History ofGraphic DesignThe

Historyof

GraphicDesign

By: Mike Cordeiro

Table of Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Page 1

Prehistory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Page 2

The Rennaisance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Page 5

Industrial Revolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Page 11

Resource Listing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Page 13

Cover Image: Takenobu Igarashi, poster for the Kanagawa Art Festival, 1984.

Image 1: Cave painting from Lascaux, France. Circa 15 000-10 000 B.C.

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History ofGraphic Design

IntroductionIn 1922, book designer William Addison Dwiggins coined the

term “Graphic Designer”. A Graphic Designer is someone whobrings together the various elements of a page (words, pictures,colours) to form a visually attractive page.

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PrehistoryGraphic Design

actually beganmillennia earlier withthe invention ofwriting. With thecreation of a written

language, people nowhad to combine bothtext and pictures forthe first time. Takingcenturies to developthe techniques wenow take for granted.The Sumerian’s

invented the first truewritten languagearound 3000 B.C.Their civilizationflourished thanks totheir ability to write,and while they wereconquered manytimes each conquerortook the writtenword with them. Sothe ability and ideato preserve thespoken word forposterity began totravel throughout theworld. And the needfor someone with theskills to record thatinformation traveledwith it. Due to thecomplexity of earlywriting systemsscribes held a

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Image 2: Cuneiformtablet, c. 2100 B.C.This clay tablet listsexpenditures of grainand animals.

Image 3: TheseEgyptian hieroglyphsillustrate the rebusprinciple. Words andsyllables are repre-sented by pictures ofobjects and bysymbols whose namesare similar to theword or syllable to becommunicated. Thesehieroglyphs mean bee,leaf, sea, and sun. Asrebuses (using theEnglish language)they could also meanbelief and season.

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Prehistory

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History ofGraphic Design

position of greathonour amongstsocieties. In somecivilizations theywere even exemptfrom taxation! In3100 B.C. theEgyptians beganusing writtenhieroglyphs. Apictorial language,each symbol was arepresentation of anitem. In order tocreate words thatwere not described bya single symbol,scribes had tocombine two or moresymbols to get thedesired word. Such as

combining thesymbol for “sea” withthe symbol for “sun”,creating a new word,“season”. TheEgyptians are alsocredited with creatingthe first majoradvancement inwriting surfaces fromthe papyrus plant.

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Image 4: Chinesemovable types, c. 1300B.C. This group ofcarved wood typesranges in size fromabout 1.25 to 2.5 cmin height.

Image 5: Woodblockimage of a revolvingtypecase, c. A.D. 1313.This quaintly stylizedillustration shows therevolving casedesigned to maketypesetting moreefficient.

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With a variety ofgrades, papyrus wasused for everythingfrom royalproclamations todaily accounting. Thenext step occurred in105 A.D. with theinvention of paper byTs’ai Lun in China,and then reliefprinting around 770A.D. In 1040 A.D. P.Sheng invented thefirst movable type inKorea, 400 yearsbefore Gutenbergwould use movabletype in his presses.

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Image 6: The DiamondSutra, A.D. 868. AChinese spiritual text.

Image 7: DharaniBuddhist charms, c.A.D. 770. Rolled upand inserted in littlepagodas, these earlyspecimens of reliefprinting had the textprinted in Chinesecalligraphy on one sideand in Sanskrit on theother.

Prehistory

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History ofGraphic Design

RenaissanceThe Renaissance

brought about greatchanges in Europeansociety, and graphicdesign was one ofthose areas thatexperienced a greatrevival. Illuminatedmanuscripts arehandwritten booksthat were decoratedand illustrated fromthe late RomanEmpire until around1450. These books

were produced onparchment or vellum,which was created bytreating the skins ofanimals. These bookswere in such demandthat the time it took ascribe to write asimple two hundredpage book caused agreat shortage insupply. With four tofive months of labourper book, typographysoon emerged. Whilethe concept of reliefprinting and movabletype had been knownfor some time,Johann Gutenberg isthe first personcredited withbringing together allthe complex systemsnecessary to print atypographic book.Gutenberg was agoldsmith by tradeand this gave him theskills to create themetal blocks of typeused in his press.

Image 8: The Book ofDurrow, openingpage, the Gospel ofSaint Mark, c. A.D.680. Linked into aligature, an I and anN become a beautifulform of interlacedthreads and coilingspirals.

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Image 9: Page fromthe Ormesby Psalter, c.early 1300s A.D.Composed of red andblue inks thedecoration, illustra-tion, and initials arejoined into a singlecomplex text frame.

Renaissance

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History ofGraphic Design

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Image 10: TheLindisfarne Gospels,carpet page facing theopening of SaintMatthew, c. A.D. 698.A mathematical gridhelps bring structureto the contours andswirls.

