Drawn to Type: Lettering for Illustrators 9781350066946, 9781350066915

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Acknowledgments It goes without saying (or, as an illustrator who was new to the English language once said: “It walks without talking”) that this book would not exist without the help and contributions of many. First and foremost, thanks to Louise BairdSmith, commissioning editor at Bloomsbury, who found online the teaching blog for my Lettering for Illustrators class, and thought the subject might make for a book. Deep thanks too, to Leafy Cummins, my editor, for her wisdom in patiently shepherding this novice writer through the long process of research, writing, and rewriting. I’ve always known that merits of this book heavily depend on the calibre of work represented in it. So many esteemed practitioners of the graphic arts have been kind, generous, and forthcoming by sharing their work. If the book engages with any kind of audience, I know it is because these fine

professionals have made it look good. There are so many inspirationally creative and imaginative designers and illustrators working in the world, and some of the best have agreed to take part in this book. Profound thanks and gratitude to every single one of them: from the well-known pros to the recently graduated former students. This book would not exist without you and your talents. A special shout-out to Steve Simpson for his brilliant cover. Thanks too, to my dear husband, Mister Be, for keeping me well fed and well loved throughout these many months of writing. Finally, this book is dedicated to my father, Melville Edgar Blake Jr. (1924–2017). He was a great writer who never did publish that book he had planned, though he did reveal his verbal prowess, wit, and wisdom to us in brilliant letters. This one’s for you, Dad.

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Preface For millennia, humans have used visual communication to tell stories, keep inventory, brag, celebrate deities, and manifest beauty. Before there were alphabets, before there were codified writing systems, before the concept of time itself, humans were impelled to make marks that outlasted the mark-makers. Cave paintings have been found all over the world: in present-day Europe, Australia, Southeast Asia, and Africa. We cannot know for certain the purpose of cave paintings. Were they artifacts of ceremonial rituals? Were they meant to record the moment for themselves or to communicate with others? Who was the intended audience? In the darkness underground, in these hard-to-find places, recognizable marks were made on the walls. Beyond the creators’ ability to conceive, contemporary humans have found (surely only some of!) these hidden places, and now we are the audience. Hand-shaped silhouettes placed on cave walls are among the earliest marks found. More elaborate are the drawings, distinct enough to suggest the past and the beings that lived then. We recognize the hunter and the beast; we can imagine the story being told, seeing it mapped out on the cave walls. As humans evolved into increasingly sophisticated and complex societies, so too their means of communication became more codified. Pictorial representation was present but writing systems to mark spoken language and abstract concepts—such as numbers—were created and shared. Writing systems evolved from representational pictorial marks, becoming increasingly simplified, outgrowing the original intent in appearance and purpose.

Before the ages of mechanical reproduction and photography, it was the graphic artist’s challenge to integrate type and image in a mutually supported message, all done by hand, whether by the monkish scribe with a pot of ink or the engraver with a block of wood. The advent of movable type—in the Western World, with Johannes Gutenberg’s mid-fifteenth century Bible—heralded greater means of mass communication and increased literacy. In the ensuing centuries, new tools of printing, the invention of photography, and, later, digital media, expanded the means by which creative people could communicate, whether for a client or for themselves. For centuries, type and image have been combined in countless ways, in uses from commercial to literary to personal expression. The early twenty-first century has seen a renewed interest in craftsmanship, in the artisanal, and the hand-made. This may be a rebellion against digital processes, but perhaps ironically, digital means of promotion and production have exponentially multiplied opportunities for creative people in other ways. In the field of illustration this is apparent in the wealth of graphic work that weds word and picture in beauteous, ironic, and clever ways. The arts of brush lettering and calligraphy, from vernacular styles to formal scripts, have enjoyed a renaissance. These traditional forms of writing are only the beginning of contemporary explorations. Hand lettering is popular and widely used in commercial applications, and not just created with traditional media. Illustrators and designers are inventive with their materials, using collage, digital applications, chalk, flower petals, mosaic tile, and flaming bamboo, among other things, all to communicate messages in attention-grabbing and original ways.

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PREFACE

This book is not intended to describe in depth the history of alphabets, nor to teach in detail how to write calligraphically or to hand letter; other books explain those things well and thoroughly; some of them can be found in this book’s bibliography. The interest here is in the exploration of the infinitely variable combinations of two major systems of visual communication—written and pictorial—and how they interrelate. My approach takes perhaps a broader stance than some; I am interested in a wide range of media, interpretations, and styles. A distinction needs to be made between typography, calligraphy, and hand lettering, because this book includes all these visual forms of verbal communication. Typography means set type, typically digital and at times digitally manipulated further. Calligraphy is written by hand, wherein the tool informs the mark; this includes writing with both pen and brush tools, and other more experimental methods. Hand lettering is usually drawn first and then filled in, whether with traditional media or digitally, or with alternate media, or some combination of those. The focus of this book is on the Western alphabet. This is not to discount the beautiful brilliance of writing systems from all over the world—but they deserve texts that will do proper credit to their importance historically, culturally, and aesthetically. This book begins by establishing a fundamental understanding of the basics of visual perception and of typography so the novice to graphic arts will be equipped to analytically view the samples of work that follow. The central core of the book is case studies of professional practitioners— examples of illustration and text together in a variety of styles, media, and projects—presented for a closer look. First, we’ll look at illustrators and designers who manipulate set typography, creating combined type and image. Next, we’ll examine forms of calligraphy and brush lettering, to see how illustrators incorporate these ways of writing

into their work. The fourth chapter is the broadest section, encompassing hand lettering with illustration, with examples in all kinds of media, both traditional and digital. Chapter five is devoted to unusual materials: alternate media and collage are valid forms of illustration and can be used to create lettering as well. These four chapters are organized according to the means of creation: typographic, calligraphic, drawn, and created with alternate media. Many of the examples of work from featured artists are of printed matter. But traditional printed matter is just one way that graphic communication is transmitted. There is an additional brief chapter that explores the myriad of forms through which lettering and illustration combine to communicate: in public spaces (graffiti, murals, and signage), in sequential narratives (comics, graphic novels, and ‘zines’), online, and in motion. The final section has project and assignment ideas, for the teacher and student, or for the independent, intrepid, creative soul—to spark readers in their own work. The intended audience for this book is not only students of design and illustration (as well as their teachers), but also hobbyists who want to branch out and professionals who seek inspiration. This book aims to reference the past, examine the present, and anticipate the future of the marvellously diverse integration of illustration and lettering. Author’s note It must be mentioned that among the illustrators and designers showcased in this book, most of them have talents, skills and work that exceed the bounds of the category into which they’ve been placed in this book. Duly noted. With the goal of clarifying and organizing into creative categories for the purpose of cohesion, I’ve taken the liberty of sorting very talented people into creative piles. Please bear with me.

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Introduction Illustrators and designers are invariably childhood doodlers. The impulse to draw, to write, and to do both together is a hallmark of the budding graphic artist. The very thing that would get us in trouble in class—ignoring the teacher to carpet the covers and margins of our school notebooks with caricatures and balloon lettering—could be the sign of a future professional. But it’s not only formally trained professionals who create graphic art; this is a human activity. The purposeful nature of graphic communication makes it universal. The applications of graphic arts in service of identification, clarification, decoration, and narrative can be found on every imaginable surface, everywhere in the world, including the virtual world, the digital realm. Sighted humans need visual communication to help navigate through life: to find where to go, to share stories, to make political statements, to understand information. But it is not merely utilitarian; the love of beauty and the desire to decorate is ubiquitous. This is not exclusively the province of royalty and the wealthy—although they certainly, historically, have been able to afford the best, the priciest, the most exquisite things. Yet still, any citizen with the fare can ride a lavishly embellished bus in Pakistan (figure 0.1). A man seeking a barber in Ivory Coast will look at illustrative signage to help him choose where to go (figure 0.2). The paintings are leached of color, with the emphasis on the shape of the haircut. The pictures communicate clearly, while the name appears centered above in simple blockish lettering.

Figure 0.1  A public transport bus, customised and highly decorated in Arabic lettering and genuine Pakistani paintwork.

Figure 0.2  A hair salon in Ivory Coast. The paintings look a bit like black and white photos, with the gray tones and modeled gradations. The customer sees styles to choose from, and the barber in action. The pictures support and amplify the shop’s name above.

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INTRODUCTION

Katherine McCoy, once co-chair of the Cranbrook Academy of Art graduate design program, proposed the idea that not only do we read text and see images, but we also do the opposite: we see text and read images (figure 0.3). What does this mean? When we see text, apart from the act of reading the words, we discern tone, mood, and attitude in the lettering style and the arrangement of the letterforms. Most consumers of the written word are not schooled in typography, its history, and the provenance of the typeface. Yet on a visceral level, people can sense the personality and spirit of a typeface’s appearance. In an appropriately designed piece, the reader can tell at a glance whether the message is serious or playful, and who the intended audience is: a child? A punk rocker? A banker? The reader first senses the answer by simply seeing the typeface and design, before reading the content of the words. This is part of the meta-message of design: the underlying amplification or subversive contradiction of the meaning of the words.

Figure 0.3  Typography as Discourse diagram, 1990, by Katherine McCoy. McCoy’s chart cleverly demonstrates how we perceive information, not only reading text and seeing images but the opposite as well: we see text and read images. The act of seeing is visceral and intuitive while reading entails a methodical approach.

When we read a picture, we interpret it by studying the contents: the characters, the color, the composition. We analyze the details to understand the story. With an effective illustration, we may be struck at first glance by the dominant element, but are rewarded by closer examination. A skilled illustrator sets the stage to tell the story both at large and in detail. The subject of the illustration is of course primary but that story is furthered by the use of color, light, texture, and composition.

“. . .McCoy rejected the traditional distinction between reading and seeing, arguing that designers should actively mix these categories of experience: a picture can be read, while written words can be objects of vision.” Ellen Lupton

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INTRODUCTION

Looking at McCoy’s poster through this lens, inverting the way we read text and see images, our first impression is that this is a post-modern piece (figure 0.4). The sans serif typefaces, the layering of type and image, the montage illustration, the vertical split of violet and blue, all communicate a non-traditional design. Some of the type is boxed in frames with connecting lines, suggesting an information graphic, imbuing it with an implied authority. At the same time, the overlapping words and picture impede legibility and readability, drawing us in to wonder: “what does it say?” We need to look closely at the collage to read it, because of its intriguing complexity. We can see fragments of equipment, a funnel, a head, an orb, a phone and letters, letters as objects and shapes. On the left there are examples of 2D design; on the right, 3D design. When we read the words we understand the oppositional pairings listed in the center column of text: form/content, symbolic/diagrammatic, conceptual/aesthetic, and so on. McCoy’s design brilliantly illustrates these dichotomies before we even begin to read the words. The modernity and complexity of McCoy’s poster is perfect for its targeted audience: the collegeeducated, artistic graduate student. Even the unwitting observer could tell for whom this poster is intended. Clear visual communication is created with an awareness of audience and presented in an appropriate form and context. Take, for example, a comic—is it seen at a zine fest populated with creatively garbed, pierced, and tattooed people? Or at ComiCon filled with cosplay fans in elaborate costumes, emulating their superheroes? Or at a local book store in the section for small children where there’s a reading hour for toddlers? The

Figure 0.4  Poster for The Graduate Program in Design, 1989, by Katherine McCoy. McCoy’s poster is an illustrated example of her chart seen in Figure 0.3. The pictorial detail and embedded text invite a close reading.

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INTRODUCTION

designer’s concern is not simply what is being created, but for whom and where it will be seen. The notion of audience has evolved since the dawn of printed matter. In the Western world, early Christianity gave rise and urgency to the message to be disseminated: in the believers’ view, the word of the Lord. Literacy was limited during the medieval era in Europe; the clergy and the wealthy were those people who had the means to access and acquire books, and most of the books created at that time concentrated on Christianity. The books were very expensive to produce, both in labor and materials. Monks would inscribe highly detailed texts and illustrations on parchment (sheep, calf, or goat skin). There was sacredness not only in the subject matter, but also in the laborious process of creation and careful preservation of these invaluable tomes. One of the best known is The Book of Kells, housed at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. Thought to have been created by monks in the scriptorium on the island of Iona in the late 8th–early 9th centuries, it is one of the most exquisite illuminated manuscripts extant. In the accompanying plate we see the elaborately decorated opening page for the Gospel of John. Ornamentation and abstraction abound; the twirling Celtic knots and medallions fill every corner, some of them snaking around the letters (figure 0.5). The figure of John the Evangelist sits somberly atop the largest letter, a highly stylized P. On the other side of a quartet of disks we see a fellow swigging from a goblet of wine as a monster hovers above, grimacing, a long tongue protruding from his toothy maw. The figures contrast in posture and in action. We know who John is but. . . who is the drinker? The monster? The text is embedded, the letterforms varied in style, integrated and integral to the illustration. The text reads “In principio erat Verbum et Verbum” (“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word”) yet on this page the words are broken and arranged as if they were pictorial elements rather than a contiguous text meant to be read in a linear fashion: IN P/ RINCI / PIOERAT VER / BUMETVERBUM. The materials used to paint the page convey lavishness: the scribes mastered the creation of richly-colored pigments and added

Figure 0.5  Incipit, The Gospel of John from The Book of Kells, ca. 8th–9th c. An illuminated title page that includes the letterforms as illustrative objects; stylized figures are embedded within the layered shapes and decorations that comprise the large letter P.

precious gold. It is ironic that the ascetic monks would create such luxurious work; their devotion to their faith manifested in book form. However, the eventual owner of the tome would invariably be the opposite: prosperous and powerful. The Book of Kells predates Katherine McCoy’s poster by over 1,000 years, and yet both exemplify the point of her chart. We read text to parse the meaning of words, and we see images to add to our understanding. We also read images closely to process what we see, and we look at the text to make sense of how it operates visually, to decipher what its appearance tells us about what is written there.

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INTRODUCTION

Ten Rules for Working, aka Sister Corita Kent’s Immaculate Heart College Art Department Rules Frequently attributed to experimental composer John Cage, it was actually nun and poster artist Sister Corita Kent who wrote the following 10 Rules for Students, Teachers, and Life. Sister Corita Kent was herself a brilliant exemplar of hand lettering and illustration. Her best-known posters were popular, activist cries for peace and mercy during the troubled years of the Vietnam War. Cage was cited in Rule #10, and his partner, genius choreographer/dancer Merce Cunningham posted these rules in his dance studio in New York City. Whether a student in school or a life-long learner (as we all should be), these rules are wise. Rule 1 Find a place you trust and then try trusting it for a while. Rule 2 General duties of a student: Pull everything out of your teacher. Pull everything out of your fellow students. Rule 3 General duties of a teacher: Pull everything out of your students.

Rule 6 Nothing is a mistake. There’s no win and no fail. There’s only make. Rule 7 The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It’s the people who do all of the work all the time who eventually catch on to things. Rule 8 Don’t try to create and analyze at the same time. They’re different processes. Rule 9 Be happy whenever you can manage it. Enjoy yourself. It’s lighter than you think. Rule 10 “We’re breaking all of the rules. Even our own rules and how do we do that? By leaving plenty of room for X quantities.” —John Cage Helpful hints: Always be around. Come or go to everything. Always go to classes. Read anything you can get your hands on. Look at movies carefully, often. Save everything—it might come in handy later.

Rule 4 Consider everything an experiment. Rule 5 Be self-disciplined. This means finding someone wise or smart and choosing to follow them. To be disciplined is to follow in a good way. To be self-disciplined is to follow in a better way.

Source: Maria Popova, Brain Pickings, https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/08/10/10-rules-for-students-and-teachers-john-cagecorita-kent/.

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Foundation

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To ensure that the readers of this book have a basic understanding of the fundamentals of design and typography, this first chapter of the book will cover those topics. It’s essential that one establish a foundational vocabulary: to be able to articulate what one sees, to sharpen one’s perception, to help in the act of seeing, and to be better informed. The reality is that every teacher in every classroom or every book will approach these very same subjects with some differences. For anyone who’s spent time researching and reading from a variety of sources, a well-rounded understanding of the subject at hand will emerge, a comprehension of the underlying principles and a well-tuned awareness of what they might look like. Whatever details of distinction might be discussed among practitioners of the graphic arts, there are basic principles and terminology that can generally be agreed upon.

“A theory of design that isolates visual perception from linguistic interpretation encourages indifference to cultural meaning.” Ellen Lupton and J. Abbott Miller

Developing one’s critical eye for visual communications involves literacy with specific terminology. It is not enough in analyzing a piece of graphic art to say “I like it” or “that’s not very good.” Why do you like it? How is it not good? What does good mean? Can you elaborate on that? In the classroom, the critique process is an essential mechanism to help students more clearly express their opinions about what they are seeing. This includes learning the lexicon of graphic arts: terms for basic design principles and the fundamentals of typography, both styles and anatomy. Not covered in this foundation section are other essential components of a well-rounded education in the graphic arts—color theory, history (art, illustration, and graphic design), composition, craftsmanship, and conceptual thinking—although these are all topics of discussion when looking at artwork in the following chapters. 1

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CHAPTER 1: FOUNDATION

The Gestalt Principles of Visual Perception In the early 20th century, German Gestalt psychologists addressed the issue of visual perception as an aspect of human behavior and psychology. The original famous phrase of Gestalt psychologist Kurt Koffka is, “the whole is something else than the sum of its parts.”1 In short, we tend to perceive things in context; the relative context affects how we see what we’re looking at.

1 Equilibrium

2 Figure/Ground Contrast

Equilibrium can be symmetrical or asymmetrical. Symmetry (figure 1.1) is typically left/right balance, mirrored on a vertical axis. Symmetrical designs are classical, formal, and static. In an asymmetrical design (figure 1.2) elements are off-center and find a balance within the imagined gravity of the page. It’s as if the page were a window into a world where the laws of physics must be obeyed. It makes the viewer inexplicably uncomfortable if there is no counterbalance for the visual weight of each element in a design; it feels as though the page will tip over. Asymmetry is less predictable than symmetry; it’s more dynamic, modern, and energized.

Figure/ground contrast suggests that there is a principle component of the picture, the figure, and it appears against a background, i.e. ground. The relative relationship of darkness and lightness (or value contrast) between figure and ground affects how clearly a picture can be read. A picture can be high or low contrast, or somewhere in between. The highest contrast is, of course, black and white.

Figure 1.1  Equilibrium, Symmetrical: Symmetry is mirrored on a vertical axis. Symmetrical designs are considered classical, stable, and static.

Figure 1.2  Equilibrium, Asymmetrical: Asymmetry has components arranged irregularly; the visual weight of elements is balanced by their placement. Asymmetrical designs are modern and dynamic.

Koffka, Kurt. (1935). Principles of Gestalt Psychology, Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc., Ramway, p. 176.

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The figure and ground can be manipulated to appear to flip, as in the well-known face/vase illustration (figure 1.3). When we see the black shapes as figures, we distinguish them as a pair of faces and the white shape becomes the ground. When we perceive the white figure as a vase, the black becomes the ground.

Figure 1.3  Figure/Ground Contrast: Figure/ground contrast does not presume the figure is black and the background white. In this famous example, the figure could be a black pair of faces or a white vase, the background is the opposite in each case. Black and white are as high in contrast as two colors can be.

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THE GESTALT PRINCIPLES OF VISUAL PERCEPTION

An artist can lessen the degree of contrast to impart atmosphere or to add mystery to make the viewer work a little harder to see what is going on. In this Degas monotype (figure 1.4), the artist uses atmospheric perspective to enhance the sense of depth: as the hills recede towards the horizon, the color grows paler, with a light textured scumble of green hinting at trees. The darkest figure in the picture is the growth atop the more pale rocks that sit in the foreground. The overall low contrast in the values of the pigments give the impression of a misty morning. He conjures the landscape through loose shapes, yet the vista and moment are evocatively conveyed. Through the three examples seen here (figure 1.5) we can see that the figure/ground relationship varies when the figure is the same but the ground changes. The dots in these three examples are identical colors, but the color and shade of the background impacts our ability to perceive the dots. The palest yellow dot is imperceptible on a white background but shines against the black.

Figure 1.4  This monotype print by Edgar Degas has low figure/ground contrast. The softness of the color palette and the overall pale values impart the haze of fog and the muted light at that time of day.

Figure 1.5  Color variations of figure/ground contrast. All three of these blocks have identically colored dots. The visibility of the dots depends on their hue and value relative to the background color. The red dot is highly visible on the white and black backgrounds, but almost vanishes against a darker red.

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CHAPTER 1: FOUNDATION

3 Similarity

5 Closure

When we see things that have a shared quality, we tend to group them. That shared quality can be size, color, value, shape, texture, or a combination of these. In the grid of dots seen here (figure 1.6), we see an implied red strip by perceptually grouping all the red shapes into a row.

We do not need to see an image in its entirety to imagine the whole—we can complete the form in our minds’ eye. In the graphic, there appears to be an incomplete pair of triangles overlapping one another: a white one flipped on top of another defined by a red outline (figure 1.8) The teal partial circles on the outside corners can be imagined as full circles, somewhat hidden beneath the implied white triangle.

Figure 1.6  Similarity: The grid of dots is evenly spaced and all the dots are the same size, yet there appears to be a red strip. We conceptually link the red dots together.

4 Proximity We also conceptually group things that are arranged closely to one another. The groupings of dots seen here (figure 1.7) share a red strip along the lower portion, yet we see them as three parallel vertical columns, due to the proximal relationship of the vertically arrayed dots.

Figure 1.7  Proximity: The same grid of dots seen in Figure 1.6 now have more space between some of the vertical columns. The red strip still runs along the bottom but the dots’ arrangement forms three columns.

Figure 1.8  Closure: Our mind’s eye will essentially close the gap in a form to complete it. In this example, there appear to be a pair of triangles overlapping and flipped atop one another, even though neither of those shapes is fully drawn.

This visually economical device is particularly effective in logo design, allowing for complexity within simplicity. The logo for the New Bedford Whaling Museum is a good example (figure 1.9). At first we discern the sails of a tall ship, then realize the odd spaces between the sails form a whale’s tail. The designer efficiently conjures a whaling sail ship, merging two forms into a satisfying new whole. Figure 1.9  Logo for New Bedford Whaling Museum designed by Malcolm Grear Designers, Providence, RI. The distinctive shapes of a whale tale and a ship’s sails are combined, the tail inhabiting the negative space within the positive form of the sail.

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THE GESTALT PRINCIPLES OF VISUAL PERCEPTION

Coles Phillips was an early 20th century American illustrator who cleverly mastered figure/ground contrast as well as the principle of closure. In many of his illustrations he would depict a pretty woman with detailed, contoured rendering of her face and hair, her arms and legs. Her garment would seem to disappear into the background, lacking definition and sharing the exact same color. The backgrounds had little detail, though perhaps there would be a full moon or another framing device. Her clothing might have pattern to define a cuff or hem. In this example (figure 1.10), we see the edge of her petticoat and a clever row of buttons that suggest her posture as she sits on the ground; the bench behind her adds a bit more definition to where her body is in space. He used this visual device so often that he became famous for his “fade-away girls,” as they are known.

Figure 1.10  Coles Phillips, “Know all men by these presents,” Life magazine cover, 1920. Coles artfully places the woman’s figure to overlap the dark furniture so that we can see her dressed body seated on the floor, even though the dress merges with the identical color of the background. The buttons, shoes, and pinafore complete her outline.

6 Continuation When space exists between objects of similar type, we can imagine an underlying armature, a connecting set of lines. Envision lying at night on a hillside in ancient Rome, gazing at constellations in the sky (figure 1.11). There are no traces of light that connect one star to another, yet by their proximity, shapes seem to form: we could “see” a lion, a goat with a fishtail, or a scorpion. These “lines of continuation” are the underlying principle of a grid in a layout or within the composition of an illustration. They aren’t explicitly drawn, but give structure to the various components of the design. Without any grid at all, the design would disintegrate or become flabby and formless—which might be fine for punk or post-modernism, but would be uncomfortable for most graphic designs.

Figure 1.11  Continuation: Continuation relies on both proximity and closure. If the stars are close enough to one another in the night sky, and the groupings trace a familiar shape, we draw imaginary lines to form a constellation.

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CHAPTER 1: FOUNDATION

7 Isomorphic Correspondence Isomorphic Correspondence is a long-winded, multisyllabic way of describing an image that bears a resemblance to something in the real world that we’re familiar with. Familiarity is key to the effectiveness of this principle. If you’re an American teenager looking at the illustration, you would not only say “Pizza!” but could go on to describe it as a mushroom and pepperoni pizza with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese (figure 1.12). However, if you’d been raised in the wilderness and never seen anything from Western culture, in real life or on a screen, you might interpret the picture very differently. By the same token, a Western, urban teenager would be helpless in the rain forest of Borneo when faced with a graphic picture of something local that would be utterly clear to a resident of that place. Illustration is dependent not only on the communicative quality of rendering, but also the cultural context. With remarkable efficiency, an object can be rendered in a reductive way, with the minimum number of marks that allow it to be understood as what it is meant to be. The viewers will understand it—if they’re familiar with what it is.

Scott McCloud’s brilliant book Understanding Comics studies how we perceive comics and the stylistic conventions of this form of illustration. He analyzes how the economical approach to drawing comics allows the reader to impart her or himself onto the simplified face of a comic character: “The fact that your mind is capable of taking a circle, two dots and a line and turning them into a face is nothing short of incredible.”2 This is Isomorphic Correspondence in operation: we recognize the simply drawn face, but, taking this notion further, McCloud suggests the simplicity of the drawing allows us to identify with the character. We humans have a primal need to make sense of what we are looking at. It surely resides deep within our lizard brain, our primordial selves that we know the pattern of vertical strips is tall grass, but the flash of orange warns us “Tiger!” The development of Gestalt thinking and language are a way to codify and sort out our perceptions, and to give ourselves a common language with which to talk about what we are seeing.

Typography vs. Calligraphy vs. Handlettering A distinction needs to be made between typography and lettering. Typography means set type, such as what you are now reading (figure 1.13). The focus of this book is on Western writing systems and alphabets, but the fact is that the first system of printing with moveable type originated in China, predating the Gutenberg Bible by over 500 years. The term moveable type means that each letter was a separate unit, allowing the artisan to compose various texts and then print multiple copies. In China, and later Korea, character sets were created from ceramic, wood, and bronze to print books, money, and documents. One great challenge of implementing moveable type in Asian cultures was the fact that most of them had written language with character sets in the hundreds. The Western alphabet has only 26 characters.

Figure 1.12  Isomorphic Correspondence: Isomorphic Correspondence is a complicated way of describing a picture that resembles something in the real world. The picture can be a reductive way of rendering that thing, yet it’s still recognizable.

McCloud, Scott. (1993). Understanding Comics; The Invisible Art. A Kitchen Sink Book for HarperPerennial, New York, p. 31.

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TYPOGRAPHY VS. CALLIGRAPHY VS. HANDLETTERING

a numbering system weren’t developed until the eighteenth century. The era of metal type lasted from Gutenberg’s time in mid-fifteenth century until the early twentieth century (figure 1.14).

Figure 1.13  Typography means set type, such as this line you’re reading now. Calligraphy is “fancy handwriting,” the stroke of the letter is defined by the writing tool, whether a chisel or flexible nib pen, or a brush. Hand lettering is essentially a drawing of letters.

In the Western world, Johannes Gutenberg developed a method of creating metal moveable type as well as the composition of the metal and the ink that would adhere to it. His masterwork is known as the Gutenberg 42-Line Bible, completed in 1455. In the ensuing half century this new printing technology spread widely; by 1500 there were hundreds of printers throughout Europe, notably including in Venice, Italy. Printed matter was once handlettered by scribes or carved into woodblocks, but after Gutenberg texts were most often typeset from metal fonts. The term font is now often used to signify an alphabet style, but originally it meant a single alphabet of metal type at a specific size. Rather than numbered sizes, font sizes had names, which now sound whimsical, such as “Great Primer” and “Double Pica Roman.” Standardized sizes with

One innovation of the early nineteenth century was the creation of letterforms of wood. This allowed for much larger headlines, poster art, and elaborate and decorative styles. Cast metal type would be too heavy for such large sizes, although metal fonts certainly were more durable and long lasting through multiple inkings, printings, and cleanings. For a brief period in the mid-twentieth century, type was set by photo typesetting processes, much of it with early computing systems. Later in the twentieth century came the advent of the personal computer; the means of typesetting was now in the hands of any person who had access to a computer. For trained and knowledgeable graphic designers this has led to rousing debate and forums on “Crimes Against Typography,” about the countless egregious errors in typesetting committed by the unschooled and the unwitting. On the more positive side, the personal computer has allowed the very same designers a measure of creative control and finesse that was impossible during the era of the typesetter as a separate, trained professional.

Figure 1.14  Metal type. Each letter is an independent bit of cast metal, all of them of equal height to ensure an even pressure as they hit the paper with ink. The letters are arranged by hand in a composing stick (yes, that is the actual name of the tool) to arrange them into words and sentences. These rows are transferred to a galley then locked into a form to create a page of text.

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The invention of digital methods to further manipulate, customize, and distort letterforms has expanded exponentially the ways in which graphic artists can toy with perception, legibility, and interpretation. In the 1990s, David Carson designed magazines such as Beach Culture and Ray Gun, disordering the design and typographic rules and conventions, pushing graphic art software to the outer limits of legibility and common sense. Carson, based in California, was an honors graduate in sociology from San Diego State University; he taught psychology, economics, and sociology in Del Mar, California before discovering graphic design (figure 1.15). His aesthetic had a bold freshness that first rattled, and then inspired, the design community. The commercial world took note; he won widespread respect, and went on to design advertising campaigns for major brands all over the world. He’s had his own design studio since the mid-1990s, and endured the mixed blessing of having his work widely imitated. His most recent explorations include a book of his

Figure 1.15  Beach Culture magazine, designed by David Carson. Carson pushed the limits of legibility, readability, and orderliness to extremes, crafting a new visual language.

collages, nu collage.001. These collages layer type and image as tactile originals with energetic surfaces and a dynamic play of color and scale. While set type is a mechanical or digital way of transcribing texts, calligraphy and hand lettering are, as the names suggest, ways of writing out and drawing letters by hand, albeit with different processes. Calligraphy, from the Greek for “One who writes beautifully,” has the connotation of the practiced mastery of fine writing. Formal calligraphy is still seen commonly on wedding invitations and official certificates. Its historic provenance is in earlier handwriting styles, from a time when handwriting was the usual form of written communication between people, as well as the highly skilled writing of scribes. In addition to formal calligraphy, there are a multitude of informal lettering styles, some of which may hew closely to handwriting, and more stylized versions that can be carefully designed or decorative. With calligraphy using pen and brush tools, the chosen tool will affect the appearance of the letters. The Irish monk in the ninth century inscribing a manuscript with a chisel tip feather quill would write with defined and consistent thick and thin strokes. One thousand years later, one might use a flexible nib metal pen that would result in thick descending strokes and swashes as thin as a hair, the pen obeying the pressure of the hand to yield a line of varied weight. The twentieth century sign painter wielding a brush with lengthy bristles creates yet another array of shapes that particular tool makes possible. There is a third category of lettering which is even broader in its manifestations: hand lettering. In this instance, the letters are essentially illustrations of letters. The drawing styles and media are as varied as the artist’s imagination allows for. The only requisite is that there be sufficient resemblance to the letterform for the reader to see and interpret the message. Early forms of hand lettering can be see in the illuminated initials of medieval manuscripts, where the illustration and the letter form a unified whole, neither obscuring the other but the two amplifying the communication in unison. Later iterations included illustrated drop caps, formed into cast metal or carved of wood, announcing the entrance to a page of text.

