Task 3 Part 2

Victor Moscoso Vs Stefan Sagmeister

Here we shall be taking a look into the world of two great graphic designers. They both lived in very different times and both have affected graphic design in unthinkable ways. I chose to group these two artists together due to the fact that they are/were involved in creating graphics for the music scene. In this introduction I want to create some awareness about the actually music scene. Music goes hand in hand with graphic design from album covers to gig posters, but more importantly music has a fandom, creates a style, a culture which in turn directly affects art.

  

Victor Moscoso was part of the psychedelic movement of the 1960s, I chose him in particular because he was the first of the rock poster artists who had formal academic training and experience, therefore there is always that aspect of professionalism in his works.

Moscoso was a product of the baby boom which happened during World War 2. By the 60s there products of this baby boom had reached the age to be able to think for themselves, and this was the age of a radical new way of thinking, Acid and Free Love. Some may look at as morals being lost and experimentation, and such a topic is debatable, though what is certain is that out of this new way to thinking came a new age in graphic design.

The works being produced were all about color and movement, and in a sneaky way it was all about bringing art Nuevo back into the art world. Moscoso's use of vibrating colors was influenced by painter Josef Albers. Another important note is the fact that he introduced photography into these rock posters.

 

Looking at the modern world, the world we currently inhabit we have another great name within graphic design, his name is Stefan Sagmeister. He is one of the most influential graphic designers of the modern day with good reason. He has an incredible attention to detail and most of all he’s not afraid to make a mistake. He is trying to change the graphic design culture in a positive way. He believes that due to all the technological advancements graphic design became lazy. Truth be told he is right. He is trying to build awareness that one should not find the easy way out but instead broaden ones capabilities and create something new.

Sagmeister has created multiple artworks for big name bands. And to be honest the popularity of the band is irrelevant, it is the art work one must focus on. Therefore we already see a link between two artists brought up in different decades, music. Needless to say graphic design is nothing without typography and once again we have two artists who pushed type to new limits. Moscoso is the artist who experimented with the optical illusion side to type, having his type flow together, reducing letter spacing and creating movement and vibrations on what was once a blank plane. Sagmeister on the other hand has pushed type in a different way. He left to computer and showed the world that one must not use readymade fonts but instead free one’s mind and create something with their bare hands, bringing back the craft aspect within graphic design.

Images to the left: Victor Moscoso

Images to the Right: Stefan Sagmeister

Moscoso V. 2008. About Moscoso. [online] Available at:http://www.victormoscoso.com/about.htm [Accessed 10 Novemeber 2013]

TED 2013 Speakers Stefan Sagmeister: Graphic designer. [online] Available at: http://www.ted.com/speakers/stefan_sagmeister.html [Accessed 11 November 2013]

Wolfgang Weingart

Here we shall be looking at one of the most influential postmodern graphic designers, wolfgang Weingart.

He was a teacher at the Switaerland Basel school of design which was a great starting point within his voiews on postmodern graphic design.

 

He was influenced by pure geometry of rectangles. Having such a simple starting point is a way of thinking shared by many graphic designers. Weingart had what one would call a ‘stair stepping’ visual idea as we can see in the image above, this will be copied by many different designers becoming atrademark of postmodern graphic design.

 

When it came to the swiss movement weingart questioned the use of orger and its cleanliness, he wanted to explore lead him to question the rules of typoigraphy. As a resuly his works had a certain energy to them and used a lot of texture. He experimented with collage and combining layers of film and merging images and textures, overprinting colours, wide letter spacing and type within bars. Such experiments lead to new style works and allowed him to be more creative with every approach. Though after all his experimentation he still kept loyal to the most famous typeface Helvetica.

In todays age weingar is a teacher and no longer designs.

William Morris and Arts and Crafts movement

When one looks at graphic design one notices that individual artists have the ability to alter the course of art history. A new idea can keep inspiring people to go through new lengths of research, and create new movements. In this case we will be looking at one of the leading members of the ‘Arts and Crafts Movement’. Apart from being an artist Morris was also a designer, printer, typographer, bookbinder, craftsman, poet and writer. Therefore one may call him a man of many talents. Though people tend to remember his pattern designs most of all. Art and industry were separate for long periods of time, but William Morris had a vision in which he wanted to combine the fine arts with commercial design, paving the way for design as we know it today. Morris had a rather ‘textbook mentality’ where he believed a designer my constantly research within his field to keep art works fresh.

  

Once again I shall be relating William Morris to modern day digital graphic design. In this example we have a flat floral pattern which is intricate and stylized. There is no shading in particular but the slight illusion of depth is created using the line art and colour. Modern graphic designers mainly use software to create their  designs but the principles of design haven’t changed much. Pattern design is something that it still highly used today by graphic designers, be it for a decorative function or for commercial use. Which at the end of thew day is what William Morris would have wanted.

 Art factory, 2014. William Morris, Available from: www.artyfactory.com [2^nd January 2014]