Tschichold’s Library. A part of the analysis venture “The Sources of Jan Tschichold’s The New Typography” by ECAL/Ecole cantonale d’artwork de Lausanne. On show at ISIA Urbino. Views of the set up. Photograph by ISIA U Chiara Rebolino, Lorenzo Urgesi,
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– 2024-05-24 00:53:40