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ANATOMY OF LETTERFORMS

Figure 1.16  Inscription at the base of Trajan’s Column. While there are what would now be considered archaic details—such as the use of V for what is now a U, and the use of bullets (dots mid-height) instead of word spaces—this text is still entirely legible to a contemporary reader.

Although writing by hand predated typography, it is essential to first establish familiarity with the basic terminology of typeset letterforms. The foundation of our digital alphabets was established nearly 2,000 years ago. The most familiar and longest-lived alphabets in Western culture can be found in Rome, Italy, inscribed in the first century during the Roman Empire. These letterforms came from Greece via the Etruscans, with modifications and additions along the way. It is a testimonial to their enduring beauty and legibility that they are as familiar today as they were to their literate public then. On Trajan’s Column in Rome, c.113 A.D., someone brushed an inscription in capital letters with red paint, taking great care with proportion and spacing (figure 1.16). A stone-carver followed these marks, chiselling away to form angled troughs, ensuring the letters lasted for thousands of years.3 Today you can digitally typeset a font named Trajan that was inspired by those ancient carvings. Trajan was designed in 1989 by Carol Twombly. She updated the stroke weights and usability for digital means of reproduction. She could not have anticipated that Trajan would become a cliché in movie poster design. Inexplicably, this typeface has been used to advertise countless—and utterly different—movies from Titanic to Thor to the horror movie Prom Night.

Meggs, Philip B. (1992). A History of Graphic Design, 2nd Ed., Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York, p. 36.

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It has been overused, become overwrought, and thus, unfortunately, lost specificity and meaning. It is now a contemporary meme in a way unrelated to its original beauty and grace.

Anatomy of letterforms In order to look at letterforms in depth we should dissect them to understand the discrete parts. We don’t know what we’re talking about if we cannot name it—the letters are simply shapes without distinction. For that reason, it’s useful for the novice letterer to be fluent in the vocabulary of the anatomy of letterforms. This requires a granular examination of detail, developing a sensitivity to the nuances of the forms. Notice that many of these words are the same we use to describe parts of the human body; this familiarity helps us find kinship with alphabetic marks. Typeface designers often use the word Hamburgefonts to test a new design. It contains most of the features needed to comprise a full alphabet—straight forms, rounded forms, angled forms—so it’s a useful word to examine the potential shapes. However, Hamburgefonts is missing some of the features that need to be named, so there are additional characters in the explanatory typographic illustration (figure 1.17). Different styles and eras of typeface designs have

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Figure 1.17  Anatomy of letterforms (font used: Adobe Garamond).

different particularities, but an Old Style typeface will have most of the features needed for this purpose. Adobe Garamond is used here to illustrate the anatomy of letterforms.

are long, if the x-height is relatively short, the whole word will appear to be much smaller. The two exceptions are the Slab Serif Clarendon and Decorative Titling Gallia. These two typefaces have such wide bodies they extended too far horizontally so these were set at a smaller size.

Type classification Typefaces evolved since the invention of moveable type. There were cultural differences in different areas of Europe and these were reflected in the styles of lettering that became popularized. There are some basic categories by which contemporary graphic artists organize certain styles distinguished by particular features. Any serious designer or typographer will break these categories into smaller and more specific ones, but we’ll stick to the basics. The word Hamburgefonts will be used for each, so the same features can be compared from one typeface to another: apples to apples rather than to oranges. Almost all of these examples were originally set at the exact same point size, yet optically they vary, sometimes by a lot. This is because a font’s size is determined from the bottom of the descender to the top of the ascender. If these extensions from the x-height

Oldstyle

Figure 1.18  Oldstyle typeface (Bembo)

Oldstyle letterforms had their origins in Italy around 1500. The metal fonts were based on calligraphic letterforms that were in common usage at that time, known as “Humanist.” The angles of the head serif and the axis of the “o” resemble the effect of a chisel nib pen held at an angle to the baseline. These letters’ abiding beauty of proportion and legibility are proven by the fact that typefaces of Old Style heritage are still widely used today. Contemporary examples of this category include Bembo, ITC Berkley Oldstyle, and Centaur (figure 1.18).

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TYPE CLASSIFICATION

Transitional

Slab serif

Figure 1.19  Transitional typeface (Baskerville)

Figure 1.21  Slab Serif typeface (Clarendon)

In the eighteenth century, designers of fonts began to diverge from the Humanist-prescribed forms that were inspired by calligraphy, such as the angled axis and the sharp terminals. No longer were the shapes of letters dictated by handwriting. The axis became vertical, the serifs more refined, the shapes of terminals more rounded. This is a smaller grouping than most others in these classifications; it’s more significant historically than in numbers. Good examples of transitional typefaces include Baskerville and Perpetua (figure 1.19).

In the early nineteenth century, further explorations evolved in typeface designs extrapolating from the thin serifs of Modern styles, enlarging their attenuated forms into rectilinear bricks. As with the Modern styles, slab serif fonts rarely have bracketing on the serifs. Some slab serif fonts appear to be virtually mono-weight, meaning the stroke is the same thickness throughout the letterform. The astute observer will notice that, in mono-weight fonts, the stroke thins as a curve approaches a stem. This is to compensate for an optical illusion: if all strokes were the same thickness, they would appear to clog up at the joint. A second optical illusion is that horizontal strokes are usually a bit thinner than vertical strokes. If horizontal and vertical strokes were identically weighted, the horizontals would give the impression of being too heavy. Slab serifs currently available include Clarendon and Rockwell (figure 1.21).

Modern

Figure 1.20  Modern typeface (ITC Bodoni 72)

Around 1800 in Italy, Giambattista Bodoni took the vertical axis and upright stress of Transitional typefaces to an extreme. The stress or stroke variation are of more pronounced contrast and the rhythm of the vertical stems is severe yet elegant. The serifs have no brackets; they’re reduced to simple hairline strokes. The residual mark of the calligraphic hand is no longer in evidence. At the same time, in France, Firmin Didot developed an eponymous font that exaggerated the stroke contrast even further with similarly elegant results. The enduring success of these typographic styles is evidenced in their widespread use in the cosmetic and fashion industries, for example in Calvin Klein’s logo and Vogue magazine’s nameplate. In addition to Bodoni and Didot, Fenice is classified as a Modern font (figure 1.20).

Sans serif: Grotesque

Fig 1.22  Sans Serif: Grotesque (ITC Franklin Gothic Book)

The earliest sans serif typefaces were met with horror in the mid-nineteenth century; type designers were accused of chopping the hands and feet off of the letters by removing the serifs— hence the name Grotesque. Not until the twentieth century were sans serifs in common use. The dawn of Modernism embraced these styles and the reading public became more accustomed to seeing streamlined and modern typographic

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designs. Inheritors of these earliest styles include Franklin Gothic, designed by Morris Fuller Benton in 1902, and News Gothic. As the latter’s name suggests, this type family was created for use in newspaper design; the narrow letters allowed more words to fit in the column and the page. In the early mid-twentieth century, evolutions included Univers and Helvetica, which were designed as complete and varied type families for the designer to use (fig 1.22).

Most of these letters show little variation in the weight of the stroke, except where a curve meets a straight stroke. The shapes of the two-story a and g, the spine of the s, the curved stems of the f and t, all reveal the elegant proportions of the Old Style typefaces, but are executed with the clean modernity of simple lines. Gill Sans is still widely used; other typefaces of this sort include ITC Goudy Sans and Stone Sans (fig.1.24).

Script: Formal Sans serif: Geometric

Figure 1.25  Script: Formal (Bickham Script). Figure 1.23  Sans Serif: Geometric (Futura Medium).

Geometric shapes were the foundation for Futura by Paul Renner; he rendered the first version in 1928. This early version of the alphabet awkwardly forced triangles and solid circles into the alphabet’s design. Subsequent variations focused on straight and circular lines, which, in their simplicity, gave sufficient variety to compose a full alphabet. Contemporary variations of geometric sans serifs include Avenir and Century Gothic, as well as Herb Lubalin’s design of Avant Garde. The latter is difficult to set well (and almost impossible to do it the justice its creator did), and it has a distinctive whiff of the 1970s (figure 1.23).

Sans serif: Humanist

The stylistic inspiration for Script typefaces is found in the handwriting of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when writing well by hand was an expectation among literate people. Formal script fonts show evidence of the pen: both the chisel nib and the flexible nib. A flat, usually 30º angle at the ends of stems indicates the influence of chisel nib styles. A fluid line with hairline strokes and a smooth transition in the stress of the stroke suggests a flexible pen nib as inspiration. The example seen here, Bickham Script, is based on a flexible nib style. Calligraphy in its pure, handexecuted state allows for infinite variability and customization. Many script fonts include additional swashes and alternate characters (figure 1.25).

Script: Informal

Figure 1.24  Sans Serif: Humanist (Gill Sans Medium).

Figure 1.26  Script: Informal (Charme).

Humanist-inspired sans serifs alphabets derive their forms from Old Style serif typefaces—without the serifs and the stress in the stroke weight.

There is a broad category of typefaces inspired by informal calligraphy styles. The range of tools used for the original forms can include the

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TYPE CLASSIFICATION

above-mentioned chisel and flexible metal pen nibs, plus metal nibs with a round point (creating a mono-weight stroke), as well as markers and brushes, both wet and dry, the latter adding texture to the stroke. Informal scripts don’t necessarily have connecting strokes between letters. Inspiration for these alphabets can be seen in sign painting and other vernacular graphic arts. This category includes early-twentieth century typefaces such as Mistral, mid-twentieth Brush script, and many more recently designed styles (figure 1.26).

reputation of Blackletter fonts was tainted for a time by Adolph Hitler’s declaration that they were proudly Germanic and therefore Germany could only print texts in these styles. In contemporary usage, we associate Blackletter fonts with the nameplates of respected newspapers, such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, as well as with heavy metal bands and rap artists. It defies explanation. Blackletter typefaces in current use include Goudy Text and Cloister Black (figure 1.27).

Decorative Script: Blackletter

Figure 1.28  Decorative (Gallia).

Figure 1.27  Blackletter (Cloister Black).

It may seem odd that the original source for this grouping of type styles historically predated, as metal fonts, nearly every other category listed thus far. But contemporary use of these typefaces is quite limited, so it’s listed near the end. Blackletter—sometimes know as Fraktur or Gothic— was the kind of alphabet most often written by calligraphers in what is now Germany: from the twelfth century leading up to the time of Johannes Gutenberg’s printing of his self-titled Bible in 1455 A.D. This explains his decision to design and cast, in metal, his typefaces in this style. Within fifty years the use of the printing press spread widely through Europe and lettering styles popular in other countries were created there. Germany remained stubbornly attached to the distinctly different Blackletter styles—which is strange, given that they are much harder to read than Oldstyle and other Humanist type styles. The insistent rhythm of the vertical stems—likened to “picket fencing”—and the shortened ascenders and descenders make it difficult to discern letters from one another. The

This is by far the largest and most varied of the categories, and there is an infinitude of sub-categories within the Decorative grouping. Due to their unusual attributes, most of these typefaces have rare usage. One of these fonts might be perfect for a logo or book jacket. . . never to be used again. The imaginative sources of inspiration for these styles are seemingly infinite. Because of their decorative nature and, at times, challenges to legibility, these typefaces are best suited to display settings: set larger (above 36’) and seen as headlines, nameplates, titles, and logos. The special features of the sample above are not universal to decorative fonts but, rather, particular to Gallia. Every decorative typeface will have its own peculiarities and features. The decorative category of typeface styles is among the richest for graphic artists to study and explore, to see the range of styles and elaborations, to understand what variations remain legible, to play with alternatives. Incorporating hand lettering with illustration often involves a lettering style that has a decorative quality. If the lettering itself is stylistically simple, then the arrangement of letters and words can be intricate (figure 1.28).

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Serifs

Figure 1.29  Serifs. These are all simply capital letter “I”s. Note the inventiveness of style and shape of the stems as well as the serifs.

One detail worth noting, regarding the creation of letters nearly 2,000 years ago: serifs. It is not fully known how these small terminal strokes evolved but enough traces remain that an educated guess can be made. On the Trajan Column, where the letters’ outlines were first painted, traces of red paint remain, a palimpsest of the original design. A flick of the brush at the end of the basic strokes gave each letter a more complete and finished look. The same could be said for the chiselled letters; to tidy up the ragged ends of strokes, a much smaller stroke was carved perpendicularly to complete the shape and give it an attractive finish. Serifs offer an opportunity for a variety of shapes, some of which are named categories and others fanciful inventions. Some of these styles were birthed in the Victorian era with the advent of wood type. Because larger letterforms made larger printed matter possible, there was an explosion of visual competitiveness, aided and abetted by the rise of commerce and the need to promote and sell things. Chromolithography was another means of reproduction that advanced during the nineteenth century. The conjoined drawing of message and illustration by hand on the litho stone also allowed for inventiveness and a fully integrated design. All of the examples on this page are capital “I”s, set at the same point size. Note the variation of stroke weight, letter width, cap height, and of the

relationship of the letter to the baseline (figure 1.29). We think of serifs as small horizontal strokes, perhaps bracketed, perhaps as thin as the thinnest stroke of the font, but certainly thinner than the stem. Among the assortment we see here are tiny serifs, fat serifs thicker than the stem, thorny serifs, asymmetric serifs, serifs that bulge above and below with a pinched stem in between, serifs like daggers, some stems split up the center. The possibilities are endless.

Inlines, Outlines, Shadows and Other Ornamentals

Figure 1.30  Inlines, Outlines, Shadows, and Other Ornamentation. These, too, are all capital letter “I”s. Decoration can take many forms, varying in weight and in detail.

Letters need not always be solid forms with clean outlines. There are a multitude of inline, engraved, and shadowed letterform designs (figure 1.30). The design elements can be quite elaborate and include other shapes and silhouettes. Some infer dimension, as if the letter extruded up off of the page, some appear to be carved, some are simply embellished. Each of these decorations and anomalies, deceptively easy to execute on the simple form of a capital “I”, has to be successfully designed to work with the shapes of the 25 other letters of the alphabet, the numbers 0–9, major punctuation like ! and ?, and &, the ampersand. For illustrators or hand-letterers who aren’t designing a full alphabet, this challenge is confined to the message at hand and the letters within that message.

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Typography and Illustration

2

The border between illustration and graphic design is porous and frequently crossed, blurred and redefined. Many graphic artists inhabit this zone, drawing on their talents and skills from every quarter. Early in the history of the graphic arts, not only would the artists draw the illustration but they may have designed the lettering as well, or set the type, inked the plate, and printed the page. The range of abilities required to accomplish all that is considerable. For example, aside from designing the letterforms in his 42-line Bible, Johannes Gutenberg concocted the metal alloy he cast the letters with, and invented an ink that would adhere to the hard metal surface and successfully transfer word and image to paper. Artists, designers, engravers, and printmakers have, through the centuries, had their artistry tied closely to the craft of reproduction.

“In a world rife with unsolicited messages, typography must often draw attention to itself before it will be read.” Robert Bringhurst

The necessary skill sets in today’s world are often removed from the physical form, though not invariably. As with other arts, in graphics there is a yearning for old school media and crafts, leading to a resurgence in the popularity of letterpress printing. Alas, countless fonts of metal type were melted down in the mid- to late-twentieth century; the process was thought to be obsolete. Thankfully, there have been aficionados, hobbyists, artisans, and stalwart businesses that have endured the passing of the era of metal and wooden type. Letterpress has enjoyed a resurgence of interest and appreciation. One example is Hatch Show Print in Nashville, Tennessee, which has been in business since the late nineteenth century promoting Southeastern U.S. culture and entertainment. They are esteemed for their preservation of metal and wood type, and for their inventive reinterpretations of vintage design and typography with contemporary aesthetics. Elsewhere, individual artists, including Alan Kitching in the UK, explore colorful and ingenious ways to use wood and metal type to create everything from packaging design to posters to art prints.

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CHAPTER 2: TYPOGRAPHY AND ILLUSTRATION

The era of phototypesetting was an historic blip, enduring for a short time in the mid-twentieth century. Since the 1970s, the bulk of typesetting and design has been done digitally, at first by typesetters. Later, with the advent of the personal computer, type was set not by a specially trained typesetter but by the designers themselves. No longer did designers have to mark up manuscripts with typesetting instructions, wait for the galleys of type, and make step-by-step adjustments to achieve their design ideas and copy-fitting needs. Now they had to learn the hands-on craft of typesetting but could also handle design decisions on the fly, making major and minor changes along the way. The digital malleability of letters is infinite but most satisfyingly done by an educated and sensitive artist who is aware of the original form and respectful of the letter’s integral shape and spirit. The tools for typesetting are in the hands of everyone who possesses a personal computer, but for the majority of untutored users, typesetting is in actual fact closer to mere typewriting. This can be seen in the choices of software programs we use. Word processing programs have cumbersome design and typesetting functions, with ungainly and unattractive templates. Without specific skill, these programs lend themselves to bad design. Professional designers and illustrators use professional software, including bitmap image, vector drawing, and page layout programs, that give the user full control of the design. They have built-in functions that allow for finessed and expert typesetting. Well-informed clients know enough to hire skilled graphic artists who can bring an appreciation for typographic history and a knowledgeable craftsmanship to their projects. There are graphic artists who meld type with illustration in ingenious ways. The capacity to handle the typography of a project as well as the illustration allows for more creative control. This creativity is not only in the selection of the typeface to start, but fonts can be manipulated in details, proportion, and placement, and combined with illustrative detail and decoration. Typefaces can even become the illustration.

Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich, originally from Brazil, is an art director, designer, and illustrator, who now resides in San Francisco. He started working in New York City as an art director in book publishing at Random House and later HarperCollins, creating award-winning book jackets. His current work includes branding, restaurant design, and publication design. He still wins awards and is widely respected in the field. His work reveals a sensitive eye for historic letterforms but with a fresh approach that elevates his graphics to a new modernity. His work as an illustrator includes decorative and shape-based illustrations wherein the letters and the illustrations interact to form a pleasing whole. He’s created his own illustrations for book covers, from concept to placement to color palette. He might often employ silhouettes or geometric forms. He’s not a classically trained illustrator, so these stylistic choices enable him to communicate visually without having to render detail or paint realistic depictions. The type handling becomes an inextricable part of the illustration. As seen in the accompanying illustration (figure 2.1), the

Figure 2.1  Cover for book about nannies and families. Letterforms are turned into vectors and the stems assigned individual warm colors adding a degree of playfulness to the design. The brackets embrace the type and imply the cheery caregiver’s arms reaching for the baby. Client: Memoria Visual, Brazil Design and illustration: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

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ROBERTO DE VICQ DE CUMPTICH

Figure 2.2  Bembo’s Zoo, cover. On the cover, the bear’s face becomes part of the word “Zoo,” the facial features composed of lower case “e”s with one pair copied, flipped, and overlapped to form the muzzle. Client: Henry Holt and Company, NYC Design and illustration: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

stems, bowls, and finials of the letters vary in color—though all are in a warm palette of split complementary yellows and oranges—playfully pulled apart and reunited, a perfectly cheerful tone for the subject of the book. De Vicq’s purely typographic illustrations are among his most notable. In 2000, Henry Holt and Company published Bembo’s Zoo. This charming and inventive book has led to other assignments rendered in this style. The designer made an intriguing choice with this first book (figure 2.2). He took a classical Old Style typeface and treated it with an affectionate irreverence. Bembo was designed in the early days of metal type, around 1500, in Venice, Italy, by punch-cutter Francesco Griffo for publisher Aldus Manutius, it was redesigned in the twentieth century by Stanley Morison for Monotype Corporation. How many other typefaces have such a long legacy?

“For elegance and subtlety of outline, Bembo is widely accepted as the premier old face, the standard by which other designs may be judged. While Bembo is prized as the most readable text face, its sharp clean gracefulness was the inspiration behind using it to create the illustrations for this book.” Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

muzzle. The angled cross strokes of the “e”s form a serious mouth for a thoughtful bear. The stress of the rounded stroke thickens towards the bottom of ears and muzzle, implying a shadow underneath.

De Vicq uses the letters of each animal’s name as building blocks to create the inhabitants of his zoo. On the cover, the middle “O” of “ZOO” becomes a bear with lower case “e”s for ears; a larger pair of “e”s are overlapped and tilted to form the animal’s

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Both capital and lower case letters are used; de Vicq tilts, flips, and rotates the letters to achieve the intended effects. One can imagine a fun game with a child who is learning the alphabet: figuring out the spelling of each animal’s name and hunting the illustration to find every letter. For the quail, the tail of the “Q” doubles as a convenient tail for the bird and the feather atop its head. (figure 2.3). By using both capital and lower case letters, de Vicq can access the sharp shape of a capital “A” to draw a beak and a lower case “i” stutters along the bird’s breast to imply a pattern of feathers.

Figure 2.4  Bembo’s Zoo, Lion. Within the limited color palette, de Vicq uses repetition, rotation, and flipping to build a variety of forms, patterns, and textures. Client: Henry Holt and Company, NYC Design and illustration: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

Figure 2.3  Bembo’s Zoo, Quail. With the capital Q upside down, the tail of the letter becomes a perfect feather atop the quail’s head. Client: Henry Holt and Company, NYC Design and illustration: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

With animals as his subject, De Cumptich was free to use whimsical stylization, often manifesting in cartoonish proportions and a geometric quality (figure 2.4). He used repetition and rotation of “l” to form the lion’s mane. Flipped capital “B”s, joined at the stem, make a perfect lobster body. He found patterns in nature and recreated them from that entirely human creation, the alphabet. The limited color palette adds a consistency to the series of illustrations and to this book as an object.

Bembo’s Zoo attracted interest and admiration, and led to further assignments in this vein. For David Godine, a publisher in Boston, Massachusetts, de Vicq created a series of portraits of authors and notable figures for a small and elegant book. It’s remarkable that de Vicq was able to use letterforms in a more nuanced way to create likenesses of well-known people with a technique that would be clumsy in less-skilled hands. He confines his palette of “strokes” to the letters that compose the person’s name, but, on this project, he used a range of different typefaces, seeking letter styles best suited to the person being depicted. The cover of the book is a black-silhouetted profile framing the title, which is composed of a richlyvaried assortment of typefaces. Inside, each writer is “drawn” with a different typeface, each one conveying not only the writer’s personality but also the quality of their work (figure 2.5). Racine, a French neo-Classical playwright, is rendered using a calligraphic script font as if to conjure the pen marks the writer made. The capital “C”s repeat to make a wig and smaller letters are artfully arranged to draw his serious face. Ayn Rand is known for her didactic Objectivist views, and the choice of the heavy slab serif font gives her face an appropriately blustering quality.

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WILL STAEHLE

Figure 2.5  Men of Letters and People of Substance, cover and spread. De Vicq chooses typefaces that convey the spirit of the writer: a swirling script for Racine and a beefy slab serif for Ayn Rand. Client: David Godine Design and illustration: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

Penguin Books publishes small editions of Nobel Prize acceptance speeches. For J. M. Coetzee’s book, de Vicq used the typeface Tema Cantante, which is conceptually perfect, since it is used on all of Coetzee’s book covers (figure 2.6). As de Vicq says on his website: “That typeface worked well for the portrait, since he has a very jagged face with a lot of personality.”2 The varied stress and sharp terminals of the typeface give Coetzee’s face an expressive quality, as do the tilted eyebrows, the lines on the face, and the asymmetry. It’s hard to believe this wasn’t a portrait drawn with a brush pen. Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich is better known as a designer than illustrator, but he’s used his knowledge of typography to great illustrative effect.

Will Staehle Will Staehle is a designer and illustrator who is also well known for his book jacket work; at one time he was an art director at HarperCollins in New York, New York. Now he has his own studio, Unusual Corporation, in Seattle, Washington, where he continues to design and illustrate book covers as well as other projects. He will often customize a pre-existing typeface to conform to his design idea, playing with hierarchy, placement, and size. His 2

http://devicq.com/coetzee.html (site obsolete)

Figure 2.6  J.M. Coetzee Nobel Prize Speech, cover. The sharp angles of the letters draw the portrait of Coetzee with an expressive spikiness. Client: Penguin Books Design and illustration: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich

keen eye for retro and decorative typefaces, and how differing styles might combine well together, often results in an historic feel, suggesting late 1800s tabloids, circus posters, and Wild West “wanted” flyers. There’s a wit in his vintage references that rescue them from saccharine sentimentality. Staehle’s illustration work is enhanced by his knowledge and skill as a designer and art director. Just as a graphic designer must seek the appropriate aesthetic for a project, Staehle has the ability to adapt his illustration style to suit the task at hand.

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Take the book cover for Christopher Buckley’s They Eat Puppies Don’t They? (figure 2.7). Buckley is a humorist writer and the viewer gets the joke right away. Staehle chose a pug dog to dress in Chinese Communist garb, the dog’s face suggestive of Chairman Mao’s own round face. The color palette of red, black, and a dingy white, along with the glorifying burst and banners, all conjure Communist propaganda (figure 2.8). Perhaps because in the West we have a different alphabet than in China, for typography, Staehle references blockish Russian Constructivist letters, staying true to Communist propaganda as a source of inspiration while switching the country of origin.

Figure 2.7  They Eat Puppies, Don’t They? book cover. The blockish lettering of the author’s name suggests Russian Communist propaganda posters—different country, but same ideology. Art Director: Anne Twomey Client: Twelve, Hachette Book Group Design and illustration: Will Staehle

For his series of middle school books about Warren the 13th (figures 2.9–2.11), Staehle was able to invest creative energies into the illustration and play with the typography and design. Written by Staehle’s old friend Tania del Rio, the titular character Warren is a bellhop at his family’s ancient and enormous hotel. Mysteries ensue and must be solved. Every detail of the design is integrated into a satisfying whole: the illustration, typography, and layout all meshing together. There’s an ersatz, Victorian complexity with the many different typefaces and decorative elements, a two-column layout for the text pages, and spot illustrations. The illustration style combines, in collage, original drawings, 3D models with engraving effects applied, and dense engravings. The books’ appearance is saved from chaos by the limited color palette, the generous margins, and, above all, the handsomeness of the design.

Figure 2.8  Chairman Mao Leads Us Forward, 1968. This vintage Chinese Communist poster elevates Chairman Mao to god-like status, beaming down on his citizens.

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WILL STAEHLE

For the title type on the cover and chapter openers, Staehle uses late-nineteenth century typefaces and design devices: embellished serifs, grotesques, blackletter, irregular baselines, dingbats (an ornamental character, or tiny illustration, that is part of a font set), rules (designer’s term for ornamental lines), and framed panels. He mixes styles throughout the title panels. The cover title has exaggeratedly large caps, a curved baseline and “the” in a contrasting script. The subtitle is a sans serif but elaborated with an embossed gold outline.

Staehle’s illustration style in these books is reminiscent of Edward Gorey and Charles Addams, yet his inventive mixed media and Warren’s own winsome monstrousness make the creation distinctively Staehle’s own. The vintage engravings blend well with the original line art of Staehle’s; there is no dissonance of texture. The stylistic choices made in the design and illustration aptly communicate the author’s tone, and the characters and world she conjures. The author and graphic artist are perfectly matched.

Figures 2.9–2.11  Warren the 13th and The AllSeeing Eye: A Novel, book cover and interior spreads. The old engravings and historic typefaces don’t look stodgy or sentimental thanks to the sharpness of the red–orange, the Gothic creepiness of the imagined world, and the comical humor of the characters. Client: Quirk Book Design and illustration: Will Staehle

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Tad Carpenter Tad Carpenter, designer, illustrator, and art director and his wife, designer and lettering artist Jessica Carpenter, run their own studio, Carpenter Collective, in Kansas City, Missouri. Tad’s a teacher and author as well. Tad has illustrated nearly two dozen children’s books, and, together, Tad and Jessica have designed and illustrated countless posters and branding and packaging projects. They do not confine themselves to a certain aesthetic but use iconography, typography, illustration style, and color palette to appropriately communicate the right tone for each client’s project. On their gig posters, one can see distinctly varied and spirited styles, often using set type that’s been modified (figure 2.12). The visual weight of the lettering versus the illustration differs from poster to poster: sometimes the picture dominates, sometimes the words do. In all of them there is a strong, dominant form that grabs the eye from a distance and beguiles the viewer to come closer, to see what it’s all about. They succeed in their ability to attract attention from a distance. For the Snoop Dogg and Guided by Voices posters, the technique is deceptively simple: type floats translucently over the linear illustration, word and image each operating on its own perceptual plane, each readable in its own necessary way. For the Violent Femmes poster, an otherwise pedestrian sans serif is made three-dimensional, extruded, and trotting back on a tilted plane. The Vampire Weekend poster winks at early twentieth-century designer Cassandre’s posters for Dubonnet. With

the band’s origins at an Ivy League University, this erudite reference is not out of place. Sometimes the illustration becomes a container for the type: a hat for Modest Mouse, a forehead for Imagine Dragons. Sometimes the type is paneled, sometimes the type floats freely in white space. For Frankie Rose’s poster, each letterform is in a different typeface, the letters rotating and dancing across the page with golden leaves, a challenge for readability but a charm to behold. Carpenter Collective did a series of graphics for Macy’s holiday season (figures 2.13a and 2.13b). There’s a retro vibe to the typography and illustration style, but the bright color palette is modern. Tad created the illustrations and Jessica designed the typography. The headline in the Santa poster is modeled on a typeface called Brothers Bold (figure 2.14). Compare the poster and the type sample. Not only have the letters been handsomely decorated with ornamentation within the stems, other modifications are apparent. The chiseled serifs are a bit larger, the “S” has been redrawn with vertical terminals, and the second “A” in “SANTA” has an elongated outer stem. “SANTA” and “LAND” are taller and narrower than the original, although “MACY’S” appears to be true to the original proportions. On the Tree Lighting poster in Figure 2.13b, greater liberties have been take with the width of the letters: the word “LIGHTING” is much taller and narrower. The ornamentation has changed as well with a row of gold dots, red outline, and a green-lined shadow gracing the body of each letter.

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TAD CARPENTER

Figure 2.12  Assorted gig posters. Carpenter’s gig posters reference a broad range of historic graphic styles reimagined as freshly contemporary. Client: Assorted Design and illustration: Tad Carpenter, Jessica Carpenter

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Figures 2.13a and 2.13b  Macy’s Christmas posters. The illustrations and lettering are combined so type or image are both an integral part of the whole. Client: Macy’s Design and Illustration: Tad Carpenter, Jessica Carpenter

Figure 2.14  Brothers typeface. Inspired by the early twentieth-century letterhead of the Coles Brothers’ Circus, this font has a durable vintage feel. Client: Emigre Fonts Designer: John Downer

Each of these two posters uses a different tactic to meld illustration and lettering. In the Santa poster, the primary type floats overhead in a burst of excitement; a dangling ornament and sign, held by an elf, become containers for secondary information. On the Tree Lighting poster, the width of the lines of display type mimic the triangular form of the Christmas tree; the manipulated capital height and letter width fit the tree shape and concept. The foliage resembles mistletoe more than fir boughs, but it’s charming how the illustration overlaps and intersects with the lettering, as if the type were actually tucked into the tree.

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DANIEL PELAVIN

For the cover of the book Science Experiments You Can Eat, Carpenter used a simple sans serif typeface; a thin skeleton lines each letter (figure 2.15). Every few letters, a spot illustration substitutes for the letterform. Carpenter looked for shapes that resembled the letters they replaced: a triangular Erlenmeyer flask for an “A,” a carrot for an “I,” and so on. In a couple of instances, the illustration becomes a container for the letter: a poisonous bottle forbiddingly “X”ed, a rectangular “N” fit into a beaker. Because the title is also the cover illustration, the entire graphic can fill the cover, edge to edge, without becoming claustrophobic and overly crowded. The geometric simplicity of the forms and limited color palette help keep the appearance fresh and modern. Carpenter Collective produces stellar work that plays with type and image combined in every imaginable way.