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Image 11: These early-nineteenth-centuryengravings illustrateGutenberg’s system forcasting type. A steelpunch is used to stampan impression of theletterform into a softerbrass matrix. After thematrix is slipped into thebottom of the two-parttype mold, the mold isfilled with the moltenlead alloy to cast a pieceof type. After the leadalloy cools, the type moldis opened and the type isremoved.A. Punch.B. MatrixC. Type Mold (withmatrix removed to showa newly cast H)D. & E. Type Mold(opened so that the newlycast H can be removed)

Renaissance

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History ofGraphic Design

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Image 12: Woodcutillustrations for JostAmman’s Book ofTrades. The occupa-tions of the graphicarts are shown here.

A. The parchmentmaker is shownscraping animal skinsto produce a smoothsurface.B. The papermakerlifts his mold out ofthe vat as he formseach sheet by hand.C. The typefounder isdepicted pouring themelted lead into thetype mold to cast acharacter. D. One printer isshown removing anewly printed sheetfrom the press whilethe other one inks thetype.E. The designer isdrawing an image foran engraving.F. The woodblockcutter cuts thedrawings.G. The illuminatorapplies colour andgold leaf to themanuscript.H. Bookbinders arecollating pages andapplying the cover.

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With the creation ofGutenberg’s pressand the Renaissance’sdemand forintellectual growth,the fields of graphicdesign exploded.With the printer, typedesigner, author, andartist workingtogether in closecollaboration manywritten works werecreated that are stilladmired today. The1700’s brought abouta stunning growth in

typography. Withthousands of newfonts beingdeveloped for theneeds of a widevariety of people.With graphic designcentres now inFrance and Englandthere were fonts forevery need. Fromfanciful and delicateto strong and crisp.Many of the fontscreated during thistime are still inregular use today.

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Image 13: GeoffroyTory, construction ofthe letter Q fromChamp Fleury, 1529.Tory used fivecompass centres in hiseffort to construct ageometrically idealroman O, and he usedan additional twocompass centres toadd a tail for the Q.

Image 14: GeoffroyTory, fantasticalphabet from ChampFleury, 1529. Itincluded thiswhimsical sequence ofletterforms composedof tools. A is acompass, B is a fusy(steel used to strike aflint), and C is ahandle.

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Renaissance

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History ofGraphic Design

Industrial AgeThe Industrial

Revolution broughtabout high speedprinting presseswhich initiallydoubled the output ofa typical hand press.With the invention ofthe Linotype byOttmar Mergenthalerin 1886 the secondproblem of having tomanually typeset apage was also solved.A typesetter couldnow simply punch akey and have the

correct letter fall intoplace. With theinvention of the

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Image 15: LouisJacques Daguerre,Paris boulevard, 1839.In this earlydaguerreotype thewagons, carriages,and pedestrians werecorded because theslow exposure couldonly record stationaryobjects. On the lowerleft street corner, aman stopped to havehis boots polishes andbecame the firstperson ever to bephotographed.

Image 16: OttmarMergenthaler demo-nstrates the BlowerLinotype, the firstline-casting keyboardtypesetter, to editorWhitelaw Reid on 3July 1886.

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photo-graphiccamera, graphicdesigners could nowincorporate a newlevel of reality intotheir work. The war’snear the beginning ofthis century broughtout some of the mostcreative work in thegraphic arts. With theconclusion of thesecond world war, the

technologicaladvancementsdeveloped forwarfare were put tonew uses inindustries. Graphicdesign tentativelybegan to adopt someof the newtechnology availableto them. In the1960’s pioneeringwork was being doneat MIT and otherinstitutions in therealm of computerengineering. In theearly 1980’s thatwork came tofruition with theintroduction of theApple Macintosh.

Image 17: Ad for theKodak camera, c.1889. GeorgeEastman’s camera,simple enough foranyone “who can winda watch,” played amajor role in makingphotography everyperson’s art form.

Image 18: HughDubberly, ClementMok, and Doris Mitch(graphics designers),Apple Computerannual report supple-ment on Hypercard,1987. This very earlyuse of hypertextenabled stockholdersto navigate the data inan interactive manner.

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Industrial Age

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History ofGraphic Design

While not the firstcomputer to be usedin the graphic designfield, it’s ease of useand relativelyinexpensive costallowed many usersto become desktoppublishers. Producingnewsletters and otherprinted material fromtheir homes thisrevolution provedinfectious to moretraditional designhouses. Until today,when one designerdoes the work thatonce took dozens ofskilled tradesmen toaccomplish. Perhapsin the near future thatone designer,working wherever isconvenient, will senda completed job to beprinted without theuse of any plates, andwe will leave the lastof Gutenberg’s legacybehind us.

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Image 19: Cover forEmigre 10 magazine,1989. Traditionaltypographic rulesyielded to an experi-ment in unconven-tional sequencing fora special issue about agraphic designexchange between theCranbrook and Dutchdesigners.

BibliographyMeggs, Philip B. AHistory of GraphicDesign, New York,New York: JohnWiley, c1998.

Thompson, Bradbury.The Art of GraphicDesign, New Haven,Conn.: YaleUniversity Press,1988.

This booklet was produced in March 2001 by Mike Cordeiro atMohawk College. Images were scanned on an Agfa SnapScan

1212 and processed in Adobe Photoshop. Layout was completedin QuarkExpress 4.1 for Macintosh and Windows.