Figure 2.15  Science Experiments You Can Eat, book cover. Illustrations on this book cover are simplified into iconic forms, as simple as the letter shapes they sometimes substitute for. Client: HarperCollins Design and illustration: Tad Carpenter

Daniel Pelavin Daniel Pelavin is an accomplished letter and type designer, well known for his complex and polished designs executed with a great sense of history, color, and detail. His pure illustration work has a graphic quality with shape and line building recognizable elements from simple forms, often densely layered to create complex compositions. There is both economy and richness to Pelavin’s work. His literacy with graphic arts history is demonstrated with inflections of Art Deco or WPA travel posters or whatever era the project inspires. His familiarity with, and fondness for, vintage ephemera can be seen not only in the general appearance of the designs but also in the details. Since Pelavin’s early career predated digital media, his hand skills with French curves, pen, and ink were soundly established, a foundation that has served him well. He was an early adopter of graphic arts software and brought to the personal computer the same demanding standards he brought to the drawing table. He knows how to look beyond the pixel. While his current work is created digitally, his fountain pen sketches are often where his creative thinking begins. His work is well suited to packaging assignments where the illustration can manifest as decoration, often non-figurative but purely ornamental. For the Les Condamines perfume package labels (figure 2.16) Pelavin has a showcase for his customdesigned fonts. Orange Verte uses Pelavin’s font Mimosa; it’s visually related to fonts like Typo Upright and French Script, with the vertical angle of the stems; however, the exaggerated x-height and mono-weight stroke set it apart. Jasmin has a jazzage feel with the striations in the strokes, the simple silhouettes, the streamlined “S,” and the missing crossbar in the “A.” Mandarine uses Pelavin’s font Bing: it resonates with the Vienna Secessionist aesthetic in the angled crossbars, undulating stems, and high waistlines on many letters. The color palettes are sophisticated throughout. Pelavin skillfully emulates the appearance of a gold foil stamp using gradients, leaving the impression of a gilded and embossed surface. Simple flower forms appear on the Orange Verte package but otherwise the illustrated elements are decorative: abstract borders and patterns.

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Figure 2.16  Les Condamines perfume packaging. Pelavin’s own typeface designs are featured in the names of the perfumes, each of them reminiscent of fin de siécle styles, lending the product a luxurious appeal. Client: Les Condamimes, St. Remy De Provence, France Illustration and lettering: Daniel Pelavin

For editorial assignments that need to reference retro graphics, Pelavin is reliably knowledgeable. A magazine or newspaper that appropriately conjures a bygone era can affect readers on a visceral level. For Los Angeles Magazine (figure 2.17), Pelavin created a title panel in the style of a vintage fruit crate label. He captures not only the aesthetic, but also recreates textures reminiscent of chromolith printing within the illustrations. The composition is symmetrical, anchored by the orange at the center. The title lettering has the illusion of dimension and reiterates the orange color with a subtle gradient. The arch of the title panel is echoed by the angled lines in the complementary blue sky. The subtitle perfectly mimics print advertising design of the 1930s with the shaped, black panel and the sturdy slab serif Golden Type font outlined in an orange stroke. The small logo marks in the corners solidify the look of the fruit crate label, although they credit the artist rather than the grower.

Figure 2.17  This editorial illustration uses vintage crate labels as inspiration for an article about a civic organization that harvests fruit to prevent waste. Client: Los Angeles Magazine Illustration and lettering: Daniel Pelavin

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DANIEL PELAVIN

Pelavin’s vibrant color palette and finesse with display typefaces lend themselves to poster design as well. For the Mumfest poster, the basics of a seed packet inform the design: large flower, big title, and a margin to contain it all (figure 2.18). The panel around the flower head is formed by a shaped Scotch rule (a pair of parallel thick and thin strokes). Type and ornaments are in two shades of purple, complementing the mustard-colored border while the flower glows in a gradated deep rose color. Overlapping forms, such as smaller labels and banners, help to organize the busyness of the content. The title lettering itself curves above the illustration and contains floriated serifs, curling terminals, and layers of drop shadows, purple and white taking turns. Daniel Pelavin’s many graphic gifts include access to his fonts, which you can purchase and incorporate into your own work.

Figure 2.18  Mumfest poster. Playing with scale, this poster enlarges vintage seed packet graphics to oversized proportions. Client: Mumfest, City of New Bern, NC Illustration and lettering: Daniel Pelavin

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Tips and Tricks Typography and Illustration • Know your typographic history! Develop an interest in the provenance of letters and get acquainted with their personalities. Typography will set the tone for your whole piece so you need to be knowledgeable about what that tone is. • Collect inspiration and assemble mood boards; when needed, they can be targeted for specific projects. You can use Pinterest, or other sites online, or use sketchbooks or bulletin boards for printed matter. • Sketch your designs to see how the illustrations will interact and intersect with the letterforms. Allow yourself to have many different ideas at first. Cast your net wide before you hone in on your best ideas, then refine those ideas to select from the best of them. Do thumbnail sketches: small doodles within rectangular boxes to indicate the edge of the design. You can think conceptually more quickly if you work small, getting your idea down without worrying about rendering refined details. • No matter what medium you work in as an illustrator, if you’re working with set type, chances are 99% it will be digital. Typeset the title or phrase in a number of different typefaces and print the page. (Yes, print the page. You’ll see it differently than if you only look at it on screen.) Look at each line of type, at the personalities and shapes. Which typeface has the right personality? Which suits your message best? If you have lots of “S”s in your words, look for a font with a great “S.” Does your message need to be bolder or lighter, taller or wider? Look for a font with the appropriate weight and proportions.

• Draw right on top of your printed out type, either on tracing paper or with a contrasting color marker, to quickly explore alternatives. Doodle. Play. Experiment. Do you want to manipulate the letters, to extend a stem, to enlarge a letter, to tilt or curve the baseline? Where is the illustration relative to the text? • Once you’ve decided what font you’ll use and what the overall design is, typeset your words in the basic formation of your layout. Use a vector drawing program such as Adobe Illustrator. This will give you the most options to manipulate and customize the letters and will print at the best quality. Copy the set type and go on the menu bar to Type > Create Outlines. The words are now vector shapes with anchor points you can use to adjust the shapes and customize your letters. Resolve your spelling and letter spacing first though; once made vector, the type is no longer editable. • In your digital file, organize your illustration and lettering onto named layers in a way that makes sense to you. This seemingly mundane digital housekeeping will spare you headaches in the long run! It also makes it easy to share your layered files with printers and other production teams, which will streamline the process and lessen confusion.

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Calligraphy, Brush Lettering, and Illustration

3

There are illustrators who’ve added calligraphy and brush lettering to their hand skills. Their ability to control a line is applied not just to drawing or painting, but to words as well, uniting image and text, often with the same tools. Historically, handwriting predated the advent of movable type. However, in contemporary times, the computer enables even a child to know the meaning of the word “font” and to engage in typewriting, if not typesetting. Writing by hand is becoming a lost art, beginning at schools that often deemphasize skill in the art of writing. At the same time—perhaps in rebellion—there’s a growing interest in things made by hand, and calligraphy and brush lettering are among the crafts enjoying a renaissance.

“…these letters are all humanly possible instead of inhumanly perfect.” Jacqueline Svaren

Hieroglyphic writing systems were the origins of many alphabets and characters throughout the world. The most widely know are perhaps the hieroglyphs in Egypt; in the West, Mayan culture developed a glyphic writing system that was in use for over two thousand years until the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors. Pictographic communication evolved into more abstract and conceptual ways of expression. Throughout the world, distinct writing systems developed as exceptional examples of each particular civilization’s culture. While not the subject of this book, non-Western writing systems should be mentioned here; they are extraordinary examples of calligraphy. To choose but one from innumerable examples, Chinese brush lettering is an ancient art dating back thousands of years and still revered in modern times. There are thousands of characters in the written Chinese language, the origins of which were 29

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CHAPTER 3: CALLIGRAPHY, BRUSH LETTERING, AND ILLUSTRATION

pictograms (stylized renderings of objects) and ideograms (symbols representing ideas). The artistry of Chinese brushwork extends to the pictorial, oftentimes with texts written on the same paper or silk surface as the painting, the delicacy and energy of the brushwork connecting the two (figure 3.1).

Figure 3.1  Autumn colors on the Qiao and Hua mountains. Artist and date unknown. The text hovers in the sky, brushwork in both foliage and text, with additional information in simplified characters in red woodblock imprints.

Just as stylistic groupings of typefaces have a foundation in the history and evolution of typography, so too can calligraphic alphabets be categorized into styles with historic and geographic origins. And just as with typography, knowledge of the roots of a calligraphic alphabet brings depth and wisdom to a design. The student of lettering may experience an epiphany in discovering the calligraphic origins for some familiar typefaces: for example, the connection between Old Style fonts and the calligraphic alphabet Humanist Bookhand. Blackletter fonts bear a strong resemblance to their handwritten origins (figure 3.2). Trajan (mentioned in chapter 2) was originally a calligraphic alphabet, found later incised into stone on the Trajan Column, and centuries later as a font. The letters J, U, W, and X were missing from early alphabets; they

Trajan Rustic Greek Uncial Uncial Half-Uncial Visigothic Luxeuil Figure 3.2  The evolution of the minuscule or lowercase alphabet. Note that the final line is typeset in the font Times, illustrating vividly the influence of Humanist calligraphy on Oldstyle and Transitional type faces.

Beneventan Carolingian Insular Protogothic Textualis quadrata Fraktur Humanist Times

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PEN CALLIGRAPHY

didn’t exist yet. Uncial is what we would now call a “mixed case” alphabet; most of the letters resemble contemporary lower case letterforms but the B, N, and R look like current capital letters. Certain alphabets have a suggestive quality; we associate them with specific places or cultures. The histories and origins of the alphabets are more complex than that, but we are designing within the context of our time and place. For example, Uncial and Half Uncial alphabets bring to mind Ireland. These lettering styles actually evolved for centuries along myriad winding paths throughout Europe, yet Half Uncial has an enduring affiliation with Ireland. Blackletter alphabets were based in Textualis, Quadrata, and Fraktur. The fonts and Bible created by Johannes Gutenberg, and centuries later, the cultural declaration of Adolph Hitler that Blackletter type styles were the official German fonts—by far the least of his countless horrific acts—ensured that Blackletter styles were associated with German culture. Well into the twentieth century, books published in Germany were typeset in Blackletter styles. In modern times this style has two entirely different common uses: as nameplates for newspapers, which seems to lend an air of gravitas to the publication, and in promoting heavy metal music, perhaps for the gothic flair. The Blackletter style has an inflexible vertical stem which sets up a rhythm so steady that it impedes readability, an effect sometimes called “picket fencing.” The ascenders and descenders are very short and “curves” are often 45 degree angles, further complicating legibility. There is a pronounced stroke variation: the thick strokes are very thick, the thin strokes very thin. Trajan and Humanist letterforms originated, separately, in Italy. The letters have an openness in their counters and a generosity of proportion that makes them highly legible. Their successful and enduring transition from calligraphy into typography and their subsequent widespread usage have made them universally familiar, transcending the boundaries of their point of origin. There are a multitude of typefaces that mimic calligraphy but they reveal their digital origins when, upon examination, one sees exactly the same letter recur identically. There are none of the subtle variations that would ensue when written

Figure 3.3  Bickham Script, an Open Type calligraphic font with alternate swash characters.

by hand (figure 3.3); the practiced eye can tell the difference between set type and calligraphy. With actual, inked calligraphy one can also control for such variables as paper quality, which can add a textural quality to the mark. Because calligraphy is so defined by its tools of creation, it is difficult to tease apart the appearance of the letters from the process by which they are formed. There are many other books that give lessons in calligraphy (some are cited in this book’s bibliography), as well as online tutorials. The examples seen here, and the following tips, are just to whet the appetite for the craft, and to give a little background for the work of the featured illustrators.

Pen Calligraphy Calligraphy usually requires a pen of some sort, although beautiful work has been executed with all manner of tools, some of them quite experimental (figure 3.4). Medieval scribes used feathered quills, but a contemporary calligrapher has access to a range of nibs, the most durable of which are made of metal. There are also wooden nib pens and inexpensive marker pens, although these lack the precision of the metal nibs. Flat or broad nibs show a marked contrast between thick and thin strokes, the degree of contrast depending on the width of the nib. There are also round nib pens that write with a single or mono-weight stroke. Different styles of alphabets dictate specific nib weights to render the letters at appropriate sizes; this is how the calligrapher can control the relative boldness of the letters. Flat tip nibs are rigid, with a reservoir in the nib to hold the ink.

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In brush lettering, the softness of the bristles affects the mark. A soft bristle, pointed-tip brush will enable the artist to thicken or thin the stroke with gradated nuance. A stiff bristle, chisel-tipped brush will result in a textured mark, particularly if lightly loaded with paint or ink, producing a dry brush effect.

Elvis Swift

Figure 3.4  Calligraphy pen and brush lettering tools. These range from the affordable and accessible Tombow brush pens to the professional calligrapher’s Leonhardt flexible pen nib.

The other main type of metal nib is thin-tipped; it has a springy quality when applied to paper, responsive to pressure. The tip of the nib is split down the middle; the two sides separate when pressed down, widening the stroke. Releasing pressure will permit the line weight to return to the thin width of the pointed nib. Crow Quill is a common name for this style of nib; these pens are popular among some illustrators and comic artists for ink drawing. The ink reservoir is within the hollow curve of the nib. For both types of nibs, the artist will want an array of nib holders to insert the nibs into; some Crow Quill nibs require different holders than those needed for broad tip nibs. Calligraphers will also want to buy specific ink for this purpose. Calligraphic ink is more viscous than India ink, better suited for the metal nibs commonly used.

Brush Lettering By contrast, brush lettering has its roots in a more informal history than calligraphy. Although in past centuries a schooled person’s handwriting might resemble what we now describe as calligraphy, brush lettering styles more closely resemble commercial sign painting of the early twentieth century, typically bolder and more casual.

Elvis Swift is an illustrator who works with a flexible nib pen. His lettering conjures Spencierian script from the 1890s (figure 3.5) and the expressive drawings of David Stone Martin’s 1950s jazz album covers. Andy Warhol, early in his career as an advertising illustrator, had a similar style in his line quality, though his lettering was often more inspired by jagged 1950s lettering—as well as his mother’s handwriting, of all things. Swift’s surprising yet somehow perfect combination of influences is modernized by irregularities that rescue the work from fusty perfection.

Figure 3.5  Spencerian Script. Image from page 46 of “Penman’s Art Journal” (1898). The regularity of the small lower case letters contrasts with the much larger, elaborate decorative capitals and swashes.

Swift’s label for Matchbook Wine Company integrates the flourishes of swooping pen line into the illustration; the scrollwork becomes hair and beard, garment and cuff (figure 3.6). These spinning curlicues are Victoriana unhinged and unconstrained. Formality is further disrupted by the blotches that ensue, perhaps by the pen nib catching on the page or too much ink in the nib, spilling and spattering onto the paper. The line suggests that the pen rarely left the page; each component leads to the next with a dizzying grace. The lettering shares the same line quality: it’s not quite perfect, and that is somehow perfect.

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ELVIS SWIFT

For the illustration about wine, a pastiche of words and pictures, Swift’s words layer atop one another and the line drawings, all combined into a mass (figure 3.7). The swashes again conjure Victoriana as do the shapes of the letters—but they are messy, blotchy, and squished, with seemingly random negative spaces within letters playfully colored in. It is an exuberant interpretation of traditional forms. In the black and white spot illustration, Swift embeds the lettering into the illustration; it becomes the title of the book the snooty little man is reading (figure 3.8). The swirling strokes are calmer, but the line bristles with weight and texture in the arm of the chair and on the far edge of the book. Figure 3.7  Editorial illustration. The illustrations and words inhabit the same plane, interwoven, the hierarchies of size subtle. Client: PCMA Convene magazine Illustration and lettering: Elvis Swift

Figure 3.6  Wine label. The illustrated man is composed of flourishes that customarily would decorate letterforms, here liberated to create a man. Client: Matchbook Wine Company Design and illustration: Elvis Swift

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Figure 3.8  Spot illustration. The reader’s self-satisfied expression is amplified by the title of his book. The lettering is fully part of the illustration. Client: The Boston Globe Illustration and lettering: Elvis Swift

Figure 3.9  Spot illustration. There is a translucency in both line and shape. Client: SAVEUR Magazine Illustration and lettering: Elvis Swift

Swift’s use of color is not typically a dominant feature of his illustrations, although for the spot illustration of the bowl of loquats, the squiggly line for lettering, hand, and bowl contrast nicely with the translucent flat shapes for the fruits (figure 3.9). In the spot illustration of the heart, all the words float in black atop the pale red heart. We see his trademark swirls in red, animating the chambers of the heart like pumped blood (figure 3.10). Swift’s deft hand skills with pen and ink enhance his lettering and illustration alike.

Eleonora Kolycheva Originally from Estonia, Eleonora Kolycheva is an illustrator who currently works in the UK. Her work is primarily illustration, but she includes lively calligraphy in some of her pieces. She also designs and illustrates charming maps, on which she incorporates calligraphy with hand lettering to identify locations. Her painted illustrations

Figure 3.10  Spot illustration. The words flow through the heart, in and out again, emotions expressed as if blood coursing through the veins. Client: Penn Gazette Illustration and lettering: Elvis Swift

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NATALYA BALNOVA

are in gouache but the calligraphy is written in ink with a flexible nib pen. It is spikier than Elvis Swift’s, and her baselines are often tucked tightly together and slightly curved, making the words form a textural mass. On this one personal project (figure 3.11), rather than integrating the lettering into the illustration, Kolycheva breaks them into their component parts, each functioning independently yet harmoniously. The illustration and lettering are united in their color palette and by the edgy whimsy that they share.

Natalya Balnova Natalya Balnova’s illustration and brush lettering are bold, vibrant, and funny. Born in Russia, she attended the Academy of Industrial Art and Design in St. Petersburg. She’s been living and working in New York City for over two decades; she studied at Parsons School of Design and the School of Visual Arts (SVA)—where she now teaches. She works on assignments for a stellar roster of clients in a wide range of industries, but is not limited to commissioned assignments. Balnova also creates her own projects: silk-screened prints, books, and zines that she designs, writes, prints, and markets herself. This means of reproduction gives her work the constraint of a limited color palette, though the one she chooses is usually colorful and bright. Within that limitation she finds variety, contrasting bold blocks of color with areas of ornate detail. There is an inflection of folk art in Balnova’s illustrations, an appetite for decorative elements. Hers is not delicate ornamentation, it is brazen and even a little rude, in the best way possible, and befitting the content of her publications. Her writing is thoughtful, witty, and wide-ranging in subject matter: from history to modern consumerism. Balnova uses a fatly loaded brush to write out her words; the ensuing strokes are thick and juicy. The baselines of the letters dip and curl, the letters hop about in size, she mixes upper- and lowercase, script and roman letters. The same loose and expressive line is used to draw the illustrations, sometimes with a dry brush to give texture. There is an immediacy to her work, as if her fertile imagination could not be contained.

Figure 3.11  Personal project. The words shrink and swell in size to amplify the meta message: “Nonsense . . . you see?” Illustration and lettering: Eleonora Kolycheva

In the booklet October 16. 1793 / The Guillotine Letter, Balnova illustrates Marie Antoinette, her feather plumes, clothes, shoes, desserts. . . is this a play on words, that Marie Antoinette received her “just desserts” (figure 3.12)? Excerpts from her letter to her sister-in-law, written as she awaited the guillotine and death, occupy sections of the book, sharing the pages with the illustrations. Balnova’s words vary in size and weight, amplifying the sorrowful message, as in “Alas, poor child!” writ large. There are meaningful contrasts in the design: the modernity of the electric red, purple, and black used to draw the historic figure and

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CHAPTER 3: CALLIGRAPHY, BRUSH LETTERING, AND ILLUSTRATION

Figure 3.12  October 16. 1793 / The Guillotine Letter, personal project. This booklet is an excerpt from Marie Antoinette’s letter to her sister-in-law. The brilliant color palette contrasts with the historic content, giving the booklet a contemporary energy. Illustration and lettering: Natalya Balnova

her eighteenth-century embellishments. An even greater tension lies between Marie Antoinette’s heartbroken text and her decadent fripperies. Balnova has created a multitude of self-published prints and posters, generally two-color, that feature her original writing with wild and comical illustrations. Her phrases are funny, ridiculous, and charming, sometimes all at once. The creatures— very often they are creatures—are absurd looking, a perfect match for the phrases. Her illustrations sometimes look as if they had been drawn by a child, albeit a very precocious and clever child (figure 3.13).

Figure 3.13  I Am So Impressed With Myself, personal project. Balnova’s silkscreen prints preserve the tactile juiciness of her brushwork. Illustration and lettering: Natalya Balnova

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NATALYA BALNOVA

Balnova works in other media and on other projects, and whatever the medium, it informs the appearance of the work. The work is always unmistakably hers with a robust line and sense of humor. One client is Blue Q, a company in Massachusetts that produces quirky illustrationladen products. Blue Q writes their own snarky copy and finds illustrators whose work meshes well with the texts (figure 3.14). For the “Patience. Yeah, No” socks, Balnova rendered her distinctive blobular beings and wrote the terse phrase “Yeah, no” as if the quirky critters were jaded hipsters. For the Comics Cookbook the color is laid down more lightly than the previous examples, in translucent layers of pinks, yellows, and greens (figure 3.15). The content is more useful than expressive; this is a recipe after all and has to serve that function. The text with title, ingredients, and instructions weave through the spot illustrations, usefully in sequence. Evidence of Balnova’s fanciful tendencies is found in the oversized pasta and the shrimp bulging from the pots. Balnova’s artistry maintains her distinct character and wit regardless where it appears. Figure 3.15  Shrimp and Basil, illustration for a Comics Cookbook anthology. The illustrations and lettering are interwoven, words curling around, labeling, and embracing the spot illustrations. This is a functional information graphic made artful. Client: Centrala publishing house Illustration and lettering: Natalya Balnova

Figure 3.14  Patience. Yeah, No. The thick lettering and simple, shaped illustrations reproduce well in textiles. Client: Blue Q Illustration and lettering: Natalya Balnova

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CHAPTER 3: CALLIGRAPHY, BRUSH LETTERING, AND ILLUSTRATION

Kimberly Glyder Kimberly Glyder is a book jacket designer, letterer, and illustrator who lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The scope of her lettering work is far broader than brush lettering alone. Her background as a fine art and literature major, and later a graphic design student at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), followed by her time at Da Capo Press as a staff designer, gives her current work a depth of understanding about professional practices. In addition to her assignment work, she remains busy creating her own sketchbook and personal projects; these explorations invariably find their way into her commissioned book jacket art. Her projects always have a workman-like polish, but there is a handmade, accessible appeal, in particular to much of her brush lettering.

For an early version of the book cover for The Wangs Vs. the World, Glyder painted a retro station wagon, headlights blaring, and floated it diagonally on a bright red background (figure 3.16). That red background and the yellow border ornament convey “China,” and the title reiterates the heritage of the book’s characters. The lettering, in a contrasting white, is painted and textural, the script is informal, one handsome step above handwriting. This cover was not approved nor was it the only comp. For the final version, Glyder’s illustration becomes abstract, an array of circles in a tight spectrum of reds, like swatches of lipstick, alluding to the Wang family’s cosmetics empire

It is endemic in the book publishing industry for art directors, designers, and illustrators to create countless versions of cover designs, seeking to please multitudes: the publisher, the editor, the marketing department, and often, the author as well. This is not necessarily a reflection on the caliber of the design but rather the juggling act of trying to get a disparate group of people to agree. Many talented book jacket artists have a Salon des Refusés, a collection of book covers they’re rightfully proud of that have been rejected for, oftentimes, arbitrary reasons. The ease of creating alternate designs with digital technologies has only worsened this problem.

Figure 3.16  The Wangs Vs. the World book cover. This was an earlier comp (comprehensive sketch), with brush script lettering and a painted illustration, the illustrated car incorporated as a design component. Client: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Illustration and lettering: Kimberly Glyder

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KIMBERLY GLYDER

(figure 3.17). The yellow becomes gold, a foil stamp on the cover with a luxurious sheen. The lettering is still at an angle; still brush lettered, white against intense color, but now simplified as sans serif capital letters. In a visceral way, without figurative illustration, the world of the book is conjured. For The Library of America, Glyder designed and illustrated a boxed set of Madeleine L’Engle books, including her Caldecott Award-winning A Wrinkle in Time (figure 3.18). The central book is geared for young adults and involves a girl’s travel through space and time in search of her lost father. She has companions for her search, including a younger brother. They slip into the cosmos

Figure 3.18  A Wrinkle in Time book package. The tesseract is imagined as a glowing, spiraling disc: lightness against darkness, symbolizing the struggles between good and evil in the novel. Client: The Library of America Illustration and lettering: Kimberly Glyder

through a tesseract, a portal to other dimensions, and on the cover this is rendered with brush as a glowing, warm-colored circle against a cosmic blue darkness. The shape is symbolic but also a design device, a container for the title written in white, a basic script with the same brushed texture. Because the boxed set contains a number of stories, the complex contents are represented simply, with silhouettes in flat colors: a girl, a boy, a bird, water, leaves, and to convey the magic within, a flying horse.

Figure 3.17  The Wangs Vs. the World book cover. In this final version, the illustration is abstracted into a crowd of overlapping circles, luxury imparted with the regal reds against gold, the lipstick colors suggesting the family’s cosmetic company. Client: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Illustration and lettering: Kimberly Glyder

Glyder’s been a notable figure in the resurgence of brush and hand lettering in book jacket work, although she is modest about that. As she said, in an interview: “It’s been a nice change in the last few years to see a resurgence in hand lettering and illustration on covers.”1 She is one of the best reasons this is the case. 1

https://spinemagazine.co/articles/kimberly-glyder

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CHAPTER 3: CALLIGRAPHY, BRUSH LETTERING, AND ILLUSTRATION

Tips and Tricks Calligraphy and Brush Lettering • Know your calligraphy history! Study historic forms to establish a basic understanding of the origins of the alphabetic styles you want to use. There is a wealth of resources online and in books; check the bibliography of this book for some good examples.

appearance of boldness of the letters; any good calligraphy book will give guidance to the precise number. In addition, different style alphabets require different angles of the nib to the baseline, very often between 30 and 45 degrees.

• Invest in good, basic tools and materials. Start with inexpensive ones to explore your preferences: do you gravitate towards formal or informal ways of expression? When you unearth your natural way of working, you can spend more money on better pens, inks, and papers to elevate your craftsmanship.

• Whatever lettering tool you choose, the general rule of thumb (or hand, as the case may be) is to pull the writing instrument, pen, or brush towards you, from top to bottom of the page, or from left to right. Pushing the tip of the tool will make you lose control; it is impossible to make an attractive mark this way. (Apologies to left-handed people. You will need to make necessary accommodations.)

• Practice, practice, practice! It takes a long time to write with an attractive consistency and control. Practice writing upright strokes in a rhythmic set of lines, practice writing circular forms in rows and rows of loops, both upside down and right side up.

• Once you’ve gained some proficiency, allow yourself to play more expressively and experimentally. Try writing very large, engaging the full arm in the motion, on large pieces of paper. Allow for happy accidents. Layer your marks; investigate the outer limits of legibility.

• For metal nib calligraphy, before you start to write letterforms, lightly pencil the baseline, x-height, cap, and ascender and descender lines. With a chisel nib, you’ll mark a series of small horizontal strokes to establish these guidelines. However many strokes you determine will establish the

• Enjoy using non-traditional means, unorthodox tools and media. Consider writing with a coarse bristle brush, a comb, or even a branch. Try using thicker paint instead of ink. Investigate different papers with a variety of surfaces: smooth, rough, textured. Figure 3.19  (left) Calligraphy instructional page for Humanist Bookhand Italic. A good guide will show the sequence and direction of strokes. Figure 3.20  (below) See how, by using a pair of pencils, the calligrapher creates the illusion of a varied stroke weight, thick to thin.

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Hand Lettering and Illustration

“Letterers can break all the UXOHVLIWKH\ZLVKŜWKH\ can defy pen and brush logic and make crazy, zany letterforms not grounded LQWUDGLWLRQŜEXW\RX have to know the rules to know how to break them.” Jessica Hische

4

Hand lettering is the broadest category in this book. The degree of inventiveness, the stylistic range, the wealth of interpretations by graphic artists are infinite and inspirational. Hand lettering draws on all of typography and calligraphy, reinterpreting existing letterforms with the individual mark of the artist. When illustrators draw letters by hand, they are essentially creating an illustration of a letterform. They rely on isomorphic correspondence (revisit the section on Gestalt Principles in chapter 1 if you must). The handmade letter must resemble its typographic or calligraphic original form enough for it to be recognized and read—although it is remarkable the degree to which one can distort and customize letters and still leave them legible. Of course, since letters are typically seen alongside other letters, forming words and sentences, the reader has contextual help in the interpretation, enhancing readability. The illustrator who does hand lettering will have a measure of literacy with typography and design. Many of the artists described here are schooled designers; all of them are consumers of the written word and have the literacy and aesthetic sense to, at the very least, reinterpret letterforms in their own ways. Illustrated letterforms can encompass a broad definition of the term “illustration” to include non-figurative and abstract decoration. Abstractions can be the reduction of familiar things into their simplest shapes, or can be shapes all on their own. Texture, color palette, and pattern all help to communicate tone and style. The design of letters and words with pictorial

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illustrations, and the relationship between the two components, amplify the message of the contents. An adept illustrator is sensitive to all of these factors to articulate the gist of what’s being said. From a pragmatic standpoint, illustrators who are also able to execute lettering broaden the number and the kinds of assignments they’re able to handle. From a creative standpoint, doing both illustration and lettering design multiplies the ways in which graphic artists can express themselves. Some of the types of assignments that lend themselves to lettering with illustration include printed matter such as greeting cards and other paper goods, posters, maps, book covers, and packaging. Objects can be printed or woven with text and image: tote bags, t-shirts, socks, hats, textiles, etc. In the physical environment, way-finding and explanatory signage are enhanced by the creative input of hand lettering. Online illustrations with lettering can be animated to attract attention and help with site navigation.

Jill De Haan Utah-based Jill De Haan’s work has a beautifully decorative quality. She demonstrates variety in her sensitivity to both calligraphic- and typographicbased hand lettered forms. De Haan is a skilled painter but she does not stop there; her media extend to woodcarving, embroidery, murals, and beyond. For the Daphne du Maurier book jacket (figure 4.1), De Haan contrasts the stoic flared strokes of the typeface Albertus with a more delicate, hand drawn, slanted script for the book title.

While the term “hand drawn” is used often here, it is meant to encompass any kind of drawing tool, whether traditional or digital. Regardless of the tool, skill and finesse are required to create graphics that communicate clearly and with visual interest. To clarify a distinction, calligraphy and brush lettering, as described in the previous chapter, mean letters written naturally with the tool, without further manipulation digitally or by hand. The hand-lettered scripts in this chapter might resemble calligraphy, but are more likely penciled, modified, refined, and then colored. Graphic artists who do hand lettering are no less skilled than the calligrapher, it’s simply a different process—even if the results resemble each another, especially to the untrained eye. During the sketch process, digital drawing tools are infinitely reworkable, although many graphic artists still express a fondness for modest, portable pencil and paper.

Figure 4.1 My Cousin Rachel book cover. The illustration is like wallpaper come to life, wrapping around the title as if to entrap it. Client: Little, Brown Illustration and lettering: Jill De Haan

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JILL DE HAAN

The illustration is of a plant form as pattern, sprigs of yellow flowering vine curling over the surface like wallpaper, the vine sprouting from the script’s swashes. Green stems furl through the author name as well; all of the lettering is embedded in the vine, suggesting entrapment and claustrophobia—symbolically apropos for an historic thriller novel. De Haan’s personal projects include a line of cards and prints with quotations designed in attractive lockups. She is masterful with designs where lettering and ornamentation mesh together in a way that clarifies the hierarchy of the message, all the components forming a pleasing new whole. For the Ram Dass quote, the words “quieter” and “hear” are emphasized, larger than all others (figure 4.2). They are rendered in a style that references Blackletter alphabets, with the verticality of the stems, the diamond-shaped crossbars, and angled strokes instead of curves. Most of the secondary words are drawn as classical Old Style caps, except for “the,” which is a slanted upper- and lowercase variant. The design is held together with swashes and simple flowers, the surface of the design evenly spaced, busy, yet in no way crowded. Her use of paint to execute the artwork adds the slightest texture and a warmth that digital execution would not allow without an intentional effect or filter.

Figure 4.2 Personal project. Gradated color adds a subtle glow, as if Ram Dass’s name were the setting sun. Illustration and lettering: Jill De Haan

For De Haan’s Nature print, most of the letters are built out of smaller illustrations (figure 4.3). The legibility is challenging—and worth the effort. The limited color palette is lovely, but don’t let the prettiness fool you. She refers to the natural world in all its beauty and terror—bunny rabbits to bones, flowers to scorpions. The illustrations pile atop one another to construct the stems and bowls of the six letters of the word. Smaller letters in red reveal a quote: “Let nature be your teacher.” The whole design is made elegant by the black background. These various projects showcase De Haan’s distinctive motifs: forms from nature coupled with inventive design and lettering.

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Figure 4.3 Nature print, personal project. The colors of this print have an old fashioned, desaturated quality that avoids the more obvious choice: green. Illustration and lettering: Jill De Haan

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JOHN HENDRIX

John Hendrix While an MFA candidate at NY City’s School of Visual Arts, John Hendrix labored over complex and painterly compositions. His teachers and classmates noticed that his line-based sketchbook drawings seemed more unique and original. Inspired, Hendrix’s work veered into that stylistic direction. Since then he has written and illustrated books, and illustrated editorial assignments from his home in St. Louis, Missouri, all generated from this deceptively humble beginning. As with many other illustrators, his self-motivated work was the truest touchstone of his creativity, his best ideas, and processes. Early in Hendrix’s career he worked as a graphic designer, so his hand lettering has a solid foundation from which to explore. His sketchbooks are still key to his experiments in illustration and lettering. He is known in his community for drawing in church, where he brings his sketchbook to transcribe the day’s sermon into a spread, finishing and coloring them afterwards at home, often with Golden Paint Liquid Acrylics for their translucent quality. Each spread is unique. Without the constraints of a client’s wishes, Hendrix is liberated to explore countless ways of integrating word and image. Hendrix is adroit with composition, playing with scale and hierarchy to fully communicate the message. In Death Trembles, “tremble” sits atop the figure of Death, rendered as if 3D and then, as if digging into Death’s back, colors invert (figure 4.4). For Cain, the letters spelling “Cain” form a desert city, the rest of the text laid out on the sand (figure 4.5). Directional arrows guide the reader through the smaller text while the figure of Cain weaves through his city name, alive, dying, and dead at different intervals. Abel’s tombstone is buried above his skull, a reminder, with the sunken heft of guilt. Hendrix has illustrated a number of children’s books and written some of them. In writing his own books, he is able to explore his own interests and bring them to a younger audience. In Drawing is Magic he shares his passion for his craft through useful tips and playful prompts for budding artists. His storybooks are usually grounded in history, Hendrix’s moral integrity finding expression in

storytelling. His most recent (as of this writing) is the fascinating The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler, for which he won a gold medal from the Society of Illustrators in New York City. By choosing to tell the story in graphic novel form, Hendrix expands the conventions of comics, refreshing a narrative that might otherwise bypass the target audience of middle-grade children. There is a limited color palette of teal, red, and black; the inks appear translucent, expanding the opportunities for layering. Hendrix varies the page layout to amplify the tale of the deeply moral hero. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, already a committed pastor, was exposed to the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, New York, as a young man. When he

Figure 4.4 Drawing in Church sketchbook spread: Death Trembles. The word “trembles” weighs on the hunchedover silhouette of Death. “Before” trembles and “Him,”, the Lord, resonates with repetition like an echo. Illustration and lettering: John Hendrix

Figure 4.5 Drawing in Church sketchbook spread: Cain. The letters spelling “Cain” form a desert city, the rest of the text laid out on the sand. The corpse threads through the word buildings in varying stages of decay. Illustration and lettering: John Hendrix

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returned to Germany he saw the rise of Nazis through the lens of human rights. He became a member of the Resistance movement and what follows is an adventurous and ultimately tragic tale. On the cover, the word “Spy” is an inline sans serif, but it mimics the vertical stems and angled corners of a Blackletter alphabet, an appropriate reference to the German context of the story (figure 4.6). Embedded in the closed counter of the “P” is a cross, alluding to the protagonist’s Christian faith that motivates him. One interior spread has a timeline, with the text broken up by a diagonal chasm, panels marking the steps in the erosion and collapse of German civil society (figure 4.7). The color tracks degradation, gradating from a wholesome green to a hellish red. The ravine is a powerful metaphor, its sides littered with icons of death and destruction: tanks, gas masks, skulls, and tombstones. The type on this page is all explanatory, smaller body copy, allowing the illustration to dominate. On another spread, Bonhoeffer is David to a Germanic Goliath (figure 4.8). Words swell in size to shout out of the text block, clean mono-weight sans serif letters framing the larger “Other,” rendered in the simplified Blackletter style. The translucent inks layer the illustrations, allowing for a complex reading of them, revealing the demonic beast emerging from the Germanic warrior. John Hendrix is also known for his editorial work. Art directors rely on him for assignments that include hand lettering, allowing the headline to be fully integrated into the illustration. For the Frack illustration, the first four letters are cross sections of the earth, verdant growth atop, bits of gravel falling off (figure 4.9). On the facing page the landscape is blighted and barren, the well gushing fire. The “K” becomes the drilled well, with the leg and arm of the letter fracturing off of their central stem. The question mark becomes a pipe furling underground. This illustration is simultaneously title, picture, and information graphic.

Figure 4.6 The Faithful Spy, book cover. The descender of the letter P is a knife-like shadow of Bonhoeffer as he runs away, pointing towards and even threatening him. Client: Amulet Books, an imprint of Abrams Books for Young Readers Text, illustration, and lettering: John Hendrix

John Hendrix applies conceptual thinking to his projects, resulting in work that is not only engaging to look at but also rich with meaning. Figure 4.7 The Faithful Spy, interior timeline spread. This spread is a timeline infographic, doubling as an illustration of the disintegrating landscape. Text, illustration and lettering: John Hendrix

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JOHN HENDRIX

Figure 4.8 The Faithful Spy, interior spread. The translucent inks are layered, allowing for a complex reading of the illustration, revealing the demonic beast emerging from the Germanic warrior. Text, illustration, and lettering: John Hendrix

Figure 4.9 Editorial illustration, interior spread (unpublished). The letters are themselves illustrations, becoming containers for the stratification of the earth, the drilling, even the pipeline. Client: Alcade magazine Illustration and lettering: John Hendrix

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Jordan Sondler Jordan Sondler is one of the younger graphic artists mentioned in this book, yet she is thriving with her approach to illustration and lettering. She attended Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) and currently lives and works in New York City. Her work is fresh and appealing, with a colorful simplicity that suggests the notebook doodles of a talented teen. Make no mistake, her style is harder than it looks, but its accessibility makes it very marketable. The relatable emotional openness in Sondler’s work is one reason why it resonates with her audience. Sondler is the author of much of her personal work and because it is timely and honest, it leads to assigned projects where she is writer as well as illustrator and letterer. A recent project of her invention is a heavily illustrated (and lettered) book titled Feel It Out, filled with wisdom and tips on how to handle social situations and one’s own

mental well-being. Sondler’s illustrations are not only found on printed matter such as prints and journals, but also pins, socks, patches, children’s clothing, patterns, dishes, packaging, and more. Her bold sense of color—and talent for color palettes appropriate for the project at hand—and the simplicity of the shapes she draws make them translate well onto a multitude of surfaces and at a small scale when need be. For the journal cover, Sondler literally does doodle a journal cover, with simple flowers and pencils and a cheery sun. . . oh, wait, is that a prescription capsule (figure 4.10)? There’s also the icon for a woman, a hand in a “V for Victory” salute (with red fingernails at that!) and a message heart spelling “UR QT.” For all the child-like quality of her drawing, there’s a grown woman with a sense of humor behind the scribblings. The title is written as simply as a kid might write it, in all caps, perfect for this use.

Figure 4.10 Journal cover. For the person who doesn’t doodle, a pre-doodled journal cover. Client: Art Print Japan Illustration and lettering: Jordan Sondler

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JORDAN SONDLER

Some of Sondler’s projects are purely text. For the print of the title of a Bee Gees song, Sondler’s wobbly line implies a chiseled-effect font as if it were rendered with marker and colored pencil (figure 4.11). Sondler’s work is created digitally but, because she uses digital brushes that mimic the textures and forms of traditional tools, she maintains solidarity with pencil-wielding fans. Using a limited color palette she darkly asks, “How” drawing “Mend” and “Heart” more softly in pink, “A” stands alone in red and the rest of the phrase is quiet in white with red lines. The colors guide the reader to wonder: “How mend a heart?” and the secondary message, “Can you broken?” Her use of color is like musical notation. The sadness of the phrase is softened, a bit, by the homespun depiction of it.

both attractive and useful. There is the challenge of orienting things in space, at least roughly, with key streets and buildings indicated, and random benches, trees, dogs, whatever, sprinkled about. On the map of The Highline in New York City, the hierarchy of information gives Sondler an opportunity to decorate the title lettering, parking it in a black lozenge, and emphasizing a few secondary words: NYC and FUN (figure 4.12). The color palette is quirky but, by painting the streets yellow and the background pink, two hues that are of the same value, she keeps the busyness of the overall design under control. The bright cream color of The Highline’s walkway draws the eye along the central attraction. Sondler has an aptitude for packing complex, dense information into legible and appealing designs.

One of the useful assignments for which Sondler’s work is well suited is drawing maps. She’s figured out how to reduce the complex infrastructure of a place to its primary landmarks in a way that is

Figure 4.11 Song title print, personal work. Although drawn digitally, the lines have the texture of pencil. In a seeming contradiction, the forms they draw are suggestive of letters chiseled out of sturdy stone. Illustration and lettering: Jordan Sondler

Figure 4.12 Highline Map. The geometry of the locale is simplified and stylized, with the relative relationship of places preserved. Client: Minted Illustration and lettering: Jordan Sondler

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Melinda Beck Native New Yorker Melinda Beck’s schooling was as a graphic designer at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), following in her parents’ professional footsteps. That choice informed the beginning of her career as a full-time designer. She did fine work, but wanted to be an illustrator and so she did that too, and then some. Melinda’s creativity is wide-ranging, contradicting the perceived wisdom that an illustrator should have a single, distinct style. Melinda has created a number of styles that are all recognizably hers; she will probably invent more. Her work has a through line of shape-oriented approaches, and it is consistently clever. Her cleverness is not facile; it extends to personal work that demonstrates sharply observed political commentary. The diversity of her work is found not only in her styles but also in the range of projects she has taken on: prints, posters, editorial work, book covers and books, animations, and personal work for gallery exhibitions.

form the roadway turn and veer to become the “N” in the title. To clarify readability, all of the letters in the title share the same color. The dashed mid-line turns it into a road and decorates the letters at the same time. Beck’s early work often used geometric forms as a basis from which to build her cast of characters, her landscapes, and all the things within the worlds she created. A later style of hers is composed of more curvilinear shapes, often populated by layers of flat people in profile, their noses descending from their foreheads, their lips like parted hearts. Hairdos are wavy or stacked orbs; eyeballs stare full frontal from the heads in profile. For The Pennsylvania Gazette cover, the palette of pink, red, turquoise, and purple, along with black and white, allow for a range of value with both warm and cool colors. The dense composition can be clearly read in spite of all the overlapping forms (figure 4.14).

For the children’s board book Lines, Beck’s simpleshaped aesthetic is a perfect match for author Sarvinder Naberhaus’s text (figure 4.13). The book introduces, to very small children, the concept of different kinds of lines and how lines form shapes. Beck’s charming illustrations build variety from simplicity: a triangle can be a boat’s sail, a rooftop, a pine tree, a hill. The text type appears to be a font that looks handwritten. On the cover, the lines that

Figure 4.13 Lines book cover. The simple shapes that form buildings, roofs, and trees are the ones that children first learn: circles, triangles, squares. Client: Little Simon Illustration and lettering: Melinda Beck

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Figure 4.14 Magazine cover. Diversity is represented here in completely nonsensical, non-biological colors—a clever solution that avoids the obvious color palette but gets the point across. Client: The Pennsylvania Gazette Illustration and lettering: Melinda Beck

MELINDA BECK

The lettering is likewise shape-based; sharing the eccentric anatomy the people have, with rounded edges, varied stroke weights, jumping baselines, and closed counters. The colors chosen do the neat trick of suggesting racial diversity without resorting to life-like shades of ivory through beige and brown to black. Not content to work only within the realm of the geometric, Beck has an entire body of work that uses black silhouettes as the foundation. She uses this method not only for the illustrations but for the lettering too. With Victorian era portrait profiles as the basis, Beck adds in found objects

as textural shapes to compose beings, garments, bugs. . . whatever. She lays wire, string, gears, branches, roughly cutout shapes, etc. onto her scanner. From the scanned images, Beck reduces the shapes to outlines filled with black and, with this assortment of forms, she Frankensteins together new beings and words. By using the same methodology for both text and image, there is harmony between the two. For the Spur Gallery exhibition poster, three strong colors—red, black, and a dark teal blue—are used on a cream-colored background (figure 4.15). The colors or shapes of the letters appear randomized, with words broken

Figure 4.15 Exhibition poster. On this poster the color choices are restrained with texture and silhouette providing interest. The symmetrical composition has a classicism that all the details contradict. Client: Spur Gallery Illustration and lettering: Melinda Beck

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and stacked. Exhibition dates are more uniform, making it easy to identify this key information. For all the haphazard quality of the poster, it maintains a formal symmetry of design: illustration in the center with a narrow column of text on either side framed by the garland at the bottom. The two-headed figure occupying the middle is wearing pantaloons and a skirt whose laciness is made of metal mesh. There are two smaller human girl-headed critters alongside the central one: one being hatched, the other a caterpillar being fed—signifying the two daughters of the artists in the exhibition. For the book cover for The 13th Sign, the number “13” becomes the illustration (figure 4.16). The usual scale of things is flipped, with the number enlarged and the miniature illustrations embellishing the oversized numbers. The “1” is a key entwined with a snake; the “3” is an old fashioned numeral with curling terminals. Both numbers are entwined with foliage and other details: a voodoo doll, arrows, a cauldron, a Capricorn fish-tailed goat, and a house. The scale among the tiny illustrations is as playful as everything else—the house is smaller than the doll. The body of the letters are bold enough to guarantee their readability. The letters of “SIGN” seem to have their basis in an old-fashioned Transitional serif font, expanded to a wider form, particularly in the “N,” with decorative curlicues attached. “The” and “th” are ornamented and elongated vertically, the cross stroke an arrow. All this detail is nicely offset by the simplified color palette of black and white with pops of red. The design pays winking homage to Victorianism with dark humor and modern informality added in. Melinda Beck does not have a single, signature way of handling type—nor of illustration. She’s been schooled in a broad history that she brings to bear in her creative work, finding the appropriate aesthetic tone for each project.

Allen Crawford Like many of the other creative people mentioned in this book, Allen Crawford is a polymath. He is not only an illustrator and designer, but also a writer and an artist. He and his wife Susan live and

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Figure 4.16 The 13th Sign book cover. The typical proportions of illustration relative to lettering are inverted in this design. The large numerals are encrusted with tiny pictorial details. Client: Square Fish Illustration and lettering: Melinda Beck

work in central New Jersey, and, together, they founded Plankton Art Company in 1996. The two of them have taken on a wide array of projects for an impressive range of clients. Some of their work is science illustration, most notably a series of 400 identification key illustrations for the Milstein Hall of Ocean Life at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. On other projects, Crawford has worked in an entirely different vein, creating designs, collages, films, and sculptural assemblages. Looking at his non-scientific work, it comes as no surprise that he writes under the pseudonym Breaulove Swells Whimsy. There is a revamped dandyism to much of the aesthetic, all done with impeccable craftsmanship.

ALLEN CRAWFORD

Of all the varied projects Crawford has created, for an integration of hand lettering and illustration, his edition of Walt Whitman’s Whitman Illuminated: Song of Myself is a superb example (figure 4.17). So superb, in fact, that Crawford won a Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators for this project—as high an honor an illustrator could hope for in the United States. Published by Tin House in 2014, this small edition is a work of visual art interpreting a work of poetic art. The cover establishes the simplicity of the color palette in contrast to the intricacy of Crawford’s line work. The bottom half is a rust-colored panel with hand lettering dropping out in white, Whitman’s face rises above, black on white line art, pattern in his hair, bubbles, and leaves. The title lettering fizzes and bounces, shapes interlocking. On the interior pages, the text and image intersect differently on every spread, with a vitality that perfectly suits the poem’s energy. The illustrations usually straddle the two pages of the spread; words tuck around the picture, rotate 90 degrees, or leap across a part of the illustration. The pages are like jigsaw puzzles where every square inch has magic tucked into it. Readability is challenged but never so severely as to disrespect Whitman’s magnificent poem. The illustrations are drawn with a ligné clair, a simple line of even weight, with no cross hatching or shading. The lettering shares the same line quality—a pair of lines defining the bolder stems of letters, though at times there is an inline or a series of marks to fill the stem. There is variation within the letters: they stretch, shrink, curl up, or extend into swashes.

“The text was designed to slow the reader, challenge their usual habits. It’s a relationship to text not found in electronic media. Something meditative and textural, not merely a mode of conveyance.” Allen Crawford

Figure 4.17 Whitman Illuminated: Song of Myself, book cover. Crawford’s fascination with the natural world finds a poetic creative outlet in his rendering of Walt Whitman’s masterwork, Song of Myself. Client: Tin House Books Illustration and lettering: Allen Crawford

The illustrations that float in these seas of words are often surreal in character. On the first page of the poem, the text declares, “I celebrate myself” (figure 4.18). The celebratory figure is a fantastical one, a cousin of the gryphon with a human head (that incidentally bears a marked resemblance to Allen Crawford himself), the body of a deer with human hands, and wings with decorative, scaly feathers. The figure is utterly unexpected. The next line reads, “And what I shall assume, you shall assume”—but with this book, we can assume nothing. On another spread, a baby is so thoroughly swaddled it becomes a mummy. Ribbons unfurl from the levitating infant; “Whose child?” begs the text (figure 4.19).

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Figure 4.18 Whitman Illuminated: Song of Myself, interior spread. Patterns and forms from nature find a surreal expression here, with the man/beast and his scaled feathery wings, antlers, and hoofed hindquarters. Illustration and lettering: Allen Crawford

Figure 4.20 Print ad. Crawford brings the same kind of inventive artistry to his commercial projects for advertising clients that he does for his personal projects, though the central focus is, of course, the product. Client: BBH London Illustration and lettering: Allen Crawford

Figure 4.19 Whitman Illuminated: Song of Myself, interior spread. The mummified baby unravels, ribbons curling right off the page. Illustration and lettering: Allen Crawford

Crawford has brought this style of intricately combined lettering and illustration into more commercial projects as well. For Symond’s Cider, Crawford includes a central, dominant illustration of the client’s product, a glass of cider with gradients and bubbles (figure 4.20). The gold of the beer

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shines brightly against a subdued dark blue, and the margins around the glass are crowded with line drawings and words jammed together, describing the process and extolling the cider’s merits. We see an explanatory apple, a hand picking the apple, apples tumbling into a barrel, and so on. The lettering is the same kind as seen in the Whitman book: serifed with an occasional curled terminal. This design is defined by the needs of commerce, yet inspired, perhaps, by the more poetic project that was unrestricted by such constraints.

JOHN S. DYKES

John S. Dykes Boston-based John S. Dykes illustrates for a wide range of commercial and editorial clients. There is a slightly retro feel to much of his work. Perhaps that is due to the color palette, which is often desaturated or with a cream-colored background. Add to this the drawn emulation of vintage line engravings, or the references his hand lettering makes to typographic styles from mid-/earlytwentieth century. It is not stuck in the past though; there is a contemporary charm to Dykes’ work. For the calendar cover, Dykes uses a favorite stylistic device of his: he floats an array of tiny illustrations around the dominant element of the design, the title in the center (figure 4.21). The word “Random” is itself randomized, each of the six letters a different type style showing irregularities of stroke weight and varied shadow directions, decorations, and inlines. They share a similar cap height and visual weight throughout to give the word cohesion. The words “Totally” and “Lists” are entirely different, the former a drawn script with a swashed descender and the latter a mixed case

Figure 4.21 Calendar cover. Dykes applies randomness to his line-up of letters as well as the funny assortment of characters in the margins around the title, all with a playful spin on his retro vibe. Client: Half Price Books Illustration and lettering: John S. Dykes

sans serif in black, hovering above a red version of itself. The wide border surrounding the title is inhabited by dozens of doodles. Because the client was Half Price Books, books appear throughout the border in surreal and funny ways: as Shakespeare’s collar, packed atop an old “woody” station wagon, stabbed with a fork. Dykes’ drawing aptitude often results in a fine line that makes it difficult to distinguish from an engraving. In other parts of the artwork, his line has a cartoonish quality, another aspect of randomness. Dykes’ skills lend themselves to a number of specialties including caricature portraits and maps. The maps are excellent examples of embedded hand lettering in the illustrations. His fondness for complex arrangements composed of numerous spot illustrations is challenged by the literal realities of geography. He does a great job managing perception with the approximate placement and scale within features of the landscape, whether a city block or the third largest state in the USA. He uses devices such as dots, arrows, call-outs, and exploded views of certain areas or attractions. For Santa Clara magazine, there is no single dominant element in the illustration—except, perhaps, the toned silhouette of the state itself or the enlarged view of the Bay area (figure 4.22). The spot illustrations vary in size from small to tiny. The identifying names are rendered in numerous lettering styles, curving or swelling to direct the eye to the specific location. The color palette is suffused with a buff color, desaturated greens and blues, and pops of red. Another one of Dykes’ entertainingly cluttered compositions is his frog illustration (figure 4.23). For many years, printer Dellas Graphics in Syracuse, New York, printed a Frogfolio calendar under the art direction of illustrator Jim Burke. Many highly regarded illustrators happily agreed to this open-ended illustration assignment that had only one requirement: there had to be a frog in the illustration. For this piece, Dykes made the center of interest a leaping frog wearing workout gear. The frog is surrounded by the paraphernalia of a weightlifter, as if it were customized for a denizen of a swamp. As the lettering at the top says: “reformulated.” This lettering is a style we see on

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Figure 4.22 Wraparound cover. Dykes sprinkles words and images loosely across maps that have accurate silhouettes, placing an expanded view of the San Francisco Bay area on the right so it would appear on the front magazine cover of the folded wraparound and the full map of California on the back. Client: Santa Clara magazine Illustration and lettering: John S. Dykes

other projects of Dykes’: a mono weight sans serif with parts of the strokes filled in and parts outlined, all within one letter, each differently done. There are plants, bugs, gym equipment, and words swirling all around the buff frog. A mosquito whines, “Cut it out; leemee alone. . .” Dykes has a lot of fun creating his work; it is certainly fun to look at. Dykes’ illustration invites close examination and rewards the viewer with a wealth of humorous and informative detail.

Figure 4.23 Frogfolio calendar. All of the illustrators for the Frogfolio calendar were given total freedom, provided they included a frog in the piece. Dykes was the creator of not only the illustration, but of the nonsensical text threaded through it. Client: Dellas Graphics Illustration and lettering: John S. Dykes

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JENNIFER HEUER

Jennifer Heuer Much of Jennifer Heuer’s creative work is in conceptually compelling book covers. Because a book cover must convey so much information with such economical means, the cover artist has to understand the implications of every choice— pictorially, typographically, compositionally—and how these facets of the design are interrelated. Rather than establish a singular, distinctive style, she tailors the creative solution for each cover to the needs of the text. The Things She’s Seen is a mystery novel that takes place in rural Australia, centered on the lives and deaths of two girls (figure 4.24). Heuer layers the

Figure 4.24 The Things She’s Seen book jacket. Since book jackets must convey complexity by simple means, Heuer’s illustration doubles as a butterfly and a treescape with birds, overlaid on the stark ivory background. Client: Knopf Books for Young Readers Illustration and lettering: Jennifer Heuer

silhouette of a butterfly with outlines of trees and crows, the stark black and white line art inflamed by an orange fill at the bottom. The largest, central crow’s wingspan defines the upper edge of the butterfly wings; the two images simultaneously support and disrupt one another. With great efficiency, she’s created an illustration that suggests beauty is disintegrating and something alarming is about to happen. The lettering is rendered with an agitated line, a raw and simplistic handwriting that could have been scribbled by a young person—thus, the girls in the novel are implied. The hierarchy of the design centers on the illustration, with the layout formally symmetrical, but the rendering emotional and textural.

Figure 4.25 Miss Treadway and the Field of Stars book jacket. There is a retro vibe to the cut shapes and type reminiscent of 1960s jazz album covers; appropriately, this book takes place in London at that time. Client: Harper Illustration and lettering: Jennifer Heuer

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Miss Treadway and the Field of Stars largely takes place in 1960s London, and is about an American actress who goes missing and the disparate cast of characters who search for her (figure 4.25). Heuer uses collage, with glimpses of a woman, black and white photos spliced into the corners. The lettering is likewise collaged, a sans serif typeface not redrawn but rather cut and tucked into the dominant form of a spiral that is posterized, disappearing at moments, the weight of its line varied, its sense of motion frenetic and dizzying. The color palette is simple: mustard yellow, middling blue, and a strong black. Much of the aesthetic references the jazz album covers of that era and indeed, jazz clubs are among the locales found in the book. Heuer wrote the title for Hello Sunshine with a brush script (figure 4.26). Heuer uses dark yellow for the lettering and the yolk of the egg, in contrast to a blueish black and warm white. This novel is about how a popular culinary star’s fortunes go awry, metaphorically shown with the precarious position of the egg about to slide out of a cast iron pan. The dark pan is loosely rendered with painterly texture, the shapes strong and clear, yet expressive. The pan becomes a frame for the title, the negative space below allowing the author’s name to float on the pale background. These three examples show how versatile and adept a book jacket artist like Jennifer Heuer must be.

Ross MacDonald It is hard to believe that Ross MacDonald is just one person given the volume and kinds of projects he’s done. He’s illustrated comics, children’s books, editorial and commercial jobs, from print to film props. He’s adept at mimicking retro styles, particularly from the early and mid-twentieth century. In his illustrations the color palette is often freshly bright, although the line quality, color washes, and characterization of the figures have a vintage appeal. This style extends to page ornamentation, such as banners, arrows and panels to organize information and park the text within. His talent and skill in rendering extends to the lettering designs. For the titles and display type, MacDonald

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Figure 4.26 Hello Sunshine book jacket (unpublished). The cheerfulness of the title contrasts with the egg precariously about to slide out of the pan. Heuer’s found a metaphor, uncertainty in mundane objects. Client: Simon & Schuster Illustration and lettering: Jennifer Heuer

explores different styles, both serif and sans serif, with a clear understanding of the original history of these alphabets. For some of his editorial assignments, MacDonald adopts structural features of comic book art. It doesn’t hurt that he is also a very good satirical writer. In response to the debate over “Intelligent Design”—the attempt by the religious right to discount the theory of evolution, couching it in faux “scientific” terms—MacDonald illustrated “Stupid Design” for the Virginia Quarterly Review (figure 4.27). Sarcastically grandiose banners, cherubs, and clouds frame the page. Up top, instead of Michelangelo’s hand of God, we see one ape’s hand straining to touch another ape’s, fingertip to

ROSS MACDONALD

fingertip. Parchment pages, tucked among artist’s tools, serve as containers for further drawings and comments—there’s a mug on the desk inscribed “World’s Greatest God.” The text type is simple and legible, the subheads all caps, classically serif and openly spaced. For the title, MacDonald redraws the letters in the style of vintage serif display fonts such as Windsor or William Maxwell, with features like the widely curving “S” and the extended lower arm on the “E.” By constraining the color palette, he’s able to distinguish the earthbound details in golden browns and the heavenly in blues. MacDonald references a number of typographic motifs in his work. For Southern Living magazine, he took the graphic device from tourism postcards that uses enlarged letterforms to frame pictures, and recreated it masterfully (figure 4.28). The

Figure 4.27 Editorial illustration. This is MacDonald’s response to the Christian Evangelical movement’s antiscience notion of “Intelligent Design,” a labored effort to refute Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. Client: Virginia Quarterly Review Illustration and lettering: Ross MacDonald

squared blocks of letters have slightly rounded corners and deep red dimensional sides, lifting them up off the page, allowing room enough in the wide bodies of the letters to place an illustration of a continuous landscape. If you follow the illustration within the letters, you see that the car drives off the road and onto the page. For contrast, there’s a script up top: “Summer,” a colorful gradient of cool tones against the gold background. Not only is the graphic style vintage, so is the roadster driving out of the letters. In his Connecticut studio, named Brightwork Press, MacDonald has a large assortment of equipment, materials, and tools, including innumerable metal and wood fonts, and a letterpress printing press. With these means, he fabricates props for movies and television shows. You’ve surely seen his work, and might not have realized how a person duplicates objects with the appearance of authenticity. This client base began

Figure 4.28 Editorial illustration. MacDonald references vintage postcards with enlarged bold letters that frame vistas of the locale being advertised. Client: Southern Living magazine Illustration and lettering: Ross MacDonald

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in the mid-1990s with a faux children’s book that MacDonald designed and illustrated for a movie, Baby’s Day Out. Film director and producer John Hughes had seen MacDonald’s retro-inspired illustrations, and knew his style would be perfect to create the children’s book prop, making it look as if it were from the 1930s (figure 4.29). The cover of the book has an historically accurate color plate tipped onto the cloth binding. The title lettering resembles Bernhard Gothic Bold, a typeface that dates from that era, and the interior text looks perfectly apropos for a children’s book of the era, with a large font size and typeface style like Century or Century Schoolbook. The colorful illustrations are vignetted with hazy edges and soft gradients. The viewer could easily be fooled into thinking this book had been found in an attic or an antique store. In the decades since that first film job, Macdonald has put his formidable skills to work on props for numerous movies and TV shows, from Hateful Eight to Boardwalk Empire to Parks and Rec. He knows how to artificially age paper, stain it, and batter and burn the edges, to give the object a distressed appearance. His knowledge of the history of typography as well as calligraphy, page

Figure 4.29 Baby’s Day Out film prop. For film Director John Hughes’ movie Baby’s Day Out, MacDonald created a realistically retro prop of a children’s book: illustrations, typography and front cover lettering, as well as the binding. Client: Hughes Entertainment and 20th Century Fox Illustration and lettering: Ross MacDonald

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“When I design period paper props, I don’t copy existing pieces, I use my understanding of period type, design, and printing processes to create something new. It’s like writing poetry in another language. I’m using all the same words, but arranging them into something new.” Ross MacDonald

design, binding techniques, and so on make him a reliable creator of authentic-looking props. While not all of the props include illustration, his hand skills for drawing and painting extend to a wide range of media and processes, giving him creative control over the entire object.

Lynn Pauley Some illustrators’ work explores an intersection between art and commerce. Lynn Pauley has a painterly approach to her body of work, even in her collages. She allows the medium itself to be exposed and flourish, with a visceral expressiveness. There is no sanitary gloss or digital manipulation. Pauley is well known for her reportage illustration and for portraiture. She’s been commissioned by publications to document the Masters Tournament in Augusta, Georgia, and the aftermaths of September 11, 2001 in New York City (for Print magazine) and the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City (for The New Yorker magazine). An artist with considerable energy, Pauley fills sketchbooks with her ideas. In her on-site sketching, Pauley illustrates lettering as she finds it in the world. She researches locations and essentially paints portraits of places. Pertinent to the theme of this book are her paintings of signage, typically older signs with weathered character and a design aesthetic from the past. In the painting of the Sage and Sand Motel sign, although the paint is applied loosely, one can feel a vivid sense of place with the bright sun casting shadows of the

LYNN PAULEY

Figure 4.30 Sketchbook spread. In spite of the lively, tactile quality of Pauley’s loose painterly surface, the sense of time and place is vivid, with the bright sun defining dark cast shadows.

raised neon letters and the intensity of the blue sky (figure 4.30). The yellow swoosh of the sign’s edge and the red oval speak to a 1950s American graphic notion of futurism. The vigor of her process is manifest in the surface, the way she paints right off of the edges. Her paintings of signage have been honored by inclusion in Communication Arts magazine’s Typography Annual, and attracted the attention of art directors, inspiring them to commission illustrations in this vein. SpotCo is a New York City design firm that specializes in promotion for Broadway and other entertainment productions. They are lauded for using design and illustration in unexpected and captivating ways. Having seen Pauley’s signage paintings, they commissioned her to do the poster for the play Superior Donuts by Tracy Letts (figure 4.31). For this poster, Pauley’s painting of the title retains her spirited painterly quality in rendering the raised signage lettering, casting blue shadows on the white board. The red script “Superior” has distinctive ball terminals on the “r”s and arches over the blue sans serif “Donuts.” The script, in particular, suggests a bygone time, as does the awning below the sign. Given the constraints of commerce and the needs of the poster art to communicate clearly, the design also shows the

Figure 4.31 Poster for Superior Donuts. Pauley’s passion for vintage signage brings artistry to the commercial commission to advertise a Broadway play. Client: SPOTCO Painting: Lynn Pauley

interior, seen through the window. Pauley is an adept portrait painter. Just as she conveys the spirit of letterforms, she captures a likeness of the play’s actors inside the donut shop. Elsewhere in the design, the credits for the play are embedded above and below the sign, in the awning and at the bottom, a black gradient ensuring legibility for the necessary tertiary information. Pauley is a consummate artist, but she also knows how to work, as an illustrator, with a client’s brief and the needs of a design.

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Steve Simpson The first thing you saw when you picked up this book was the work of Steve Simpson, cover artist. British-born, Dublin-based Simpson has an irrepressible and dynamic visual style. The humor in his work—sometimes of the dark variety—should fool no one. His skills are substantial. Simpson’s projects range from child-friendly products to packaging for demon alcohol and hot sauces, and yet somehow the work remains unmistakably his own. This is, in part, because of his attraction to vibrant color palettes, often with lively greens, golds, and an orangey red. He also has a fondness for skulls, richly decorated or attached to skeletons and dancing. His lettering retains a hand-made feel, complete with quirks and aberrations. His early career was in animation, and his more recent projects encompass not only printed matter and packaging but include toys and other 3D designs. He accomplishes the magic trick of retaining a distinctive individuality, while simultaneously satisfying varied clients. Simpson’s website shows each project with not only clear, well-lit photos of the final product but includes background sketches and detail shots, giving the viewer insight into his process. From the start of the sketch phase it’s clear Simpson is thinking about all of the details: what aspects of the design should remain consistent through the series, and what features should be distinctive in each version. On his bottle labels for Mic’s Chilli Damn Hot Sauces, the banners framing the central circle are constants and the characters within the frame vary. In the sketch for the Grim Reaper, one can see that the hat decorations, the bony jewelry, the speech balloon with hot peppers all remained in the final version (figures 4.32 and 4.33). One detail that was transferred from the Grim Reaper to the Naga Knockdown label is the halo of radiating stripes behind the head. The pencil sketch also allows Simpson to explore his hand lettering, to establish the basic form and recurring motifs. For the printed labels there are some handsome details in the production process (figure 4.34). A special die cut was created to give a curved and scalloped edge to each main label. On the cap strap, the die cut is a zigzag and the featured pepper is represented with its percentage, as

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Figures 4.32, 4.33 Hot sauce label sketch and finish. Even at the sketch phase, Simpson thinks about detail and decoration. In the final label artwork, color, and value help to clarify the graphic and identify the specific product. Client: Mic’s Chilli Illustration and lettering: Steve Simpson

STEVE SIMPSON

Figure 4.34 Mic’s Chilli Damn Hot Sauce bottles. To make the branding consistent and the products varied, each hot sauce has its own color palette and character, while all three labels have the same scalloped die cut shape, the central figure framed in a circle. Client: Mic’s Chilli Illustration and lettering: Steve Simpson

if it were alcohol. This is serious fun. These are consistent features in the label designs, but they vary with the name, the central character and the color palette—though the palette is unified by the recurrence of red, gold, black, and on two of them, a particular green. The title lettering varies too. On the Voodoo Reaper, the serifs resemble the cartoonish ends of bones, split yet rounded. The “v” shaped crossbar of the “A” and the diamond shapes within the closed counters of the “O”s are reminiscent of lettering from medieval manuscripts. Trouble in Trinidad also has a split serif although these are sharp and curled, and for Naga Knockdown the serifs are chiseled into slender triangles. On all of the title type, the baselines jump and the sizes wobble, making them look handhewn and lively. The logotype of Damn Hot Sauce has a modern feel, each letter built with angular lines of varied weights.

For an Adobe software tutorial banner, Simpson’s initial sketches are polished enough to clearly communicate his different concepts (figure 4.35). One concept shows each letter pale within a dark rectangle, all of them on a slant but packed edge to edge, as if they were letterpress letter blocks seen from above and tightly jammed together. The other design has letters as curvilinear as the first sample is rectilinear—though still tilted at an angle. Little birds in cages are interspersed with letters bedecked with vines and foliage. The latter concept was chosen, and it does show a more thorough and inventive way of using the software to create hand lettering (figure 4.36). It also incorporates illustration in a way the first concept does not. The Victorian-inspired, half-filled letters are modernized by the color palette and the texture with which the letters are drawn. The curves are a bit clumsy, slightly deranged, with swashes curling

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Roger De Muth

Figure 4.35 Adobe software banner sketches. There are two ideas being explored: letterpress type blocks tightly packed, or more ornamental lettering styles with swashes and illustrations. Client: Adobe Illustration and lettering: Steve Simpson

Figure 4.36 Adobe software banner art. The more decorative version was selected. The vivid colors give the letters’ Victorian details a more modern feel. Client: Adobe Illustration and lettering: Steve Simpson

like vines into the illustration. The illustrations are in greens and gold; the birds rendered as simple forms, big-eyed apostrophes embellished with scallops, feathers, and textures. Simpson’s aesthetic looks as if it was born in the 1880s, passed directly through the 1950s and landed in the twenty-first century.

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A resident of central New York state, Roger De Muth is well-traveled around the world, and has kept copious sketchbooks that prove it. De Muth has illustrated many projects in many forms for clients from all over: books, games, ads, maps, etc. He’s said that he is unhappy if he is not busy making something, so whether on assignment or not, he stays busy producing books, posters, paintings, ceramics, art supply travel cases, bird feeders that resemble retro diners, beautiful gardens in which to put the bird feeders, and more and then more. His prolific output is inflected with his droll sense of humor; for example, his series of portraits on ceramic tiles is titled “Artists and Con-artists,” which includes artists, politicians, and criminals we all know. De Muth’s often creates his own sketchbooks: bound, embossed, with brass fittings etched with his own artwork, his own marbleized end papers— all filled with his marvelous drawings and paintings. Some of his sketchbooks are not much larger than a postage stamp. He designs and decorates a title page, with slightly wobbly hand lettering that is inspired by classical letterforms (figure 4.37). There’s a formality in the symmetrically placed medallions and shaped borders, but the faces in the discs reveal goofy expressions.

“After (a workshop with high school students), I gave the students small cards with the beautiful flowing script adorned with embellishments and one of the students said to me, “I can’t read cursive letters, they don’t teach that anymore.” I wandered around the deserted city of Utica that afternoon after my demonstration and thought about my dinosaur status for the rest of the day.” Roger De Muth

ROGER DE MUTH

Figure 4.37 Sketchbook, personal project. De Muth creates and produces his own sketchbooks, right down to the detailed bindings and elaborate title pages. The classical formality is wryly countered by the quirky portraits in circular medallions. Illustration and lettering: Roger De Muth

That goofiness is out in full force on the ticket Roger gives to studio visitors (figure 4.38). The elaborate vintage design is contradicted by the nonsensical language and beasties. De Muth’s drollery is conveyed through both text and image. He pretends that a ticket is required, and that there’s a visitor’s center, gift shop, and bookstore. The design has banners—curved and flared—and classical symmetry with corner ornamentation and curlicues, and a portrait medallion in the center, all to suggest it’s a piece of official ephemera. De Muth’s skill in drawing is shown in the linework of Honest Abe; his more cartoonish style manifests itself in the squirrels and alligators. His lettering conjures classicism with the serifed letters and the drawn scripts—though the x-height is toyed with and varied, and the letters often have a highlight in the stem.

Figure 4.38 Ticket to enter the studio (he’s just kidding, he’s always kidding), personal project. The elaborate vintage design is contradicted by the nonsensical language and beasties. De Muth’s drollery is conveyed through both text and image. Illustration and lettering: Roger De Muth

You might have noticed that squirrels recur in De Muth’s work, most notably in his poster devoted to them (figure 4.39). For this bit of brilliant nonsense, he won a Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators in New York City. De Muth plays off of commercial catch phrases and silly rhymes to extol the virtues of squirrels as household products and as food. Spot illustrations dot the green ground, with text curved around, letters rendered as a drawn italic with an occasional swash. He inventively draws every imaginable manifestation of squirrel body parts re-purposed for human use. The horror of “squirrel toast” is leavened by the bright and cheerful color palette and the jovial squirrels— even the central character in the electric chair cracks a smile as jolts of deadly power emanate from his seat. Roger De Muth inflects all of his work with his inimitable sense of self.

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Figure 4.39 Squirrels poster, personal project. De Muth’s quirky humor makes taking the time to read every single line on this poster worthwhile. Who knew squirrel products were so varied and useful? Illustration and lettering: Roger De Muth

Gina Triplett and Matt Curtius Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is not only an historically important city in the United States, but currently an illustration and design-rich locale. Institutions with highly regarded graphic design and illustration programs, such as Tyler School of Art and University of the Arts are located in Philadelphia. It enjoys easy proximity to New York City, which is still the center of publishing (and many other industries) in the United States. Philadelphia is culturally rich and less expensive to live in than New York City: small wonder that so many illustrators choose to live there.

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Gina Triplett and Matt Curtius have their home and studios in Philadelphia, although their clients and projects are far-flung and widely varied. Triplett and Curtius met as students at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in Baltimore, Maryland, where Gina studied illustration and Matt painting. Since their college days they married, started a family, and have both developed careers in the arts. They each have their own practice and clientele and they also collaborate, most unusually sometimes on the same painting. Their work is primarily executed with traditional media, paints and inks, and for illustration work, cleaned up digitally. Their love of natural life forms, especially botanical, can be

GINA TRIPLETT AND MATT CURTIUS

seen in personal paintings, packaging for foods, branding for the Macy’s Flower Show, and in a line of marvelous wallpapers for the Italian company Glamora Wallcoverings. Note that Gina is the primary lettering specialist of the family. The letter “J” is in the tradition of medieval illuminated initials (figure 4.40). In contemporary times they are commonly called drop caps: a single letter, sometimes heavily decorated, always enlarged, that announces and introduces the following smaller text. This “J” is silhouetted, unlike some illuminated initials that are framed in a box or other shape. The border of the letter is smoothly painted, resembling ironwork, sturdy and even, curling into ball terminals at the end of the tail and the head serif. A pink morning glory grows within, as do smaller flowers and sprigs, grassy growths drip off the edges. A pair of purple butterflies hover. Curtius’ smoother painting style is evident in these details; Triplett’s linear graphic style fills the body of the letter with leaves and tiny blossoms.

Cornell University Press’s Spring catalog (figure 4.41). There’s evidence of two artists collaborating in the varied styles of rendering the flowers. The purple coneflowers have painterly gradients, smooth transitions from highlight to shadow—this is Curtius’ style. Triplett’s work is more graphic and line-based; the leaves and umbels of the smaller flowers, as well as the lettering, appear to be pen and ink with flat color fills. In the background are faint traceries: patterns of leaves and flowers fading in the glow behind the title. Clouds are like small pebbles dotted in a buff sky. The title grows as does the garden, but it is floating, detached from the ground. The lettering is a twisted and furled vine, forming an unconnected script with leafy sprigs as swashes. Using only black and green to draw the striated stems (in both meanings of the

Given Triplett and Curtius’s appetite for verdant illustrations, they were a perfect choice to illustrate

Figure 4.40 Letter “J.” This ornamented letter is a modern interpretation of the illuminated initials from medieval era scribed texts. Client: Jessica Hische’s Daily Drop Cap project Illustration and lettering: Matt Curtius and Gina Triplett

Figure 4.41 Catalog cover. Working in partnership, Curtius’s painterly technique seen in the purple coneflowers is offset by Triplett’s graphic style of black lines and bright colors in the lettering and butterflies. Client: Cornell University Press Illustration and lettering: Matt Curtius and Gina Triplett

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word: stems of letters and stems of plants), Triplett adds texture. A flock of monarch butterflies extends the black to encircle the title, with the warmth of orange to frame it. While Triplett has worked for high profile clients such as Whole Foods, doing branding, illustrating icons, packaging, shopping bags and more, her lettering on her Mom’s homemade strawberry jam is just as appealing (figure 4.42). There is a fresh modesty to the simple use of color, the black ink delineating leaves, letters and line, with one enlarged, luscious red strawberry. A single bluebird adds a pop of contrast, holding one of the smaller berries. The lettering is a mixed medley of forms, “Mom’s” script with tendril, “Strawberry Jam” all different styles and shapes playfully entwined. This is true for the entire composition; it’s a jigsaw puzzle, with the bird tail tucking between two letters, swashes extending into the illustration, letters curling around one another. It’s all held together with the strong black, an astringent against the clean white background. As with many illustrators who work on assignment, Triplett (and Curtius) rely on personal work to explore and develop new ideas. For Triplett, drawing an entire alphabet for fun allows her to examine each letter as a unique form while maintaining sufficient consistency that all twentysix letters can be seen as an alphabet (figure 4.43).

The two alphabets seen here are a great example; while they vary from one another, they also vary within themselves and yet retain cohesion. The use of color, medium, and decorative detail are the primary reasons each alphabet has its own internal logic. In the left-hand alphabet, the use of bright primary colors and acid green presented on a red background make it feel youthful and modern. Although the letterforms possess the irregularities of hand painting, they’re modeled on sans serif, slab serif, and balloon-form letters, all of which are more recent type styles. The patterns and containers—striped, dotted, and wonky shapes— have a child-like feel. The alphabet on the right is unified with a more serious black throughout. The inked line allows for a finer amount of detail than the brush-formed marks in the left-hand alphabet. The detail on the right is inspired by medieval or Victorian letterforms and decoration: furbelows, floriation, scrollwork, drop shadows, incised marks, and more. There are several script capitals (C, K, W) and a couple inspired by Blackletter (A, G). The rest of them would not be out of place on a circus poster from the 1880s. The color handling adds another layer of complexity; several warm tones flirt with their placement within the letters. Working at times as a duo, Triplett and Curtius more than double their aesthetic contributions to any project.

Figure 4.42 Mom’s strawberry jam label, personal work. This project is purely Triplett’s, distinctly hers with black and white line art, color sparingly applied, and patterns found in nature. Illustration and lettering: Gina Triplett

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CHRIS CAMPE

Figure 4.43 Experimental alphabets, personal work. These two alphabets are equally playful, but the one on the left feels more modern in both color and style, the one on the right inspired by older historic letterforms. Illustration and lettering: Gina Triplett

Chris Campe Resident of Hamburg, Germany, Chris Campe is not only a skilled letterer, she’s also an author and educator on lettering. Several of her books are listed in this book’s bibliography; they are highly recommended for their thoroughness, intelligence, and the beauty of their design. At the moment of this writing, her books are only available written in German, although there are plans to release an English translation of her book Making Fonts. They are heavily illustrated and much can be gleaned from them, even without understanding the accompanying text. Campe’s 2017 book, Handbuch Handlettering covers similar subject matter as this book but from an instructional standpoint, with the focus on creating lettering. Her 2018 release, Praxisbuch Brush Lettering has clear examples and exercises for brush lettering.

In Campe’s own work, her creativity focuses on designing and rendering lettering, but she has a background in illustration and pictorial elements can be found in her work in a variety of ways. For the book cover Matilda und Die Sommersonneninsel (Matilda and the Summer Sun Island) Campe establishes atmosphere without literally drawing out specific scenes or characters from the book (figure 4.44). She uses a layered digital technique, a photo of sea grass and sand dunes seen through a scrim of yellow gradating into bright blue, evoking summer and beach. The teenage girls that populate the book are summoned with scribbled doodles in white, representing their vacation, their moment in life: beachy things and girlish yearnings, hearts and stars. The series title, Summer Girls, is identified up top in a textured blue script, with the book title below in an attractive

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Figure 4.45 Summer Girls book series. Each of the three girls in the series has a book written from her perspective. Campe uses overall color and tiny details to distinguish each one. Client: Carlsen Verlag Illustration and lettering: Chris Campe

Figure 4.44 Matilda und Die Sommersonneninsel (Matilda and the Summer Sun Island) book cover. The bright glare of sunny yellow and doodles in white conjure the experiences of adolescent girls during the summer, the protagonists of this YA novel. Client: Carlsen Verlag Illustration and lettering: Chris Campe

“I sent (the sketch) to the publisher like this. . . to get their OK for the idea to put lettering on a photo. I was going to do a proper and clean drawing before it went to print, but the publisher got really excited about the sketch-like quality of it and they basically printed (it this way).” Chris Campe

lockup. Matilda’s name is emphasized in red script, as if a signature, the remainder of the title an orange mono-weight sans serif, words and letters tucked into one another. The book is one of a trilogy about three friends; each of the girls is featured in her own self-named book (figure 4.45). Campe’s process is to render everything on paper and to assemble and color it digitally. The mark of her hand is evident in the texture of the lines; the subtle aberrations give warmth to her designs. Campe’s self-authored guidebook to her hometown, Toller Ort: Hamburg’s Beste Läden & Adressen is a great showcase for her many talents (figure 4.46). The illustrations are themselves quite simple, yet in their graphic simplicity convey a sense of place. Hamburg is a port city on the Elbe River, feeding into the North Sea. The cover of the book is a cheerful blue, white clouds and black double arches in the sky, seagulls, and at the bottom a dry-brushed

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Figure 4.46 Toller Ort book cover. As a resident of Hamburg, Germany, Campe is well equipped to write and design a guide to her hometown. Toller Ort means “great place,” and the book is indeed a celebration of the city. Client: Junius Verlag Illustration and lettering: Chris Campe

CHRIS CAMPE

white wave signifying water. The lettering dominates: in scale, filling the front jacket and in color, a textured yellow and soft red contrasting the blue sky. The letterforms are based on a sans serif, the leg of the “R” affixed to the bottom right of the over-sized bowl and the “O” a round-cornered rectangle, features that imply early twentieth century signage. This impression is amplified by the contrasting color shadow on the letters giving a sense of depth, as if the letters were threedimensional signs and the circles parading down the centers of the strokes were light bulbs.

For a poster related to the book (figure 4.47), Campe reiterated the book’s cover typography but rearranged the letters to frame a map of Hamburg, top and bottom. A closer look shows that while the letters strongly resemble the book’s cover, accommodations have been made. On the book, the primary word of the title, Toller Ort, is dissected into three segments of three letters each, allowing for a wider body letter. On the poster, Tollerort and Hamburg each sit intact on one full line. To keep the cap height sufficiently tall, the letters are more narrow than on the book cover. The waves are

Figure 4.47 Toller Ort poster. The poster of Hamburg is both informational and decorative, with the related book’s title type repeated and modified. Toller Ort means “nice place” in English. Client: Junius Verlag Illustration and lettering: Chris Campe

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again at the bottom and the clouds up top, but the map rotates up and flattens out to fill the picture plane. No words are on this map but the streets create a pattern of orange lines on the yellow field; we get a sense of the city’s framework, seeing areas of density and areas of openness. Illustrators who are adept at lettering can be well suited to creating maps; their design sense helps them to organize information legibly and to establish hierarchy. In the age of GPS, the functionality of the pictorial map is liberated to be more expressive than immediately useful. For the map of the Pfaffenwinkel region in Bavaria, Campe enlarges key features as signifiers for locations, floating them all on a white background (figure 4.48). The focus of the map is of a religious pilgrimage, The Way of St. James, so churches and religious sites are among the primary locations illustrated. The limited color palette helps to reduce notable buildings and castles to their elemental silhouettes; the same palette is used to render the religious figures, thus all similar landmarks share similar colors. All lakes and rivers are pale teal and

the roadway is red, with a detour as a dotted line. Campe organizes the lettering in a similar fashion: all of the places are a drawn modern serif in black and all of the waterways are named with a blue script. Tiny illustrations are sprinkled throughout: trees, Alpine edelweiss, and beer steins and pretzels, of course. While this charming map would not suffice for reliable navigation for a driver, the relative relationship of locations to one another is clearly established. Campe’s current creative explorations include livefilmed type drawings and found lettering from her travels, all posted on Instagram. Follow her; you’ll learn something and be inspired.

Lisa Perrin After a five-year stint illustrating greeting cards at a staff job for American Greetings in Ohio, Lisa Perrin returned to teach at Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore—where she’d earned her MFA in Illustration. Working at American Greetings gave Lisa a thorough training in the field, in particular learning lettering from master calligrapher Martha Ericson. Perrin’s subsequent freelance work embraces a range of clientele: from editorial to book publishing to businesses. Her work is distinguished by a delicacy of line and a sophisticated sense of color. There is a fairy tale quality to much of her work, and indeed she has done a number of projects in that vein. For After Alice, Perrin’s illustration is a framing device for the title and subtitle (figure 4.49). Alice tumbles at the bottom, familiarly dressed in blue with her pale apron. Roots, vines, and tendrils sprout from her figure and twine upward, growing lighter and branching into greenery. Small things are tucked into the sprigs, familiar icons

Figure 4.48 Map of Munich and the region south and west. This map is of The Way of St. James (part of the Camino de Santiago, a pilgrimage route) so churches and religious motifs are emphasized. Client: GEO Special travel magazine Illustration and lettering: Chris Campe

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“I think it’s ideal when the same hand can render the illustration and the lettering for a piece, it creates a much more cohesive overall design.” Lisa Perrin

LISA PERRIN

Figure 4.49 After Alice book cover. Author Gregory Maguire retells well-known stories, including the famous reimagining of The Wizard of Oz, Wicked, later made into a popular Broadway musical. In After Alice, he revisits Alice in Wonderland. Illustration and lettering: Lisa Perrin Publisher: Headline Publishing, UK Art Director: Siobhan Hooper

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from the story: Mad Hatter’s hat, the Queen of Hearts playing card, teacup, clock. What is this translucent bird skeleton at the top? We’d have to read the story to find out. The title is hand lettered with the same graceful, thin line that delineates the illustration; the strokes of the letters extend thready spirals too. The lettering and illustration are integrated with the “T” in AFTER enlarged, forming the mouth of the lightly drawn, near-vanishing Cheshire Cat. The artwork is lent refinement with the black background upon which the cool blues and desaturated green play, the use of white in type and illustration making it crisp and modern. For the Macy’s Flower Show poster, fairy tale themes are again present, but in a much sweeter fashion than on the After Alice book cover (figure 4.50). The colors are pretty: teal, pale petal pink, coral, and a soft yellow, on a warm medium blue.

Figure 4.50 Poster. Perrin’s attraction to floral and fairy tale themes found a perfect project with the Macy’s Flower Show graphics. Client: Macy’s Illustration and lettering: Lisa Perrin Art Director: Gregory DiBisceglie

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As with After Alice, the illustration frames the lettering in a symmetrical composition, with white castle turrets on either side and a white book open at the bottom. The illustration is not identical left to right but different in its details. All is verdant: fern-like fronds spiral and twigs blossom and erupt upward. Pink woodland creatures perch on the book. There are quite a few words but the hierarchy is clarified by style, color, and size. Perrin draws a script and narrow serif and sans serif lettering styles, so there is both harmony and variety. The color palette of the lettering is keyed into the illustrations. Flourishes and swashes encircle and decorate, dots and bursts scatter like stardust. The stylization of the flowers and foliage has a folk-art quality. The title for the Macy’s Flower Show that year was “Once Upon A Springtime,” so Perrin was a storybook perfect choice for the assignment. Packaging design is like a mini poster or book jacket. It is the face of a product rather than an event or a book, albeit on a much smaller scale. The contents of Perrin’s packages for the Hudson Valley Seed Library for client, retailer Anthropologie (figures 4.51–4.53) are very small indeed, tiny seeds. When a package is so little, there needs to be simplicity to the design. All the leaves on the seed packets are stylized but retain the basic forms of the plants themselves. Thyme leaves are bi-colored, the size and shape of sesame seeds; sweet basil leaves have smooth edges and distinct veining; and lemon balm has a serrated leaf. On the front of the Sweet Basil package there are essentially three values and four colors, with high contrast to make a big impact on a little canvas (figure 4.51). There is the illusion that the off-white banner—a useful container for the lettering—furls dimensionally through space, encircling the spray of sweet basil. The soft bluish green leaves and pale green stems rise through and tuck over the ribbon. “Sweet” is rendered in a salmon pink, mono-weight script and “Basil” is in black, an ornamented fat face modern (yes, that is what the style of typeface is called, no insult intended!). Both words are hand-drawn with a delicate touch; both are decorated with sprigs, abstracted allusions to the plant. There is a detailed motif that recurs often in Perrins’ work: tiny dots that break up the flat background, like glitter or pollen. The design coheres elegantly against the black background.

LISA PERRIN

Each packet is branded with the “Seed Library” panel at the bottom. The package series is unified by the color palette, which Perrin adeptly expands by using pale tints of the colors and inverting the visual weight of each color from packet to packet. On the packet for English Thyme, she uses two tints of the salmon to concoct a pale and a medium pink (figure 4.52). This more delicate color suits the smaller texture of thyme’s leaves. A pattern is formed by the bundle of twigs arching across the surface, bound by white string, with the type inscribed on a tied-on pennant. The lettering is in black with a varied stroke weight; it borrows from both script and italic letterforms. The swashes branch into hair-like roots, delicate yet earthy.

Figure 4.51 Seed packaging: Sweet Basil. Seed packet designs are like miniature book covers; the design needs to concisely describe the contents. Client: Anthropologie, via Hudson Valley Seed Library Illustration and lettering: Lisa Perrin Art Director: Gina Dean

Figure 4.52 Seed packaging series. The series of packets shares the same color palette, but Perrin rearranges the dominant color so that each packet is distinctive. Illustration and lettering: Lisa Perrin

Figure 4.53 Seed packaging: Lemon Balm. The unfolded packet reveals other details of the illustration. The shape is not only attractive but useful; the rounded tabs tuck together in the back to close the packet. Illustration and lettering: Lisa Perrin

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For the Lemon Balm packet the bluish green becomes the background and the foliage, pale green. (figure 4.53). The lettering for “Lemon Balm” is white on a black tag shape and the string is striped, like the string in an old-fashioned pastry shop. “Lemon” is in a pretty script with slight variation in the stroke weight and a pale blush of pink. The word “Balm” is in another fat face modern, this one with curved serifs and a dotted inline decoration on the thickest stems. Line drawings of fronds decorate the tag. Unfolded, the package wrapper reveals other elements: a cocktail with a sprig of lemon balm and the bartender’s spoon to stir it with. The curved tabs are not only attractive but they also usefully, ingeniously tuck together in the back to contain the contents. Lisa Perrin’s work is evidence that beautiful graphics can also serve a purpose.

Zoë Ingram Currently a resident in Edinburgh, Scotland, Zoë Ingram has also lived in Adelaide, Australia. Her work has a youthful energy that transcends place. Line and shape are rendered with a spontaneous quality and the color palette is often adventurous. She’s done a number of projects on which the message dominates over the picture: inspirational quotes with a twist. Themes from nature and objects of daily living appear in her work, as well as abstract decorative patterns. On the Madonna quote, the prettiness of the flowers contrasts with the toughness of the quote (figure 4.54). To underscore that attitude, the illustration has a gritty quality, a scratchy stroke with misaligned color fills. The colors are a little off too, in a way that oddly works: neon pink plus hot pink plus salmon pink. To pair those colors with teal and gold is a peculiar choice and entirely fitting with what she does with the lettering. The composition is symmetrical, mirroring left to right with the linework although the fill appears hand colored with little discrepancies. The centered lines of text obey the symmetry of the composition, but there the formality ends. The letters are mixed case, either reduced to their elemental geometric selves—”M”s as pairs of upright triangles, “A”s as single triangles, “S”s as pairs of offset, tilted half

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circles—or drawn as mono-weight sans serifs. Tiny hair-like serifs make a rare appearance. Most of the letters lean forward slightly, although not with the urgent angle of an italic. With color, scale, and style, Ingram accentuates the message. “Exactly” and “Okay” are white, underscored with a dotted line, and both are larger than the rest of the phrase. “Okay” is the only word in a script but this is not a tentative declaration: it’s framed in a hot pink oval. The look of the inspirational quote is appropriately softened (figure 4.55). More delicate than the Madonna quote, the background seems to radiate, suffused with soft light washes of pink and gold. There are traceries of mandala drawings hovering in the background and within the stylized, hot pink plant form. The lettering is drawn playfully, each and every letter different from the others. They have irregular edges as if cut quickly from paper, the counters filled in solid. Each letter is decorated, the smaller words with a simple dotted inline and each of the larger letters customized with chevrons, garlands, star bursts, hatched and ornamented lines, each colored differently with a bright palette, and all the decorations rendered with a white line. There are clues that this was assembled

Figure 4.54 Madonna quote. Ingram is adept at establishing the right tone for the quotes she illustrates. The color palette and shapes for this line from Madonna have the gutsy attitude that the words do. Illustration and lettering: Zoë Ingram

ZOË INGRAM

the two lines justified to form a rectangular block. The color palette of cheerful blues, orange, yellow, and white glow against the dark blue background. “I love you to the moon and back” is modernized by the desaturated palette and the surprising choice of a gray background.

Figure 4.55 Inspirational quote. The mood of this quote is more contemplative than the Madonna quote, and Ingram signals that with a softer palette and textures. Illustration and lettering: Zoë Ingram

Some of Ingram’s work includes more highly rendered illustrations. Birds, flowers and butterflies appear often, and she mixes painterly styles with her graphic line work. These illustrations are charming on ceramic ware, where the illustrations can encircle a mug or sit framed within a circular plate (figure 4.57). The birds, although stylized, are realistically proportioned and rendered with delicate color washes and detailed markings. Alongside are simple, colorful shapes of sprigs and flowers, with intricate line drawings of mandalas and butterflies. The mandalas are used in a variety of ways: on a full plate, like a sunburst behind a

digitally—such as the neatness of the mandala within the plant form—but the irregularities in the lines and shapes, and the texture in the background all have a visceral, hand-hewn quality. For the series of greeting cards, Ingram establishes distinct color palettes (figure 4.56). The illustrations on these are usually simple, which is their strength: a black saucer with a large cone atop for the witch’s hat, a white dome with jagged bottom edge for the ghost. Here again we see Ingram’s aptitude for informality, and that her letters with filled-in counters and doodled decorations are hallmarks of her style. The letters are customized for each card. “Happy Halloween” is filled with spiders, some placed in the letters’ closed counters or crossbars, and some dangling from threads. For “Booo!” Ingram takes advantage of the word’s circles of “O”s and overlaps them into a chain with dashed lines along the thick stems. The “Thankful” card is more detailed, festooned with linear sprigs mirrored and flipped to symmetrically frame the phrase. The words are in all caps, a soft-edged narrow sans serif, the dominant word “Thankful” randomly colored with dotted stems, and the secondary line. “For small things” is a clean white,

Figure 4.56 Seasonal cards. Ingram tailors these cards to appeal to different ages, to celebrate different moments. Client: Collage Greetings Illustration and lettering: Zoë Ingram

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Figure 4.57 Field flowers ceramic ware. Ingram creates lines of illustrated housewares. Her presentation boards of the products incorporate her lettering and additional illustration making the entire display delightfully harmonious. Illustration and lettering: Zoë Ingram

bird, or within a butterfly, or halved as a scalloped edge. The recurrence of these motifs makes for a charming yet diverse set of dishes. The lettering on the products, drawn with Ingram’s familiar gritty line, is tied in with the color palette: acid yellow, orange, lime green, and black. The counters are not filled solid but often with decorative line, or strokes doubled, seemingly randomly. Her presentation of the ceramic set uses her distinctive lettering in white on a charcoal gray background to identify each piece, making for a coherent and authentic authorial presence.

Jon Gray aka Gray318 A resident of London, UK, Jon Gray’s book jacket designs and illustrations have had widespread impact in the publishing design field. It is a mixed blessing that some of his design ideas have been copied and diluted. A designer first and foremost, and one who specializes in book covers; Gray is

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brilliant at synthesizing dense texts into succinct graphic statements. For designers working in publishing, it is imperative that they not have a singular, distinct style but instead must be able to tailor their solutions to suit the text within. The version of author Jonathan Safran Foer’s Everything is Illuminated seen here is stripped down, colorless, simply black and white (figure 4.58). There is no illustration per se, just ballsy brush lettering extending to every edge. When published in 2002, the cover art yelled off of every bookshop shelf and was credited with inspiring a resurgence in hand lettering. For Foer’s subsequent novel, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, Gray drew the lettering to fill out the form of a flattened-out hand, a red silhouette on pale yellow background (figure 4.59). The lettering is a scratchy rendering of a serif typeface, the words swelling and shrinking to fit into their assigned spaces. It all fits together artfully and legibly.

JON GRAY AKA GRAY318

“I struggle designing without knowing the mood of the book, its character . . . I’m not good at fishing in the dark for concepts and I think my best work comes about when it’s rooted in the text.” Jon Gray

Figure 4.58 Everything is Illuminated, book cover. This cover has an explosive graphic presence. When published in 2002, it was credited with inspiring a resurgence of hand lettering. Client: Hamish Hamilton UK/Houghton Mifflin US Illustration and lettering: Jon Gray

On Scarlett Thomas’s book The Seed Collectors, Gray’s illustration dominates the cover, with text interwoven (figure 4.60). The book is about family, an inheritance, and the ways the descendants manage (or don’t) their lives. The illustration is a collage that mixes up scale and media, with the symbolic silhouette of a house sprouting and branching. The house is cut out of old paper with scribbled, faded sepia writing. We can only read occasional words on the old paper—”house” is one of them. A line engraving of ginkgo branches and leaves grows out of the windows and spreads over the surface of the cover and beyond, the leaves filled with flat green and the branches brown, all against a black background. One orange pod

Figure 4.59 Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, book cover. The print of a hand becomes the improbable container for the long title and credit line. This design idea has been widely imitated. Client: Hamish Hamilton UK/Houghton Mifflin US Illustration and lettering: Jon Gray

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Figure 4.60 The Seed Collectors, book cover. The tale of an inheritance and how the family manages with it is symbolized by the old house sprouting ginkgo leaves and branches. Client: Canongate Books Illustration and lettering: Jon Gray

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JON GRAY AKA GRAY318

dangles, perhaps containing the seeds of the title? Orange reiterates in the title lettering, and the cut paper of the house recurs to fill the author’s name. The lettering for both title and byline, while created by disparate means, share a similarity of form, referencing both italic and script letterforms. The title is a hand drawn outline with a fill of striped strokes. Each word and name is mixed case, both UPPER and lower, seemingly randomly; the baselines arc and letters weave in and out of the foliage. The jacket imparts the ambiance of an old world seen through a modern lens. Music packaging is not altogether different from book packaging in that the graphics are literally the face of the product—although with music packaging, the graphics often translate onto many other ancillary products, from videos to t-shirts to stickers. The style of Gray’s packaging for band Black Grape’s Pop Voodoo is raw, compared to the whiff of elegance in some of his other work (figure 4.61). This perfectly suits the music, which is high-energy rock and funk. Pop Voodoo was the band’s first recording when they reunited after a long hiatus, and both the music and the graphics announce this fact loudly. The cover is dominated by a face that could have been drawn by 1980s New York City artist Jean Michel Basquiat; it even resembles Basquiat himself, with the spray of dreadlocks exploding from his scalp. The illustration and lettering look like they were created with dry brush paint and marker, sloppily and rapidly. The “P”s of Pop form eyes, the “O” the nose and the repetition of letters in Voodoo march along the mouth like teeth. The colors are simple and vibrant: black, white, red and pink, against an electric yellow; the color palette also conjures Basquiat. For this band with their raw and rude energy, referencing a notorious denizen of 1980s downtown NYC is altogether fitting. Gray’s book jacket work translates beautifully to creating title pages for feature articles in editorial publications. The generosity of a full page allows him to expand the scale of the story title and illustrate it all at once. For The Pink House, he borrows elements of a Ouija board but re-purposes them to allow the lettering to dominate the center of the composition (figure 4.62). The eponymous pink house stains the surface of the board, a ghostly silhouette. The corner ornaments of

sun and moon, inline letters, and wood grain background are familiar, but other elements creep in: molecular models, a house puffing smoke, skulls and crossbones. “Yes” and “No” are encircled and bracket the title, which is hand drawn and scribbled, even though the stems nod to Victoriana with curled split serifs. The “O” of “House” does double duty as the cutout of the planchette— triple duty when one realizes that the “O” is also a diamond ring. The planchette is a useful space to put the author’s name, drawn in the similar style as the title. The planchette seems to float with just the slightest soft drop shadow; its white color and green lettering separating it further from the board. While there are certain recurring aspects to Jon Gray’s creativity—energetic handlettering and smartly appropriate concepts—his many years in book cover design ensure his work has an impressive versatility.

Figure 4.61 Music packaging for Pop Voodoo by Black Grape. The videos for the title song includes a masked character that resembles the face on this cover. Client: Universal Music Illustration and lettering: Jon Gray

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towards middle school readers, giving them insights into how stories are constructed and encouraging them to be authors on their own. Hunter’s cover design uses hand lettering for all of the text, the title floating on a scrap of notebook paper torn out, with spot illustrations and words circling around, much like a middle schooler’s notebook embellished with stickers and doodles. The lettering is a playful mix of colors and styles, drawn script and sans serif words interlocking. The interior is heavily illustrated, with spreads containing maps, comic book pages, and spot illustrations, the variety of design solutions supporting and communicating the content, keeping the reader engaged (figure 4.64). The informality of Hunter’s style guarantees its accessibility to the target readers.

Figure 4.62 Editorial illustration. The New Yorker magazine is one of the most well regarded publications an illustrator could hope to work for. Gray is able to transpose his book cover skills to an editorial title page for a story. Client: The New Yorker magazine Illustration and lettering: Jon Gray

Linzie Hunter Originally from Scotland, Linzie Hunter now lives and works in South London. Her illustration and lettering have a broad range of applications; she’s done books, packaging, editorial, infographics, maps, and more. Her work is always accessible and friendly, her line and shapes are basic, and her colors flat with warm and inventive palettes. Out of this economical vocabulary of form, Hunter is able to illustrate, well, just about anything. With so much information disseminated on small screens, Hunter’s simple forms read clearly and cleverly whether seen online or in print. Working with writer Caroline Lawrence, Hunter illustrated the cover and interior of How to Write a Great Story (figure 4.63). The book is targeted

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Hunter’s work translates well for adult audiences, her trademark whimsy bringing lightness to serious topics (figure 4.65). She created as a personal project graphics for a get-out-the-vote campaign, including a series of gif animations she made shareable so that this important message could be easily spread on popular platforms like Instagram. The sober and important message is charmingly rendered with bright colors and playful lettering in mono-line scripts and simple shapes. Her people are drawn with linear heads like translucent light bulbs—bearded, with glasses, hats, bows, turbans—older and younger, all voting, or entreating the viewer to. The gifs are simple animations, blinking and wobbling, just enough to attract the eye (figure 4.66). For AA Publishing, Hunter drew a map that loosely indicates global locales. The map appears in the book Londonist Drinks: A Spirited Guide to London Libation (which includes the work of other notable illustrators.) Supporting the resources of the Londonist website, the book is a guide to where to drink in London, organizing pubs and other locales in offbeat ways (figure 4.67). Hunter’s map is of a flattened-out globe showing the continents. Banners and panels, and one hot air balloon, frame the lettering, naming the taverns and cafes, each drink inspired by a different part of the world. The panels are shaped, colored, and ornamented in ways that suggest street signage, referencing each locale; for example the hot air balloon is for Mr. Fogg’s Residence. The lettering is Victorian,

LINZIE HUNTER

in homage to Jules Verne’s aeronaut Phineas Fogg. The red title is the only lettering that isn’t contained; it wanders freely around the world. Linzie Hunter’s most recent work has been children’s books, although the appeal of her work remains for an ageless audience.

Figure 4.63 How to Write a Great Story, cover. The charm of Hunter’s style makes the subject of this book accessible to young people interested in creating their own stories. Client: Piccadilly Press, 2019 Illustration and lettering: Linzie Hunter

Figure 4.65 Graphics for Turn Up and Vote. The fresh and cheery color palette and diverse roster of characters makes this serious topic appealing. Illustration and lettering: Linzie Hunter

Figure 4.64 How to Write a Great Story, interior spread. Advice for the budding writer is presented in the accessible form of comic panels. Client: Piccadilly Press, 2019 Illustration and lettering: Linzie Hunter

Figure 4.66 Graphics for Turn Up and Vote. These graphics were animated gifs, made shareable on Instagram so the valuable message could go easily viral. Illustration and lettering: Linzie Hunter

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Figure 4.67 Londonist Drinks: A Spirited Guide to London Libation, map. Motifs of street signage—lettering, panels, and shapes—give this map an added suggestion of physical places. Client: AA Publishing, 2019 Illustration and lettering: Linzie Hunter

Katie Vernon As of this writing, Katie Vernon is a resident of Flagstaff, Arizona. Her body of work can be seen in editorial and licensing uses, on products, and as original artwork. There is a decorative detail and a painterly delicacy to her work. It’s a real testimonial to her artistry that she’s able to preserve her singular voice as an illustrator while solving a broad range of professional challenges. The texture of paint is visible in most of her pieces, although she does use digital means to assemble artwork for illustration assignments. It is the tactility of traditional media that imparts much of her style’s charm. For the environmental spot illustration Vernon ignores the predictable solution, creating a highly stylized orange deer with green antlers and hot pink legs (figure 4.68). The animal’s body is a strippeddown silhouette, the legs mere sticks. The antlers

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Figure 4.68 Spot illustration. The branches of the antlers maintain painterly texture and legibility at the same time. Within the charming illustration is a heart-felt political plea. Illustration and lettering: Katie Vernon

KATIE VERNON

“I love figuring out how to fit the tone of an illustration with a style of text. For the bird noises, I knew I needed something relaxed, whimsical, and almost childlike while remaining legible.” Katie Vernon

branch into the message “Vote the Environment,” mostly in all caps, “the” a casual lower case script springing off of one branch. Legibility is helped by proximity. The “V”s and “T”s would be impossible to read if not for the adjacent letters but in context, clarity is achieved. The wash of paint gives a subtly mottled surface to the whole. Vernon’s bird pattern maintains the translucency of watercolor but desaturates the palette to grays with subtle yellowish and greenish accents (figure 4.69). The voices of the birds are written out in informal handwriting, each a bit different, as would be the sounds: “CHIP CHIP” in all caps as if louder, “pip pip” a musical loopy script, and “chitter” a connected script, suggesting a whirring blur of a call. Each bird is shaped, decorated, and colored differently, with dots, flecks, and even one handsomely pinstriped fellow. For the poster advertising an art event in Brighton, UK, Vernon illustrated a heavily tattooed woman (figure 4.70). The sponsor for the event was Lilla Rogers, who happens to be Vernon’s agent and a highly respected artist rep in the illustration business. Rogers runs a blog and courses for aspiring illustrators titled “Make Art That Sells,”1 for which this poster advertised a pop-up shop. The dark blue panel at the bottom makes it easy to see the pale, mono-weight sans serif set type, the dominant text in the composition. The scalloped top edge of the panel adds appeal to the design, its irregularity fitting with the stylization of the illustration. Vernon’s hand lettering is within the illustration, where she embeds the poster’s taglines in the lady’s tattoos. “Make art that sells” is in a script that spans the collarbones,

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Rogers is also the artists’ agent for other illustrators in this book: Trina Dalziel and Zoë Ingram.

Figure 4.69 Bird pattern. The color palette of this pattern is virtually monochromatic. The rhythm of the letters imparts the sense of sound. Illustration and lettering: Katie Vernon

“WITHOUT SELLING OUT” emphasized in all caps and encased in a banner. One forearm contains another tagline in informal script; illustrations and words dot the rest of the torso, some purely decorative and others artists’ tools or things from nature. Lilla herself makes an appearance as a mermaid, with her trademark wavy hair, and name in embellished caps. As seen in other illustrators’ work in this book, maps are an excellent vehicle for Vernon to showcase her lettering skills. Vernon has done a number of them, including this one for Dubuque, Iowa (figure 4.71). The composition is symmetrical, framed on either side by floral garlands reminiscent of Polish or Pennsylvania Dutch folk art. The palette is subdued with grays and brick red, brightened by pops of hot pink and bright yellow. The street map is flattened out on the picture plane; buildings and other features of the landscape painted full frontal, their locations more approximate than literal. The lettering is simple, mostly all caps with an occasional loop of a lower case script “l” or capital script “G.” The city’s name floats up top, painted in a sturdy, old-fashioned style with thick strokes and stumpy serifs, suggestive of the signage lettering on an early twentieth century US Main Street building. The mark of Vernon’s hand adds a grace note to all of her work.

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Figure 4.70 Event poster. Make Art That Sells (MATS) is a series of instructional courses offered by Katie Vernon’s artist representative, Lilla Rogers (who is also the rep, or agent, for several other artists in this book). This was a poster to advertise an event MATS sponsored. Client: Lilla Rogers Studio Illustration and lettering: Katie Vernon

Figure 4.71 Map of Dubuque, Iowa. The gray on this poster is leavened by the warmth of pinks and yellows. Illustration and lettering: Katie Vernon

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DAVID PLUNKERT

David Plunkert David Plunkert, with his wife, illustrator Joyce Hessleberth, have been running their studio Spur Design in Baltimore, Maryland, since 1995. They each produce their own body of work, as well as working with other designers, illustrators, and photographers, on a broad range of projects. It is this extensive professional experience that informs Plunkert’s work, giving him a depth of knowledge about art direction, branding, typography, and every other dimension of professional graphic arts. Within his personal illustration output, he’s well known for a variety of distinctive styles, including collage and block style. It’s a marvel that these two different approaches are each so recognizably his work. He achieves this in part with a color palette that is often subdued—dark red, gold, a soft green, terracotta—and an under-layer of texture that gives the appearance that it’s been printed on old

Figure 4.72 Edgar Allan Poe: Stories and Poems, cover. The surface of this book has to be seen and touched to be fully appreciated. The red mask is printed with a gloss varnish that is slightly raised. Plunkert’s experience with design helps him understand options in printing and production. Client: Rockport Publishers Illustration and lettering: David Plunkert

newsprint paper. Plunkert demonstrates aptitude with both traditional and digital media in a way that feels organic and integrated; there is no friction between old and new techniques. Rockport Publishers publishes a series titled “Classics Reimagined”, for which they hire an illustrator to bring a novel (pun intended) interpretation to a classic text. Plunkert illustrated and designed Edgar Allan Poe: Stories & Poems2 (figure 4.72). These series of books include not only the cover, but interior illustrations as well. The aesthetic of the book forms a unified whole, from page layout to typography to the sequencing throughout. Plunkert has the skill and experience to do all of the above, and it shows in the overarching drama of the book’s flow, and the details with which he graces each page. It is on the cover that Plunkert uses hand lettering; the letters are an agitated, linear scratch on an old daguerreotype of Poe. The words obey a vertical rectangle to the side of Poe’s head; within that implied panel, all-caps letters are sans serifs but irregular and scribbled, some strokes redrawn obsessively and some single scratched lines. The cover illustration is terrifyingly simple. Layered atop Poe’s face is a translucent mask formed with a tinted gloss varnish, the dark red of dried blood, abstractly skeletal with eye holes, teeth like rows of bricks. Poe’s eyes gaze through, his solemn mouth barely seen. Everything about this cover communicates the contents of the book, from the sense of dread, to the author, to a representation of one of his best-known stories, The Masque of the Red Death. One of the best vehicles for illustrators to demonstrate skill with lettering is with poster design; posters titles need to stand out in striking and unique ways. Plunkert has done poster art for musicians, for film, for portfolio reviews, and for many years produced the season’s posters for Theatre Project in his home town, Baltimore. One striking aspect of these series is that every year Plunkert will establish a visual theme, then exercise variations on the theme for that year’s posters. He uses color, design, and pictorial style to distinguish each season; there may or may not be handlettering on any particular series, though however he 2

Plunkert also illustrated Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, from the same Classics Reimagined series.

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chooses to handle the copy, it is consistent. For the 2012 season (figures 4.73–4.75), Plunkert pushes the design to the edges of the printed page: a dominant figure fills the space with all the lettering tucked in around it. All of the illustrated figures are created with collage, probably by digital means but with vintage materials. While the source materials have a dated quality, the surreal way they’re handled modernizes the design. For Gumbo (figure 4.73), an old photo of a young man’s hopeful face is framed by a spoon, his circular glasses echoed by the round clock gears over his forehead. Red pencil scribbles make him blush and his hair is cut from paper. A Classical statue of a goddess is featured on For That Which Returns (figure 4.74)—armless, her eyeless face from someplace else—she has a torso filled to bursting with an old print of water lily and forget-me-not flowers. Perhaps oddest of them all is Room 17B (figure 4.75) on which men’s pants legs cavort, three pairs jammed upside down into a larger upright pair, splayed and on its toes. These illustrations in all their weirdness are compelling to look at and engage the viewer’s attention.

The lettering is a slight challenge to read, in the way it is squeezed into every bit of space around the illustration. All three posters share the same design concept but on each one, the lettering has its own distinguishing features. For Gumbo (figure 4.73) the lines of the letters are hand drawn with a single-weight line and rounded corners. Swashes fill gaps, as single lines with an awkward simplicity. On For That Which Returns, (figure 4.74) the letters resemble those on Gumbo but some sprout thorns and loops, and the swashes grow blossoms and buds. Room 17B (figure 4.75) has bits of drawn rope for the space-filling flourishes, and the dominant letters of title and date have strokes of varied weight and random serifs, as if loosely referencing an Old Style font. Throughout, baselines angle and tilt, to cover as much surface area as possible with visual information. With the poster for the Fête du Graphisme, Plunkert references another poster artist’s work and still makes it all his own (figure 4.76). In fin de siècle Paris, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was famous as

Figures 4.73–4.75 Poster series. These posters are unified by the central collaged figure, the black background, and white hand lettering. There is a handmade quality to the letters and the vintage materials, the digital process hidden. Client: Theatre Project Illustration: David Plunkert Lettering: David Plunkert and Andrea Kalfas

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DAVID PLUNKERT

Figure 4.76 Poster. The inspiration for the figure derives from Toulouse Lautrec’s poster of Aristide Bruant, though here depicted in Plunkert’s graphic style with exaggerated proportions. Client: Fête du Graphisme Illustration and lettering: David Plunkert

Figure 4.77 Ambassadeurs—Aristide Bruant, poster by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, 1892. Aristide Bruant in Lautrec’s original poster has the same long red scarf and branch walking stick seen in Plunkert’s poster.

a chronicler of nightlife and culture through his paintings and lithographic poster art. One of his best known works was of singer and nightclub owner Aristide Bruant (figure 4.77). Plunkert’s figure is flattened out, a plump and squared-off hieroglyph in profile, but he captures Bruant’s long red scarf, his dark hat and coat and even the stick he carries. The figure is outlined in green— there is no black in this design—and floats it all on a pale buttery background. The lettering of “Bruant” looks like a hand-rendered approximation of Lautrec’s writing with tall narrow forms, though all of Plunkert’s words are drawn as a hairline with a buff outline stroke. Bruant is astride Paris, its landmarks miniatures below. David Plunkert’s versatility enables him to tailor each graphic to an appropriate solution.

The examples seen thus far rely more on handwriting than any particular typeface. For the movie poster The Tin Drum, there is a specific resemblance to the display typeface Eagle Bold, with the angled arms of the “T, the extended leg of the “R,” the pronounced angled tops of the “N” and “M” and the way the center of the “M” ends short of the baseline (figures 4.78 and 4.79). In Plunkert’s rendering, the arms of the “T” are pulled down the stem, implying a cross. The illustration is in Plunkert’s more graphic style, yet it conjures German Expressionism with the raw texture of a wood cut, a perfect point of reference for the subject matter. The central figure is stylized into a flat form, the head attached directly to the pants, rotated facing up, mouth agape. The white head doubles as a panel for the title type and the film

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director’s credit line sits below, like a belt. The limited color palette and stark shapes make the black and white figure and the red of the drum’s pattern pop forward, allowing for the gold and black background to recede, filled with grim details of ominous faces, a city aflame, death and destruction.

Andrea Pippins Currently based in Stockholm, Sweden, Andrea Pippins is originally from Maryland, outside of Washington, D.C. She studied graphic design at Tyler School of Art, Temple University, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, earning both a BFA and an MFA. She’s worked in the field as a designer and also taught design as a professor. It’s important to understand Pippins’ thorough schooling in design to appreciate that the informality of her illustration style is girded in knowledgeable, thoughtful choices. Her illustrations and lettering are vibrantly colorful and artfully decorated, a celebration of line and shape. It is not only in the aesthetic of Andrea Pippins’ work that we find inspiration, it is also in the messages she delivers with confidence, power, and joy. While she’s done work for corporate clients, it is in the products of her own invention that she ensures that the images she wants to see in the world are disseminated. It has taken vision and drive for her to accomplish this. She’s engendered

Figure 4.78 Poster for the film The Tin Drum. Plunkert’s roughly drawn title is based on typeface Eagle Bold, customized in form, and texture added to harmonize with the woodblock feel of the illustration. Client: Client was Criterion Collection / Janus Films Illustration and lettering: David Plunkert Figure 4.79 Typeface Eagle Bold, initially designed by Morris Fuller Benton in the early twentieth century.

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Figure 4.80 I Love My Hair: A Coloring Book of Braids, Coils, and Doodle Dos cover. Countering the prevailing paradigm that Blondeness=Beauty, Pippins uses the charming and accessible means of a coloring book to promote a healthy embrace of hair as a form of selfexpression, particularly for women of color. Client: Random House Illustration and lettering: Andrea Pippins

ANDREA PIPPINS

a positive feedback loop: she creates the work that’s missing from our visual landscape, and thus inspires clients to give her more projects like that. As an African-American woman, Pippins wanted to see pictures in media that looked like her, in affirmative and diverse ways, reflecting how African American women in the real world truly are. Pippins’ first self-authored book, I Love My Hair: A Coloring Book of Braids, Coils, and Doodle Dos, is a coloring book that extols the marvelous variety and inventiveness with which women of all ethnicities can style and groom their hair. On the cover she features line art with faces tucked into an unfurling landscape of hair (figure 4.80). Blank areas centered in the ringlets contain the title and credit panels. Bits and pieces are colored in red foil stamp, keeping

the palette simple while clearly communicating that this is a coloring book. On the interior pages the illustrations are all line, and these lines are gloriously and wildly varied: curls, waves, ringlets, braids, and on and on (figure 4.81). The locks of hair appear as textural, abstracted surfaces but also in context on heads from all different eras and places, demonstrating the importance of self-decoration as an historic manifestation of culture. Pippins uses a similar technique illustrating language, drawing words describing the many ways in which hair can be: “gorgeous, cool, dope, elegant. . .” Each of these words is drawn in a different style, all of them nestled together, decorated with outlines, swashes, and spurs. Hand-drawn and playful, these letters make clear that Pippins’ work is grounded in an understanding of typography.

Figure 4.81 I Love My Hair: A Coloring Book of Braids, Coils, and Doodle Dos, interior drawings. The interior illustrations reference hair from throughout history and from all over the globe, to emphasize her point that decorating hair is a universal experience, one to be celebrated. Illustration and lettering: Andrea Pippins

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Pippins style was perfect for the Lincoln Center Out of Doors Summer Festival graphics (figure 4.82). The jumble of figures, objects, and text interlock without overlapping, forming a dense surface of detail. In contrast, the drawings of the forms are themselves simple, allowing one to easily scan the surface and read the images. Within the clarity of her outlines, Pippins draws in details to add texture to the surface: the beaded netting on the shekere, the ruffles on the dress, and so on. Throughout the composition are stars and bursts to signify sound: this design sings. Pippins plays with scale—the pizza slice is as big as the child riding the adult’s shoulders—and there are whimsical alignments: a saxophone blares at a gleaming taxi and a Popsicle leans towards a drum. The color palette is bright and happy with gold, olive, and teal, pale red and hot pink, all vivid against a black background. Words are interspersed with the pictures, describing the events with plump, free-form letters in mixed case, some paneled in bursts or blobs or a

Figs. 4.82 Lincoln Center Out of Doors Summer Festival poster and banners. Pippins’ style and color palette have a contemporary freshness that would appeal to a broad audience, attracting people of all ages and backgrounds to the Festival. Illustration and lettering: Andrea Pippins

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talk balloon for “Spoken Word.” Lettering styles are mostly of a sans serif with round-edged strokes, with script for “music” and a yellow shadow on hot pink “Unity.” The design uses a multitude of small components arranged together making it flexible system, easily reconfigured for other sizes and uses needed for the branding of the event: posters, banners, and other media. Pippins is not always the author of her own texts, although her chosen projects consistently reflect her passions and interests. Young, Gifted, and Black: Meet 52 Iconic Talents from Past and Present (the title citing Nina Simone’s stirring song To Be Young, Gifted, and Black) is a book written for children by Jamia Wilson (figures 4.83 and 4.84). It features short biographies of fifty-two people of color whose accomplishments are notable and whose lives should be made familiar to and celebrated by

Figures 4.83 Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present, book cover. The title of this book echoes the anthemic song of the 1960s Civil Rights movement in the USA, Nina Simone’s stirring rendition of To Be Young, Gifted, and Black. The song— and the book—are positive and inspirational messages to children of color, and valuable for all children to learn. Client: Wide Eyed Editions Illustration and lettering: Andrea Pippins

TRINA DALZIEL

children. In her illustration style of simple lines and flat fills, Pippins demonstrates how to capture a likeness with economical means, using proportion and shape. Greater detail lies in the decorative backgrounds that frame the figures and texts, with flares, drops, waves, and simple shapes that take on symbolic meaning, such as a keyboard as a halo for Nina Simone, butterfly and bee for Muhammad Ali, and rocket ship for Katherine Johnson. The words float in banners that encircle the figures. Whether sans serif or script, Pippins lettering has a distinct quality to it, an informality that, although created digitally, has a handmade feel, with slight irregularities of stroke weight, letter height, or the shape of a curve. The colors are appropriately celebratory: bright coral, green, lime, and hot pink, with a spectrum of browns to illustrate the skin tones of these notable people. The graphic quality of the interior illustrations brings to mind vernacular sign painting, textiles, and other democratic expressions of visual communications. Pippins’ body of work is an inspirational example of how illustration and design can have cultural relevance and impact.

Trina Dalziel Originally from Northern Scotland, Trina Dalziel subsequently lived in London; as of this writing she has returned to a rural setting and calls Northumberland home. There is a delicate charm to Dalziel’s work; her style lends itself to domestic themes and all kinds of lifestyle topics, albeit more peaceful than punk. This makes her work perfect not only for editorial illustration on these subjects, but also as decorative surfaces for home goods and surface design.

Figure 4.84 Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present, interior spreads. Pippins includes appropriate motifs for each person, rendered in a simplified style as graphic marks. Note Ali’s butterfly and bee from his marvelous quote: “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.” Client: Wide Eyed Editions Illustration and lettering: Andrea Pippins

For her editorial work, by incorporating hand lettering into her illustrations, Dalziel is able to make the pull quote of an article fully part of the picture (figure 4.85). She uses color and shape to accentuate certain words: the steam from the hot turkey envelopes the words “Turkey EVERY Way” and the acid green of the tiles reappears to emphasize “Thanksgiving” and as part of the oven mitt pattern. The whole of the illustration is unified with color, her delicately scratchy line, and

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with patterns, not only the oven mitts but in the striped containers, the woman’s hair, her nubby sweater. By angling the reader’s point of view from above we can see into the oven and the roasting pan, yet the words float flatly on the picture plane. The phrase is a mix of lettering styles, including a wispy script with slightly fattened stems and a sans serif in all caps, some of them hollowed as outline forms. Most of the line art in both drawing and lettering is a dark brown but the words “EVERY Way” share a bright orange with the nearby pot on the stove and carrots in the pan, making the words pop. Even with her light touch, Dalziel knows how to draw letters to give the written language an inflection, as if spoken out loud. Dalziel designs and illustrates presentation boards for home products that are as charming and attractive as her work itself; the aesthetic is seamless. For the Midsummer Soirée products (figure 4.86), Dalziel works with just two colors: a steely blue and greenish yellow. She uses pale tints of the blue to expand the palette and its darkest value for line art. The title hovers over the grainy

Figure 4.85 Editorial illustration. The illustration does double duty as the pull quote for the article, with text fully integrated into the picture, framed by steam from the oven. Client: Family Circle magazine. Illustration and lettering: Trina Dalziel

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scribble of an oval in acidic yellow, disregarding the border, words and shapes freely misaligned. A linear petaled circle encompasses the tagline “Let’s party until the birds wake up,” written in a script handwriting. The title itself is more designed lettering: “midsummer” lower case sans serif, an outline stroke with a thin dimensional side shadow. It’s tucked into the second word drawn in a contoured script, the pair of lines delineating the letters shrinking and expanding to describe the stress of the stroke. There is no fill on these letters; they are translucent against the background. The birds of the tagline appear in the illustrations of and on the products: a wine cooler encircled with flowers and birds, and candle holders with flowers below and a sculptural bird atop. Bubbles of contrasting color—lighter, darker—hold the identifying texts and whimsical observations. The patterns described on the products recur on the imaginary table top of the trend board, uniting the whole. Even the writing on this board inhabits the same charmed world as the visuals do: “Use until the Dawn Chorus comes.”

Figure 4.86 Trend board for home products. Dalziel creates illustrations for home goods, and her presentation boards for these are illustrations themselves, helping companies to visualize how her style might work applied to products. Illustration and lettering: Trina Dalziel

JESSICA HISCHE

Jessica Hische

Figure 4.87 Map of Wharton, Texas. Map illustration is a perfect opportunity to embed lettering into an illustration. Locations are rendered either literally (buildings) or symbolically (books for bookstore.) Client: Texas Highways Magazine Illustration and lettering: Trina Dalziel

It comes as no surprise that Dalziel is good at creating maps. Wharton, Texas, was the hometown of playwright/screenwriter Horton Foote (figure 4.87). For this map, she unifies the whole with a pale pink, bean-shaped background. The pink blossoms at the corners meld into the background, softening the effect of their out-sized scale. The main roads are drawn in a darker pink, helping the more vibrant colors of the town’s landmarks to stand out. Sometimes she renders the structure, whether the exterior such as Foote’s home or the TeePee Motel, or the interior of Provisions Bistro and Market. For the bookstore, a stack of books, coffee pot and cup suffice to signify the place. The Colorado River is in a contrasting blue, the curve of the river a mimicked flip of the map’s contour. Dalziel’s lettering is in her signature mix of script and simple block sans serif. She makes sure we don’t miss the nostalgic amusement of the TeePee Motel, highlighting the name with swabs of orange and yellow. Horton Foote floats ghostlike, as a simple line drawing, over his former home. Dalziel illustrates—and hand letters—an assortment of projects, consistently maintaining her distinctive, delicate line, and luscious color palette.

No book on the subject of hand lettering in the early twenty-first century would be complete without mention of Jessica Hische. She has, in fact, played a part in the current cultural awareness and popularity of decorative lettering. Hische does not sit still. In her mid-thirties, she’s accomplished more in her career than most do in their lifetimes. She’s designed and illustrated for publishing, for companies large and small, she’s lectured all over the world, she’s taught and she’s written, both for an audience of fellow practitioners of the graphic arts and now, for children (she has three young ones herself). Hische graduated from Tyler School of Art at Temple University in Philadelphia with a BFA in Design. Her creative energies and unflagging self-motivation led her to create her own projects while searching for a steady job. One of these, her set of cards for the Twelve Days of Christmas came to the attention of designer Louise Fili in New York City, and within hours of meeting her, Hische had a job with and learned at the helm of one of the most lauded designers of our time, one with impeccable taste. During the years in her early career as a designer at Louise Fili’s studio, Hische would work late at night on freelance illustration projects. She had an epiphany about how hand lettering incorporates elements of illustration and typography: “Through lettering, I could work like an illustrator but use all the typographic skills I’d learned pursuing a career in design.”3 She demonstrated that level of creativity when she decided to pursue a full-time freelance career. She jump-started it with another self-propelled project, The Daily Drop Cap, that she posted on Tumblr (at that time, a popular online platform for creatives), attracting widespread attention and inspiring art directors to work with her (figure 4.88). It is worth a visit to her website to see them all and marvel at the many iterations, twelve alphabets in total, yielding 312 unique letters. In the sample seen here, we see formal scripts, a child’s schoolbook writing sample, floriated Victorian forms, Art Deco, and also illustrations: of a mountaintop, 3

Hische, Jessica (2015) In Progress: See Inside a Lettering Artist’s Sketchbook and Process, from Pencil to Vector. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, p. 15.

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Figure 4.88 From The Daily Drop Cap. Jessica Hische’s self-initiated Daily Drop Cap project inspired art directors, gave them creative ideas, and led to professional assignments. Illustration and lettering: Jessica Hische

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JESSICA HISCHE

spilled milk, a child on a slide, a mint candy, a drowsy eye. The “L” is a simple script capital letter, housed in an implied box of leafy sprigs, the elegant black line art brightened with tiny red berries and robins. With “C” Hische uses a card-playing motif, the chisel serifs and curved bowl decorated with symbols for the suits of a deck of cards. As if beauty and cleverness were not enough, there is immaculate skill in the digital rendering of each of these letters. However, make note: her ideas usually begin with analog tools: pencil and paper. One significant project inspired by The Daily Drop Cap was a series of 26 book covers for Penguin Books USA. Art Director Paul Buckley conceived the notion to republish classic works of fiction and poetry, each book’s author’s name beginning with a different letter of the alphabet. To add to the beauty of the series, each cover’s background is in a different hue; lined up in alphabetic order, the books’ spines form a rainbow. The title and author’s name are set small in a classical serif typeface, all caps and open letter spacing, allowing the drop cap to command attention in the center (figure 4.89). For Moby Dick, Hische drew an elaborate “M” with stems halved, striped on the bottom and solid above, with drop shaded sides, and serifs split and

curled to resemble whale tails. A harpoon rests on top at the middle, the rope forming a decorative embellishment weaving around the letter. Five Children and It is an English children’s story from 1902 about five young siblings and a sand fairy who grants their wishes, usually with unintended and amusing consequences. The tiny purple fairy appears to exhale the delicate flourishes that form and decorate the letter “N”, pale lines spiraling at their tips, thickening just enough along the stems to discern the letter. Butterfield 8 is the most illustrative of these three. A woman’s eye peers through a screen, the sides of which are curved to complete a stylized “O.” The Art Deco style of the letter and the pattern of scales in the screen conjure the flapper era of the novel. The woman peering through is the central character, looking for her married lover, her half-hidden face suggesting the illicit nature of the affair. Much of Hische’s work centers on her abundant talent and skill with lettering. Her more recent career includes projects with an equal portion of illustration: children’s books: Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave and Tomorrow I’ll Be Kind. She is also the author, giving her the liberty to incorporate lettering in the story. Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave features a bunny child

Figure 4.89 From Penguin Drop Caps. Note the color transition from teal to blue green to blue. Lined up with the other twenty-three books in the series, the full set of twenty-six books form not only the alphabet but also a rainbow. Client: Penguin Books Illustration and lettering: Jessica Hische

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being encouraged not to worry, that tomorrow’s another day: a chance to keep getting stronger, more creative, braver. The cover is a night time scene, perfect for bedtime stories, the right time to contemplate the hope of a new day, the next day. On the cover the tiny bunny and parent gaze up at the stars, their little campsite nearby (figure 4.90). The scene is depicted with graphic simplicity: flat shapes and a limited color palette of blues and brown. The word “BRAVE” is dimensional, extruded and chiseled, on a curved baseline, the leg of the “R” an extended swash. Every facet of every stem is given a starlit gradient to enhance the illusion of depth. Even though the color palette is pretty, there’s a metallic steeliness to the surface of the letters, as if this were a word you could defend yourself with. The remainder of the title and the credit line arch above and below, framing the central word and illustration.

The interior spreads alternate large keywords and dominantly illustrated pages. Throughout the book, Hische has a consistency in the illustration style with shapes and patterns formed by foliage, branches, curtains and so on, this world populated by creatures built from simple forms. Little bunny is usually seen small and the words, oh so big. On the spread for “Strong” most of the two pages are underground, brown dirt with a buried “Strong” in beige (figure 4.91). There are stones in the dirt and ants crawl through the letter—some even carry apples from the trees above ground. The letters are all caps with an inline, split and curved serifs, and swashes to fill out the space. In this telling, strong doesn’t have to be dull or ugly. Above ground is a world of green with bunny and friend going for a run in an apple tree grove. The text of the story appears small, aside from the central word, “Tomorrow I’ll be STRONG, I’ll climb and jump and play”. Each of the action verbs is emphasized and bright. Throughout the book assorted admirable human qualities are depicted with large, illustrated letters: adventurous, strong, smart, curious, creative, confident, and (of course) brave. At the end they are listed on a spread (figure 4.92): all desirable, all achievable. Each word is depicted in a different style. Hische does not necessarily make obvious choices. For example, “Adventurous” is tall, narrow letters with tiny serifs, drawn in, of all colors, a bold pink; the baseline rises through delicate clouds as if the word were climbing a mountain. “Smart” appears dressed in slab serifs, the letters interlocking like jigsaw puzzle pieces—except, oddly the “T”, a detached sans serif. Is that how the puzzle is solved? “Creative” is a chiseled sans serif with Art Deco detailing seen in the rounded top of the “A.” A pink crayon stands in for the “I” and pink scribbles fill half of the inline, granting permission to a child’s mark. The illustrations on this spread are secondary grace notes, a supporting cast to the main stage letters.

Figure 4.90 Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave, cover. Hische is able to give lettering a major role in her self-authored book. On the cover, the illustration is flat and graphic, and the title dimensional with chiseled surfaces and shading. Client: Penguin Workshop Illustration and lettering: Jessica Hische

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Children are taught not to worry: process is part of all their goals and the process can be fun. We could all apply that precept to our own creative processes. Clearly, Jessica Hische has effectively applied it to hers. She’s even named it: “procrastiworking.”

JESSICA HISCHE

Figure 4.91 Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave, spread. On this spread the main word goes underground, like a hidden foundation. Illustration and lettering: Jessica Hische

Figure 4.92 Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave, spread. As a parent as well as creator, Hische is able to enumerate human qualities she hopes to encourage and support in her own children and others. Illustration and lettering: Jessica Hische

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Tips and Tricks Hand Lettering X Know your graphic design and typographic history. While the reader might not be able to consciously identify your points of reference, on some deep level they’ll be familiar with visual and cultural references that you make in your own work. That doesn’t mean that you cannot flip things, do mash ups, create new styles. But to do so in a knowing way is better. X PLAY! Keep a sketchbook. Doodle on scraps. Look at the lettering in the world around you. Love that logo in the coffee shop seen backward through the window? Draw it. Love that message curving around your coffee cup? Draw that too. Or draw fanciful letters that you’ve never seen before. Have fun, and see where that leads you. X When it comes to your projects, know your subject: If it’s a book, read it. If it’s a play, see it (or at least read it). If it’s a jam, eat it. Talk with your client; better yet: listen to your client. Take notes while listening. Ask questions and listen closely to the answers. Think creatively about the conceptual angle from which you’ll approach the project. What’s the back-story? Who’s the audience? Where will this be seen? What else is in that visual environment, and what will make your design stand out? X Sketch lots of thumbnail sketches. It is in these rough early sketches that you’ll be resolving conceptual and compositional issues. Do lots and lots of little sketches, variations on an idea and then brand new ideas. Start with pencil sketches but later explore tonal sketches where you doodle out blacks and then mid-tones in a middle gray. Marker pens can be handy for this kind of sketch. X Do color studies. It can be handy, with a limited color palette, to have a dark, a medium, and a light value so you can establish sufficient contrast where needed. Think about what hues (colors) you want to use, and what those colors

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communicate: are the colors pure and vibrant, suggesting happiness and childhood? Are they subdued and subtle, suggesting elegance? X When you’re ready to sketch out your lettering artwork, lightly pencil in the baseline, x-height, and cap line. Draw the skeleton (again, lightly), the basic wire-frame for each letter, adjusting for fit on the line length and for letter spacing, for overall evenness of tone. Draw in your whole lockup to make sure your elements fit together they way you want them too. X Now you can put some flesh on the letters’ skeletons (thanks and apologies to Jessica Hische for these eloquent metaphors). Draw the outlines of the strokes. What is the stroke variation? Mono-weight? Are there exaggerated thicks and thins? Or is it somewhere in between? Once these bodies have been built, tweak the letter spacing as needed. X Consider what Hische describes as the clothing for the letters: are there drop shadows, inlines, outlines, crazy serifs, swashes, whatever? How do these work with the underlying structures you’ve established? If you have outlines or drop shadows, effects that widen the letters, you’ll also need to widen the letter spacing. X You are now ready to either scan in your drawing, or to ink it and then scan that. For software, a vector program will allow you to create paths and manipulate anchor points. A bitmap program will make your approach more painterly. X Create modules that can be re-purposed on a multitude of letterforms: a stem, an ascender, a bowl, etc. For some letters, flipping and rotating can give you useful variants: consider b, d, p, and q. X For color versions, consider putting different trappings on different layers, so you can control and color them independently.

Alternate Media and Illustration

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There are illustrators and designers who work outside of the tradition media of pencil and paint. While illustrators typically draw, the more important point is that they communicate the message and concept visually. The pencil and a piece of paper may be the most immediate way to communicate an idea (setting aside the camera for the moment), but any material can be brought into service to form a composition. Collage often relies on a more visceral approach, allowing for happy accidents and unexpected combinations. Non-traditional media provide their own sets of constraints, as well as their own built-in opportunities.

“Collage demands participation; it encourages us to fill in the gaps.” John O’Reilly

It is often thought that Picasso and Braque were the first artists to incorporate collage (from the French coller, “to glue”) into their works, but cut paper and combined images can be found in many cultures dating back hundreds of years. In China, intricately cut paper was used as decoration or ornament; in Scandinavia, paper would be folded in half vertically and cut to create a mirrored illustration which, when unfolded, revealed a tree-like structure and horizontal branching areas to frame scenes on either side of a central stem. Contemporary British artist Rob Ryan’s work references this cut paper style. During the Victorian era, portraits of paper silhouettes were popular, usually cut from black paper mounted on a contrasting color. At the same time—and more colorfully—stickers and decals were in demand, giving rise to an industry for graphic artists to create images, usually on sentimental themes: flowers, cherubs, saintly children, fluffy pets, and so on. These stickers would be assembled and glued into scrapbooks, typically by girls and women as a hobby (figure 5.1). The most inventive

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collaged together so that the appearance of the page would further the message. Sometimes the montage would incorporate both type and image, but either the lettering would dominate so it could function as promotional material for an event or as a poem, or the pictorial content would take precedence with lettering receding in importance, becoming incoherent texture and shape. Heartfield, in particular, was known for his anti-Nazi posters, combining collaged images with sardonic headlines.

Figure 5.1  Page from a Victorian-era scrapbook. The unknown owner of this scrapbook assembled pages with chromolith decals and trading cards as well as illustrations cut from catalogs and books. The lettering is incidental, part of the background or a piece of glued-in ephemera.

of them would make visual diaries or journals and incorporate other ephemera, often scraps invested with personal meaning, artfully arranged. Because these ways of cutting and combining materials happened outside of the formalities of the established art world, they would be consigned to “craft,” given the perceived lesser status of personal objects for home enjoyment. Beginning in 1916, the Dada art movement sought to fracture traditional modes of artistic expression. The artists’ work was very often fueled by political passions in reaction to World War I and its aftermath. Several of the great collage artists of the early twentieth century emerged at this time, notably Hannah Höch, John Heartfield, and Kurt Schwitters. Poetry, performance, sculpture, and other creations were a part of the movement. In the printed materials, letterforms would often be

In the art world, throughout the twentieth century, the incorporation of alternate media was explored and gained currency. Material from vernacular sources might be included for a variety of reasons: because it was readily available, or as a comment on consumerism, or simply to experiment. Working with found objects and materials allowed for surprising conjunctions and Surrealist imaginings. Max Ernst, Henri Matisse, and Joseph Cornell are among the most notable practitioners of the early twentieth century, followed by Romare Bearden, Robert Rauschenberg, and, in more contemporary times, Betye Saar, Kara Walker, Wengechi Mutu, and countless others. Matisse would paint paper with his color palette then cut out shapes, calling his technique “drawing with scissors.” Max Ernst’s series with old engravings or Romare Bearden’s with magazine photography used the outlines of printed images to suggest shapes that they would extract from their original backgrounds and re-purpose in new combinations. Mid-century graphic designers used collage in novel ways to crop, shape, and arrange photographs and colored shapes into forms that signified a new conceptual whole. Lester Beall and Paul Rand both did memorable work in this vein, creating posters and book covers that today still radiate vitality (figure 5.2). It was not until the latter half of the twentieth century that illustrators began working with collage or other experimental media. In the UK, Sir Peter Blake straddled the worlds of so-called high and low art, becoming known as a British Pop Artist with his paintings but achieving even wider visibility in the realm of commercial art, notably with his collage for the cover of the Beatles’ album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. The

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Stefan Sagmeister

a safety pin into Queen Elizabeth’s nose and scrawled God Save the Queen. Graphics have rarely been so anarchic, before or since.

Stefan Sagmeister

Figure 5.2  Lester Beall (1903–1969), artist; United States. Rural Electrification Administration, funder/sponsor. Mid-twentieth century designers used collage to expand on photography’s role in their designs, cutting photos or papers, and incorporating them with other elements. Beall artfully reiterates the US flag’s stripes with the lines of the fencing, adding dynamism with the skewed perspective.

lettering is incorporated into the composition with planted red flowers forming the band’s name, the LP title literally printed on the bass drum in the center of the composition. A photo-shoot was staged with the band members and the floral foreground, and a collage of notable figures from the past arrayed around them—including the Beatles’ younger selves with bowl haircuts. Edgier work emerged in the 1970s and 1980s. British artist Jamie Reid tore and shredded paper to brand the Sex Pistols on their album covers, the graphics shrieking in neon colors, the lettering a ransom note pastiche of motley styles. He collaged

In 2000, graphic designer, artist, typographer, and writer Stefan Sagmeister excused himself from client-based work to engage in a series of explorations—philosophical musings with rendered expressions. He documented his process and results and made books and films of it all. The series, titled Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far, has been printed as a set of booklets assembled in a die-cut case. Sagmeister is the inspired creative director, unlike the other artists profiled in this book who are sole creators of their works. He commissioned illustrators and other artists, including Yuko Shimizu, Monika Aichele, and Marian Bantjes, to render his phrases, and worked with teams of photographers, designers, and interns to “illustrate” aphorisms by rearranging real-world objects to mimic letters and words: tape in a chain link fence, branches, banana peels, silver tubing floating in a pool, hot dogs on a cutting board—the list is seemingly endless. This artwork, comprised of maxims, conjures the work of artist Jenny Holzer—whom he credits as an inspiration in the introduction—although the variety of his play with materials goes far beyond hers. For Obsessions Make My Life Worse and Make My Work Better Sagmeister’s team sorted 250,000 Euro-cents into four shades of relative lightness/ darkness, and laid them out on Waagdragerhof Square in Amsterdam in a design by Richard The and Joe Shouldice (figure 5.3). Each letter of the three major words is like a rectangular ribbon, the secondary words simple sans serif, all arching on a curve embellished with flowers, all constructed from coins. Sagmeister’s interest expands into the interaction of the public with his fabrication. In this case, when thieves began to filch the coins, police carefully swept up the remainder, to “protect the artwork.” The piece is not only graphically beautiful, but fascinating in what it reveals about human nature and behaviors.

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Figure 5.3  Obsessions Make My Life Worse and Make My Work Better. Sagmeister’s team created a piece in a public square in Amsterdam. The assembling of the coins to spell out the message was a performance in itself. The aftermath could not be scripted: the next day, police carefully swept up the coins so they would not be stolen, thus destroying the art they sought to protect. Creative Direction: Stefan Sagmeister Design: Richard The & Joe Shouldice Photography: Jens Rehr

Sagmeister’s seminal work has had far-reaching impact in culture and in the graphic arts, ranging from ‘high art” to the magazine ad we’ve all seen, where the headline is composed of granola.

Marian Bantjes “My favorite typographer anywhere”1 is what Stefan Sagmeister calls Marian Bantjes—and with ample reason. Her hand skills in a multitude of media—traditional and non-traditional—as well

Sagmeister, Stefan, (2008) Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far, Abrams, New York, unpaginated.

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as her digital skills are formidable. Even more so, her creativity, conceptual thinking, and the imaginative explorations she manifests in her work are mind-boggling in their variety. Her career began in Vancouver, Canada, with a background in production, working as a typesetter for a decade. She learned the craftsmanship of typography as a solid foundation from which she could later experiment so inventively. She spent the following decade as a founder of a design firm, gaining experience as a creative designer and learning about the realistic dynamics of working with clientele, after which she had the realization that, “instead of me operating as a purveyor of whatever style was appropriate for my clients’ needs, I wanted to have my own style that people

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Marian Bantjes

would come to me for.”2 Bantjes’ epiphany, in a nutshell, clarifies the distinction that typically exists between working as a designer (in a multitude of styles, depending on the client’s needs and vision) and working as an illustrator (having a distinct and unique style that differentiates their work from others’). Bantjes’ impulse, her drive to create what she wants to, sets her apart as a visionary graphic artist. She has succeeded in attracting projects and clientele who come to her for what she has to offer—but it took diligence and persistence for her to get there. Bantjes is adept at ornamentation and patterning. Illustration is generally thought of as being figurative and representational, but in the examples of Bantjes’ work seen here, the illustration is often decoration, augmenting the lettering design. Bantjes draws well and has worked illustratively in many media, but it is her work with alternate media that will be focused on here. She often begins her designs with pencil sketches, but for Stefan Sagmeister’s project, it was with her finger and a pile of sugar that she planned and completed the maxim. “If I want to explore a new direction professionally, it is helpful to try it out for myself first” (figure 5.4).3 The phrase is perfect for Bantjes’ own creative impulses; in fact, by the time Sagmeister started his project, he and Bantjes had already met and formed a professional camaraderie. He was inspired to give her the assignment based on a personal project she’d created with sugar, Indestructible. For Sagmeister, she rendered five variations; in the example seen here the letters are a connected script, the descenders have a perky curve at the bottom and some of the “s”s slip below the baseline. The swirls of decoration have a playful, almost cartoonish aspect, finger-wide extrusions poked into the granules. The layout is set up as if for a two-page spread, the phrase reading across a gutter gap in the middle. Bantjes, Marian, (2013) Pretty Pictures, New York: Metropolis Books, pg. 5. 3 Bantjes delivers a TED talk in which she describes the origins of her working with sugar to craft words and messages. https://www.ted .com/talks/marian_bantjes_intricate_beauty_by_design/transcript ?language=en. 2

Figure 5.4  With her customary high energy, Bantjes created five different designs, all with grains of sugar. She found the grains challenging to guide into place, and her most successful results came when she relinquished some control. Client: Stefan Sagmeister for Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far Lettering: Marian Bantjes

For an exhibition of Bantjes’ work at the Chicago Design Museum, she was invited to create a site-specific installation. Because it would be experienced in real time, she had the opportunity to layer the fourth dimension of time into her concept for the piece. Tanner Woodford, the museum’s director, recommended she use plants. Given the inevitable decay that would occur, she chose the word “sorrow” (figures 5.5, 5.6). A local flower shop donated the materials, and Bantjes created the piece on site the night before the opening. It is arrayed on a black background, making the colors and shapes pop. Gold-colored twigs appear woven as the central strokes of the letters spelling “Sorrow” with eucalyptus leaves marching along each side of each stroke, each gray-green disc of leaf accented with a tiny white petal. The complexity of the embellishments is balanced by the simplicity of the letters, which appear to be based on a simple sans serif type style. The word is boldly framed by decorative elements above and below: large yellow and green striped variegated leaves form columns, with vertical bars of pale pink rose petals and acid-green sprays of stamens in between. Close examination reveals a wealth of detail: sprigs of magenta celosia stripe or curl along edges, pale asters are flattened and strewn around, the eucalyptus leaves reappear, dotted along the

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Figures 5.5, 5.6  This piece was created at the invitation of the Chicago Design Museum as a site-specific installation. Bantjes purposely chose vegetal matter that would age and shrivel at different rates; the decay of the piece became part of its sorrowful state. Client: Chicago Design Museum Artist: Marian Bantjes

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Marian Bantjes

edges of the largest leaves. Unity is found in the color palette of greens, pinks, and golds. Bantjes artfully plays with the variety of shapes—large, small, round, narrow, spindly—and, with this most unlikely medium, produces a formal design with repeated motifs and an elegant classicism. There is a beauty even in the decayed version (figure 5.6), with the durable foliage largely intact, the fragile components shriveling and receding. Sorrow remains. For the 25th anniversary of AGIdeas, an Australiabased design platform, Bantjes chose the deceptively modest means of tin foil incised with a ballpoint pen (figure 5.7). She arranged square tiles of foil into a six by six grid, drawing into each one an arabesque of swirls, parallel lines like feathers or ribbing, curling into fishtails and waves. They are reiterated and rotated, all of them lit differently and assembled digitally to give the impression of a varied color palette, randomly assembled: some silvery, some purplish, some darker or lighter. The four tiles in the center are the goldest and the brightest, and one realizes they form the number

Figure 5.7  25. AGIdeas in Australia invited 25 graphic artists to create a “25” to commemorate their 25th anniversary. Bantjes pressed swirls into tiles of foil, the center four of them forming her “25” by flipping and rotating the similar shapes. Client: AGIdeas Lettering: Marian Bantjes

“25” bisected and inverted. The bottom of the “2” is the same as the top of the “5” but flipped and rotated 180 degrees; the same applies to the top of the “2” and the bottom of the “5.” Both numbers are connected top to bottom by the flow of curved strokes, the Gestalt Principles of Continuation and Closure in operation. Some of Bantjes’ most inventive work has been executed for Varoom magazine, where she’s given complete creative freedom. Varoom, the influential illustration publication, is published bi-annually in London, UK, by the Association of Illustrators (one of the leading illustration organizations in the world). Given the theme “Empathy,” Bantjes thought of the unifying, heart-breaking experience of losing a child. She had the idea to work with the hair of the “My Little Pony” toys, and discovered one could purchase unattached, unsullied hair in the unmistakable cotton candy colors (figure 5.8). Using material from a children’s toy, Bantjes chose an old-fashioned method to execute her design: needlepoint, marrying youthful to elderly activities. Needlepoint designs are like pixels in a grid of tiny units. Smooth curves are difficult to create with this method, so the lettering style the words are based on is Blackletter. The vertical stems and angled edges that substitute for curves lend themselves to the underlying grid. The “s” breaks from traditional form, the bottom half of it reaching back

Figure 5.8  Lost Child. Varoom magazine gave Bantjes the word “Empathy” as a prompt; she sympathetically thought: “Lost Child.” The old-timey craft of needlepoint is like a low-resolution bit-mapped file, each stitch a pixel in a grid of colored dots. Client: Varoom magazine Lettering: Marian Bantjes

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to embrace the “o.” All of the letters are stitched in orange. The remaining colors—pink, turquoise, orchid, and cherry red—form simple squares as ornamentation on the panel; the strands of hair spray unrestrained, extruding from all sides. Bantjes’ willingness to explore media is limitless, although her conceptual thinking is always in tune with the message and the materials.

Lola Dupre Currently residing in Glasgow, Scotland, Lola Dupre is a collage artist and illustrator who has carved out a beautifully crafted body of work. Using what in the digital age might be considered arcane methods— scissors, paper, and glue—she obsessively cuts and pastes hundreds of bits together to devise surreal visions. With the accumulated accretion of paper scraps she distorts proportions, elongating limbs, multiplying eyeballs, and shattering edges. Some of her work, particularly of her stretched-out bodies, conjures the 1980s collage portraits Jean-Paul Goudé created of singer Grace Jones—however, Dupre’s work takes the approach to a whole new level. Her collages have been exhibited widely in galleries and, as illustration assignments, attracted a stellar roster of clients from publishing to corporate. Dupre’s depiction of lettering is a small fraction of her body of work, but so novel and well done that it merits mention here. As a personal project, she cuts out pictures of buildings to form single letters. As of this writing, Dupre has created letters “A” through “D.” It is a hallmark of her collage style to take many copies of the source image and to extract and multiply fragments, forming the hybrid with apparently seamless integration. The unity of the surface, the sameness of tone and color, help her to maintain the illusion of the newly formed object. She sometimes documents her cutting table, and, seeing all of the scraps and the cut edges, one can appreciate the manic obsessiveness of her technique. For the letter “a” Dupre renders a lowercase letter (figure 5.9). She cuts out the stone masonry that appears along the building’s corner edge and lines much of the interior of the letter’s form, using

shadowed stones to contrast the underside of the stroke with the more brightly lit stones on the top edges. A balcony wraps around the bowl of the letter, roof lines with teetering chimneys perched on top, and sets of stairs ascend into the letter from the baseline. The building is full frontal, its façade dotted with windows and portholes, some vertiginously askew. In the pale background, one can see the faint shadows of shingled bits of paper, the magician revealing her sleight of hand. The letter “B” is a capital, and Dupre uses many of the same devices as on the “a” to structure the form: roof lines and chimneys atop—one chimney pot stutters in repetition, extending upward—and staircases again lead up from the baseline and into the letter (figure 5.10). One particularly charming detail is the way the artist has doubled the masonry along the left edge of the stem, the stonework giving the effect of a typographic inline. She allows the architectural details to guide and inspire the letter, exerting final control to bend the forms to her creative will. For all the irregularities of Dupre’s structures they have their own believability, perhaps because they’re composed of photographs and, you know, photographs never lie.

Eduardo Recife The work of Eduardo Recife looks modern and antique, beautiful and distressed, all at the same time. Recife’s points of inspiration are broad; it is a small miracle of his artistry that his work remains distinctively his. Recife lives in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, but his audience and clientele are international. The name of his studio, Misprinted Type, reveals his predilection for lettering and typography. In fact, he began his graphic artist career as a type designer. His typefaces have the aesthetic of found objects, found perhaps in a Victorian-era handwriting instruction book, or on a vintage shop sign, or even a 1980’s punk band flyer. Recife started creating collages to place his fonts in a visual context and collage is a perfect medium in which to showcase them. The fonts have disparate historic references, as do the components of his collages.

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Figure 5.9  “a”, personal project. Dupre takes copies of the same photo and splices details together, to create a new, surreal structure: unbelievable and yet convincing. Illustrator: Lola Dupre

Figure 5.10  “B”, personal project. Studying the artwork, one can see the faint edges of countless pieces of paper, especially in the pale background. Illustrator: Lola Dupre

Recife’s collages are executed both as personal artwork for exhibitions and on assignment as an illustrator. There is surely a difference in the process of his creation, but the resulting works are not dissimilar; clearly, the same artist is behind the body of work. For his personal work, Recife says: “My work is all about the human nature, it’s desires, it’s purpose, it’s search for love, truth, happiness. . .”4 He relishes embedding symbolism and grace-notes, all in service to the central figure, with some of the underlying meaning kept privately

to himself. For his illustration assignments, Recife might have a specific prompt for which he crafts a concept and executes it faithfully, or he might be given creative freedom, as he had for the Tipocracia Tenth Anniversary poster (figure 5.11). The legibility is challenging because each of the title letters is built from images of organic matter: branches and leaves, a seedpod, an asparagus stalk. The visual weight of each letter varies and the word is split— TIPOCR ACIA—onto two lines, but the shapes resemble the letters just enough that we can tease out the word’s meaning. There is a scuffed label below with faint typography explaining: Tipocracia: 10 Years. The client, Tipocracia, is a Brazilian typographic organization; it helps that

Interview with Eduardo Recife, Toombes, March 21, 2018, http:// toombes.com/2018/03/21/interview-eduardo-recife/.

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Figure 5.11  Tipocracia Tenth Anniversary poster. For this poster, the lettering is the illustration, with objects arranged to resemble letterforms, some easier to recognize than others. Since the poster’s intended audience is graphic artists, they would be particularly appreciative of Recife’s playful manipulations. Client: Tipocracia Illustration and lettering: Eduardo Recife

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Eduardo Recife

the captive audience for this poster would be familiar with the organization thus visually savvy and appreciative of Recife’s artful manipulations to form the letters. The other elements of the poster build on the natural theme with a large crow perching on the “T,” drawing attention to the first letter, and butterflies flitting about. The background is stained with blotches and faint handwriting, all on old paper in a pale oval framed by a translucent robin’s egg-colored mat. This subtle device pulls the composition together. The rich complexity of Recife’s work lends itself not only to posters, but to other examples of cover art and packaging that communicate an overall tone with myriad details. Creatures of Want & Ruin by Molly Tanzer is a book about a woman in the early twentieth century who is a bootlegger by night (figure 5.12). Her moonshine, distilled from mushrooms, has dire effects on those who drink it. Recife’s illustration partially hides the ominous heroine behind oversized mushrooms, her reddened eyes gazing balefully at the viewer. The swollen moon over her shoulder is suffused with red, a harbinger of dread. What appear to be dark gold clouds could instead be a smear or a blotch; they suggest both object and atmosphere. Several bottles wobble amongst the mushrooms, but because this is a night scene and type runs atop parts of the illustration, it takes a while to see it all. The title is in fin de siécle elaborate lettering—set in a typeface designed by Gleb Guralnyk called “Smoking Typeface”—which Recife further manipulated with a raised sculptural effect and embossed pale stroke outline, the bodies of the letters with textured gradients—blue to ivory— and dark red sides. The lines of the title arch in two opposing curves with pale flourishes etched behind. The author’s name shares the red used elsewhere in the illustration, and is set in a simple condensed sans serif font, but even these letters are scuffed and dingy. In much of Recife’s work, he uses modern technologies to achieve antiqued effects. His skill level with software—in particular, Adobe Photoshop—is revealed by the convincing illusions of his digital collages, with edges, blending modes, and lighting artfully employed. Recife sells some of the tools he’s customized online for

Figure 5.12  Creatures of Want & Ruin book cover. Recife’s appetite for vintage lettering suits this novel, which takes place in the early twentieth century. The illustration and design reflect the historic era and supernatural aspect of this dark tale. Client: Mariner Books Illustration and lettering: Eduardo Recife

other artists to use, such as brushes, fonts, and Photoshop actions. His brushes include smears, scratches, stains, and other marks of timeworn damage. The actions he’s recorded can be played on photographs to give them the appearance of vintage daguerreotypes, replete with sepia tones and staining. Recife uses digital means to convince viewers they’re seeing the opposite: old and shabby tangible objects. Sometimes Recife will use typography—either of his own design or from elsewhere—other times he’ll collage letterforms or numbers as graphic shapes; in essence, they are more part

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“Often I use type as a form of decoration to my work. I like the idea of feeling like I used some old paper that had some scribblings in order to create the work. I like happy accidents, and when working digitally the accidents become sometimes, well. . . planned. So I try to bring the handmade feel to my digital works and I’m constantly fighting the machine that plans everything to be crispy, smooth, clean, and organized. . . Texture is also something that really interests me, so my work will often have that aged effect and the type will be simulated as if printed from a stamp, a photocopy or some old decayed type in the street.” Eduardo Recife

of the illustration than lettering to be read. For The International New York Times Recife created an illustration about the art market, and how people buying and selling artwork are often impelled more by money and profit than by a love of art (figure 5.13). A courtier clad in a gold-embellished red jacket stuffs hundred dollar bills and gold coins into the opening of his jacket, his open heart peeking out but blanketed over by the money. The background is an engraving of giant peonies, like wallpaper, with cut out ornaments of numbers, the distinctive scrollwork from the paper bills conveying money symbolically, to intensify the message. The man is blinded by a bar composed of checked chevrons—does he have a checkered past? The color palette is strong and handsome, the stained neutral tones in contrast to the red of the coat. Recife also creates collages as personal artwork and, with these, he is liberated to choose his subject and style, to explore and experiment in ways that a client might not choose. These have attracted admiration and been exhibited in galleries and have also inspired art directors to expand on their ideas of how he might solve their assignments. He does create one-of-a-kind paper collages (and drawings), but it is his personal work done digitally that most resembles his illustrations. For these, he produces high-quality archival prints in limited editions for sale. The lettering in these personal pieces is like a Surrealist found poem, it can operate as the title, or it can serve as line and ornament, partially hidden and barely legible. In Let

Figure 5.13  This article was about the motivations of people in the art market and how they’re propelled more by love of money than love of art. The numbers (typographic, even if not letters) are representations of economic value. Client: International New York Times Illustration: Eduardo Recife

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heart. All of this is on a soiled gold background with seemingly random crayon marks, like an old child’s primer found in a dusty attic. Recife plumbs the past for our contemporary gaze.

Martin Venezky It is the intention of this book to explore as many ways as possible of what the conjunction of illustration and letters can be. One graphic artist mentioned here who explores the outer realms of that conjunction is Martin Venezky. He is a resident of San Francisco, where he’s run his design firm Appetite Engineers since 1997. He’s also a photographer, a teacher, and an artist who’s exhibited his artwork in galleries, museums, and corporate locales. Venezky’s use of collage in his graphics is a form of illustration, in a non-literal, rhythmic, and playful way. Venezky’s work is complex to the point of practically, but not entirely, burying the client’s identity—yet it attracts attention, intrigues, and engages the viewer—and isn’t that what effective visual communication does? Figure 5.14  Let Your Heart Guide You, personal work. Lettering is largely from found objects, supplying line and texture, less to be read than to be seen. Illustration: Eduardo Recife

Your Heart Guide You, the central figure is extracted from a classical painting, as often seen in his work (figure 5.14). A child sits atop the silhouette of a small horse, eyes covered by a patterned bar. The horse is fashioned from fragments of paper, included the heart and veins branching through the animal’s body. The horse’s head is a scrap of deep blue; “SVA 29” is printed upside down in gold. A fragment of a label with bits of words in German sits in the corner. Behind the child’s headdress of shelf mushrooms and stalks of flowers, are more words in an upside-down calligraphy and script, with other letters and scribbles floating faintly. Step after step is taken to ensure we cannot read these words. A clue of the title is shown in the picture: a paper megaphone projects out from the horse’s

For a poster for wine importer The Grateful Palate, Venezky was inspired by seemingly random images: a racing horse, a cat, a bird, body parts, each of these things appearing innumerable times in the final art (figures 5.15a and 5.15b). In the accompanying image we see on the left the original scraps of cut out images in black and white and on the right, in the final poster, some of the scraps have been blown up to reveal the crudity of the halftone dot. The facial features are now placed in gold-colored orbs, dotted all over the dense surface. Some images have been colorized: red and yellow horses, magenta cats, and acid-green birds. Where is the

“Behold! This crazy world of these wines and cats and faces.” Martin Venezky

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Figs. 5.15  The Grateful Palate poster. On the left are the cut fragments of body parts that Venezky used in assembling the collage seen on the right. The resulting poster has a myriad of other elements added in. Client: The Grateful Palate Design and illustration: Martin Venezky

client in all of this incongruous mash up? Stacked on either side are letters spelling out “GRATEFUL PALATE” in all caps, embellished and unavoidable. “GRATEFUL” has the inline, stroke, and shadow of vintage packaging lettering; the letters reiterate the color palette of gold, acid-green, and black. As if that were not enough, floating behind is a larger, chiselserif version of each letter, cut from a photo of a blue sky with clouds. “PALATE” is set in a bold sans serif, Kabel Black, white with a deep 3D effect in black, floating in a blue sky and encircled with sets of gold rings, the rings intertwined to form a stacked totem pole of letters (figure 5.16). To amplify the client’s message, throughout the surface of the poster, dozens of the Grateful Palate wine bottle labels are interspersed, while cats peer through, horses leap, faces gaze, arms flex biceps, a pig, a giraffe. . . it’s endless. Up top, a rayed burst within a burst of rays, and the word “BEHOLD.” Behold indeed.

Figure 5.16  Typeface Kabel Bold, used in Venezky’s poster for The Grateful Palate. Typeface designer: Rudolf Koch

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Originally founded in 1914, AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts) is an advocacy and education organization for professionals working in the graphic arts, with regional chapters and 25,000 members throughout the USA. Venezky designed a poster for their Student Portfolio Reviews in Los Angeles that is notable for the absence of any figurative imagery. If a surface pattern of geometric shapes is a form of illustration, can’t this montage of letters also be an illustration? The linkage to the client and the project is in the obsessive repetition of the letters “A,” “I,” “G,” and “A.” While adept digitally, Venezky is partial to the tactility and immediacy of cut paper, and one can see the mark of his hand in the wobble of letters, and irregular spacing and baselines. Upon examination, in the detail on the right, one sees virtually every kind of font: sans serif, serif, italic, Fat Face, Blackletter, script, decorative with outline, shading, and shadows (figure 5.17). The

sizes of the letters swell and shrink, they rotate, do headstands, and spin. The aggregate swarm of letters fluctuates in density and is irregular in its outline. It is all held together by the universal black and white of the letters and the orange gradients in the background that fluctuate from a soft orange at the top and bottom to a bright white glow in the center. Again, where is the client in all this? A white circle sits atop the darkest orange, in high contrast, and encloses “AIGA LA” in bold, black,

“Every letter was cut out individually, by hand. All of these projects are examples of slowing the process down to a crawl. This way I can think and make at the same time.” Martin Venezky

Figures 5.17a and 5.17b  AIGA Student Portfolio Review for UCLA Extension poster. Venezky repeats the letters forming American Institute of Graphic Art’s acronym, AIGA. On the left is the full poster, on the right, a detail showing the swarm of letters accumulating to form textures and shades of gray. Client: AIGA/LA Design and illustration: Martin Venezky

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of the font, black textures and shapes surround the letters, emphasizing and embellishing them. The shapes arrayed around the musician are not recognizable as letterforms but many appear to be sliced fragments of letters—bowls, stems, apices— as well as arrows and bits of linear and dotted texture. They spiral around the singer, random in color, rhythmic in repetition.

Figure 5.18  This is the cover to a hardcover book that includes CDs, focused on music from mid-twentieth century Africa. There is a musicality to the abstract shapes that radiate from the central figure of the guitarplaying singer. Client: Dust to Digital Design and illustration: Martin Venezky

condensed, sans serif letters, rising in size, partially overlapped by the horde of smaller letters. In a black panel “STUDENT” appears in varied sizes and “PORTFOLIO REVIEW” below, in the only use of a greenish gold color, a mechanism that makes this key information stand out. One of Venezky’s clients is Dust to Digital, a small Georgia, USA-based company devoted to releasing high quality recordings of forgotten and folk music, with a focus on the roots of American music. One of Venezky’s projects for them was the packaging for Listen All Around, compilation CDs within a book about the origins of rumba music recorded in Africa in the 1950s (figure 5.18). There is a joyful exuberance in the way colorful shapes surround the central figure. The photo of a singer with guitar is cut out and printed sepia against the swirl of reddish brown, pumpkin, lime, yellow, and pale blue forms; his large scale and the singularity of his color allow him to dominate the composition. The only appearance of black is in the title Listen All Around, set in a geometric sans serif, Avant Garde Bold, all lowercase. In contrast to the simplicity

Venezky has described how as a child his uncle, who was a calligrapher, had given him a Speedball pen with which he loved to write. There is no longer evidence of calligraphy or hand lettering in Venezky’s professional practice, but there is ample proof of his love of tactility, the originality of the object itself, and the time and process it takes to create. As an artist, Venezky has profound attraction to and respect for being present in the act of creation: responsive, moment-by-moment. It would be foolish to imagine that the dense surfaces and rich complexities of his collages are mere happenstance. His openness to serendipity is evidence of a deeply engaged state. This process is most clearly manifested in his installation pieces (figure 5.19). This wall installation was done for Adobe, the software company, in San Francisco— and it’s not the only project he’s created for them. As in so much of his work there is an obsessive quality to this piece, built of thousands of fragments of paper: vintage printed matter, graphic arts books, photograms, signage, the remainders of previous cut-outs, ephemera, and objects, and throughout, push pins. As ephemeral as the contents of the wall, the entirety of the collage is temporal, held in place with push pins. The creation of the wall was, in itself, virtually a performance piece and in fact a stop motion film of the artist affixing these bits to the wall can be found online.6 From a distance, larger forms coalesce from the innumerable bits from which this collage is built. Themes recur throughout the collage: Americana— in repeated red, white, and blue, in the vernacular American imagery of flags, stars and stripes, and American life—faces, stripes, circles, more circles, and everywhere, typography—upside down or half covered or enlarged letters. One strip of paper, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efPDli5MYpY&feature=you tu.be.

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Figure 5.19  Drops from a Faucet into a Pool wall installation. Venezky built this wall as an installation for Adobe, the powerhouse graphic arts software company. It is ironic that the client inhabits the digital realm but this mural is a tactile, dimensional object. Client: Adobe Design and illustration: Martin Venezky

hung vertically, spells out the title: Drops from a Faucet into a Pool, the letters vertically aligned like water drops themselves. One can infer on a visceral level this accretion of detail building a life, a particularly American life, all told in an organic and non-literal way. Venezky’s way of working has an inquisitive, obsessive quality that enables letterforms to be both read and seen.

Viktor Koen As his own Twitter description would have it, Viktor Koen is, “obsessed with alphabets”—as well as steam-punk, weapons, and toys. Born in Greece, Koen earned his BFA at Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem, Israel, and his MFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York City, where he now teaches at both undergraduate and graduate levels. He has been published and exhibited worldwide, garnering numerous awards. His style is a mixture of polish and grunge, so artfully combined that it becomes it’s own synesthetic whole. This is due, in part, to the digital wizardry with which he assembles disparate elements. Depending on the client or project, he may use contemporary stock photography to execute a conceptual idea with a

polished feel, or, more typically, he’ll incorporate his own photography and add textures for an atmospheric effect. He is in perpetual motion to find, collect, and document objects and images to incorporate into his collages. The Type Directors Club (TDC) in New York City is a venerable institution that educates and celebrates the art and craft of typography, and its place in graphic arts and design. Viktor Koen had an exhibition at their mid-town gallery, titled Phenotypes, that featured prints of letters from alphabets of his own creation. Phenotype means “the observable properties of an organism that are produced by the interaction of the genotype and the environment”7 meaning that an organism’s genetic properties, or genotype, acted upon by environmental factors, results in the phenotype. Koen is the environmental factor for the images he combines: selecting objects and pictures, extracting them from their usual contexts, and recombining them as if in a dystopian new world. The poster for the exhibit displayed several of his illustrated letters as well as the inventive title typography (figure 5.20). He collaged together the title from set type, each letter from a different 7

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/phenotype.

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Figure 5.20  Phenotypes poster. For this poster, Koen won a gold medal from prestigious graphic arts magazine, Graphis, for their Poster Annual. He collages not only the face and the letters “A” and “B,” but the title word as well. Client: The Type Directors Club Design and illustration: Viktor Koen

Koen has created a number of alphabets, some of which were featured in the exhibit at TDC, each with a theme to tie the twenty-six collages together: Artphabet (which he used on a poster for SVA as well), Sciphabet, Toyphabet, and Steam Punkphabet. For each letter, he searches for usable shapes that are also objects on the theme. The themes are used loosely; Koen’s humor trends towards darkness. His Toyphabet (figure 21a) is not for the faint of heart. There may be doll heads, but they’ve been decapitated and re-capitated, one of them in a rusty vise, operating as the chin of the “G,” the vise in profile is the bowl of the letter, its top ominously hovering over the doll’s little head (figure 21b). The letter “J” is a doll dressed in a sweet, red, polka-dotted smock, from which emerges the fat body of an insect larva, curving up to form the descender of the letter. The red segments of the larva are likewise dotted, and the top of her head has been sliced to reveal plug prongs protruding (figure 21c). With the letter “S” Koen references the multiple meanings of the word “spine,” manipulating vertebrae to follow the entire spine of the “S,” a red ribbon arching behind and over the top (figure 21d). A wooden knob ornaments it and anchors the base. Throughout the alphabet, machine parts and body parts are combined with bits of vintage toys, all Frankensteined together to make something stranger than any one of these things individually. There is a peculiar beauty to these new forms, with the subdued color palette with pops of red, and the inventiveness of the combinations.

font, the initial “P” a heavy Blackletter form with a dagger-like stem, followed by a delicately swirling, swashed “H.” Each following letter harkens from a different era, each letter varies in size, visual weight, and style: industrial, deconstructed, or fashionable. The title is on a shifting baseline, but all of the typography is united in black, except for the oversized red period that draws the eye to the TDC logo. Several of his letter collages appear on the poster, with the larger underlying shape of a woman’s down-turned face, her head and hair merging into a colorful feather. The clean, white background is in handsome contrast to the busyness of the type and full color collages, and the irregular outline interacts dynamically with the rectangular edge of the poster.

The School of Visual Arts is notable for many reasons, including the storied legacy of brilliant posters that designers and illustrators have made to promote the school. Koen’s poster for SVA has a clean, white background on which his dense collages sit (figure 5.22). He is not satisfied with a single shape to describe the stem of a letter but rather piles rulers atop other rulers atop fragments of frames atop part of a steel drawing triangle atop thread, an out-sized safety pin, a sewing pin. . . all to create the letter “A.” A compass contrives the straddled inner stems but to sustain legibility, for the exterior outline, Koen built a frame in the shape of the letter. The manic quality is offset by his judicious selection of shapes that will communicate clearly what each letter is. For the curved bowls of

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Figure 5.21b  Letter “G.”

Figure 5.21c  Letter “J.”

Figure 5.21a  Toyphabet. Koen uses his own photography for many of his collages, enjoying the search for, and documenting of, things as part of the creative process. Client: Attic Child Press Design and illustration: Viktor Koen

the “B” Koen uses an overhead view of a circular slide carousel and the fanned pages of a color swatch book. For the larger, taller arc of the “C,” a gilt oval frame is trimmed to form the open counter, and several camera cables reiterate the open curve. It becomes a hide and seek game to examine the letters and identify each detail. There’s a witty grace note on the centrally located “V,” a computer mouse (still with a cable!), descends, leading the eye to the informational text.

Figure 5.21d  Letter “S.”

Koen is notable for his illustrations for editorial work and book jackets, but for these projects, the type and lettering are almost always handled by the designer and art director. Lettering is more often found incorporated into his personal work, and these are typically created in series. He’s exhibited his work on numerous occasions in Greece and for his Bestiary exhibit there, he appropriately chose Greek mythology as the subject for the series. The portraits he collaged on top of were found in the

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textures ghostly in the background; some are small on the page as if torn from a scrapbook. Others rise into view against darkened backgrounds with the mottled effects of the tintype plate. The references to mythological beings range from the well known to the obscure. Nemesis is best known as both noun and metaphor for one’s foe who seeks retribution (figure 5.23). In Greek mythology she was a winged goddess who sought to avenge wrongdoing. In Koen’s collage, she turns to the viewer, wings spread, and gazes out through eye-holes punched into a nautilus shell spiraling up from her nose, masking much of her face. A pistol has replaced a dagger, her usual weapon. Scraps of paper tile in strips in the background, overlaid with a map of Washington, DC, the capitol of the United States of America. Who is Koen suggesting is the nemesis? Here the integration of lettering, even as a secondary element, is surely meant to be read and interpreted.

Figure 5.22  The ABCs of SVA. Art tools and paraphernalia are natural candidates from which Koen fashioned his Artphabet. Client: School of Visual Arts Design and illustration: Viktor Koen

US Library of Congress. These old tintypes feature ordinary people sitting for their photographs, the long exposure times resulting in solemn expressions. The people are digitally collaged onto and transformed into interpretations of beasts from Greek mythology. “Being enamored of the beauty of beasts is an obsession that periodically creeps up on me and demands expression in mysterious ways. This time, I found the subjects of these old prints not only captivating and willing to be transformed into legendary creatures, but also open to the language of documentation and archives, including the official signing and stamping of documents.”8 In the series, some of the figures are silhouetted against old papers with faint lettering, images, and 8

https://www.viktorkoen.com/exhibitions/bestiary/F_bestiary.html.

Figure 5.23  Nemesis, Viktor Koen, 2016, tintype, limited edition. The Library of Congress picture collection was the source and foundation for this series of mythological portraits titled Bestiary. Historic documents are used as secondary text layers.

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TIPS AND TRICKS

Tips and Tricks Alternate Media When working with found images, especially for an illustrator, take care to familiarize yourself with the copyright laws and not to infringe on anyone else’s copyright. While fine artists, such as Robert Rauschenberg and Richard Prince, have been taken to court for using appropriated imagery, for illustrators there is the added factor that our work is not typically shown in galleries and museums, but reproduced and distributed, thus engaging widely with the public. Illustrators and designers have the added responsibility that the work is usually done for a client. Most clients will have, in their contracts with freelancers, a clause that makes the illustrator responsible for any legal repercussions rising from the disputed ownership of the artwork, even of parts of the artwork. Because copyright laws are periodically rewritten, creative people will have to make judicious decisions based on their variables and circumstances: where is the work being published? What materials are being reproduced? A general rule of thumb when working with found imagery is to use dated material (as of this writing, in the USA, 75 years or older), to look for any signature or copyright on it, and to alter it substantially and transformatively. For some assignments, as seen with some of Viktor Koen’s work, one can arrange to use stock imagery and ensure that the rights to manipulate and reproduce the work are guaranteed. One additional tip: if you need to use stock imagery to solve an assignment, alert the client of this need and arrange for them to cover those costs in the project budget. Be sure to plan for this before starting to work. When researching your images, have many versions of what you need to choose from. If you need a baby, have on hand many pictures of babies so you can see which one works best in your composition. The process of building a collage is intuitive; you’ll be responsive in the moment, seeing what conjunctions appear as you place images together.

Working with Paper Collages • Take care with your cutting tools. If you want a precise edge, use sharp and clean cutting tools, whether they’re scissors in good shape or new #11 X-Acto knife blades (or similar sharp-pointed blade). Never use an old, dull blade to try and save money. It will tug at and shred the edges of your paper. • When cutting with a blade, use a cutting board underneath. Cardboard can be irregular, and you certainly don’t want to slice into a table top! There are good self-healing cutting mats available in art and craft stores. Choose one at the maximum size you think you’ll need. The grids marked on the surface are useful for measurements. • You can also purposely tear paper to get a textural edge and expressive effect. Bear in mind that paper, like wood, has a grain and will rip more easily in one direction than 90 degrees the other way. You can create a more visibly torn edge by pulling the paper apart, one hand pulling up, the other down, as you rip. • Take care with your adhesives. Do test strips with sample materials of the same quality used in your collage, and with different adhesives. Glue sticks are handy for your portable tool kit and collaging in travel journals and sketchbooks. Look for “repositionable” glue sticks to tack materials down temporarily while you’re still planning your collage. White glues (like Elmer’s) are water-based and will cause thinner papers to buckle. Rubber cement has a corrosive effect and will cause paper to yellow and eventually fall off, so it is strenuously not recommended. Some artists like to use Matte Gel Medium as an adhesive; it works best when the surface you’re mounting the collage on is fairly stiff and solid, like illustration board. If you intend to sell original artwork, you’ll want to look for archival properties in your adhesives, such as Jade PVA, used by bookbinders for permanency.

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CHAPTER 5: ALTERNATE MEDIA AND ILLUSTRATION

• While working on a paper collage, it can be difficult to see your work in progress since the papers can curl or slide. Consider using a sheet of glass to gently lay over the foundation of the collage to flatten everything out and hold it still. Be careful though: the movement of the glass will create a puff of air, causing things to shift. • While gluing, keep to the side stacks of scrap paper—preferably not newsprint, because those inks can stain and offset onto your work. Lay your collage elements face down on the scrap paper and apply the adhesive to the back, taking care not to coat too thickly. Use a pair of tweezers or X-Acto blade to lift your collage element and place it into the composition. • “Release paper” resembles tracing paper, but has the special property that it will not adhere to your collage. Release paper (glassine or silicone) can be found at any good art store. Once your collage is fully assembled and you’re satisfied with the composition, lay a sheet of release paper over it and use a brayer roller or bone folder to smooth everything down. A “bone folder” is a book binding tool—and, in my view, essential in the studio. They are made from bone or plastic, and are smooth, dull-edged tools, 5–8” long, usually round at one end and tapered on the other. The pointed end is useful to score surfaces to break the paper fiber, making an even fold. Laid flat, a bone folder can be used to burnish and flatten a collage under the safety of a sheet of release paper. • Develop an archiving system for your materials. Depending on your workspace and style, this can vary from a file folder with tabs for different subjects to a full-blown studio with flat files or drawers filled with imagery sorted into categories. For the illustrator for whom subject is key, being able to easily access the right picture is critical.

Working with Digital Collages • Scan your images at the highest resolution that you think you’ll need: at least 300 ppi (pixels per inch) for printed matter. Always work in

RGB (red, green, blue) until preparing the artwork for printed matter. If the client has a prepress department, they are best suited to do the conversion to CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, black). • Save images for printed material as layered tiff files (or, in Adobe Photoshop, layered psd files). You can always resave the digital files later at 72 ppi jpgs for reproduction online. Always work at the highest resolution you think you’ll need. • Develop a systematic way of archiving images you may need to revisit and reuse. Think of it as a library of images. Create folders and sub-folders and name the files and folders in a way that makes sense to you and your way of working. • Store channels (i.e. mask or saved selection) of objects in a file you’ll reuse. That way you’ll only need to do the work of making the selection once and can reload it whenever you need to. • Use named layers and layer groups to organize the elements of the collage. • Blending modes can help you to achieve more varied and complex effects between layers than simply lowering opacity. • Use layer masks rather than the erase tool to select an object from its background. This ensures what’s called a “non-destructive” way of working: you can’t mess it up! Pixels aren’t eliminated but rather hidden. You can always go back and modify the edge. It’s also useful for creating a more nuanced edge: hard where it needs to be and soft where it needs to be.

Working with Dimensional Assemblages • Plan your POV (point of view). If exhibited in a gallery or other setting, imagine the perspective of the viewer and the location of the installation. If being reproduced, plan for the lighting and perspective of the photography of the piece. • Use surfaces, supports, and adhesives that will allow the artwork to survive for the required duration of the piece. Bear in mind the weight of things.

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Lettering and Illustration in Context

6

Visual communication exists in a wide variety of media, surfaces, and environments: on pages, in physical spaces, on objects in packaging, and transmitted in motion, transcending physical surfaces. Tattooing’s canvas is the human body, dimensional and contoured, the message in its most personal context. The caliber of artwork found in tattooing has been elevated with the increased interest in recent decades, broadening the stylistic traditions of heavy lines and simple colors into designs with inventive detail and rich complexity. Let’s consider some other, more public, contexts in which graphic arts appear.

The Wall: Graffiti, Murals, and Signage

“From the very beginning, human thought has been built with lines on surfaces.” D. B. Dowd

Lettering and illustration are navigational tools in the world around us: on walls, as signs, and in communal spaces. Humans have made marks on the physical world long before recorded time, before the advent of written language. In the early days of written language, in Italy, traces of text can still be found on ancient walls, “ranging from passages from Virgil to crude obscenities. . .”1 In today’s world, there’s a seemingly infinite variety in the ways that public spaces are covered with words and images, for both commercially-useful and personally-creative purposes.

Meggs, Philip B., (1992), A History of Graphic Design, 2nd ed., 37, Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York.

1

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The word “graffiti” derives from the Italian graffio, meaning “scratch,” indicating that the initial understanding of the term was of incised inscriptions rather than applied paint. A more contemporary understanding of the term began in the urban landscape in the 1970s. Gang members would mark their territory with distinctive tags, the stylized signatures of codified language, as a way to leave a mark and to communicate in the open without being physically present. (Consider the more recent meaning of “tag” in the digital realm, a way to identify someone in a shared online post.) Hip-hop artists were included in graffiti culture, an essential part of the community responsible for groundbreaking innovations in music, fashion, and break dancing. Hip-hop graffiti evolved through inventive alphabets in striking and elaborate styles, interlocking and decorated forms, gyrating stems and twisted shapes, drop shadows, outlines and inlines, arrows, star bursts, colors, and embellishments. Spray paint was the medium of choice, and, in the hands of the most skilled artists, gradients, glows, and textures were created (figure 6.1). Graffiti, accessible and democratic, spread rapidly through cultures throughout the world. Before being torn down in 1989, the west-facing façade of the Berlin Wall was heavily covered with graffiti, images, and text, most of it anonymously created. The east-facing façade was kept strictly blank, eloquent evidence of the stark socio-political differences between the two sides.

Figure 6.1  Graffiti art, New York City. Photo by Linda Fletcher. Graffiti seriously and playfully tests legibility. There are codified forms that become familiar through close reading, like a writing system in a foreign language.

Early iterations of graffiti were illegal acts of vandalism and considered a nuisance, police catching offenders when they could in a cat and mouse game. Earlier forms were also cruder, less refined, and an annoyance for citizens unable to see out of their subway car windows. Over time, graffiti artists developed increasing skill and artistry, branching from tags of distorted letterforms into ornate compositions that incorporated pictorial expressions. Artists outside of hip-hop culture joined the practice of renegade street art, some of whom gained visibility and fame: Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Richard Hamilton, and countless others. Graffiti and the more pictorial manifestation, mural art, gained rising societal approval and currency into the early twentyfirst century. Some street artists are among the most widely known visual artists in the world: for example Banksy, to name probably the most famous, who uses public streets as a forum to comment on social and political issues. At the heart of street art there remains a revolutionary soul. Murals can be commissioned by clients, or exist as works of art, sometimes awarded civic grants to cover the costs of creation and completion. There is crossover between the commercial world and the realm of fine art. One notable contemporary example of a visual artist who straddles her personal artistic vision with highly visible work for commercial clients is Shantell Martin, from South London. She draws with a wandering and informal line, almost always working in black and white. Her casual handwriting and simplified imagery cover walls, shoes (for Nike, at that), airplanes, and performance spaces. They are like napkin doodles writ large, imbued with her distinctive personal vision and voice. She’s an eloquent advocate for creative souls and has been interviewed widely. Her inspirational work and interviews can be easily found online. The world of commerce has absorbed the trappings of the rebellious street artist and incorporated it into how they promote products, businesses, and events. In the brick and mortar world this includes more ways of putting graphics on, well, brick and mortar. This is not a recent development: in the nineteenth century, with the advent of the Industrial Revolution, one saw a rise in the graphic promotion of goods and services, from painting directly on

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THE WALL: GRAFFITI, MURALS, AND SIGNAGE

walls and windows, to hung signage, to printed posters pasted onto surfaces. The graphic identity and branding of companies extends to the physical structures they inhabit (figure 6.2). Carpenter Collective (whose work is covered in chapter 4) designed the Tourist & Recreation Center for Boulevard Brewing Co. in Kansas City, Missouri, using retro typography and graphic illustration to transform the space into a welcoming place. The project entailed considerations of human interaction and interior design, with the typography and illustration operating at a larger scale and with far greater challenges than smaller, hand-held printed matter. Carpenter Collective worked with Helix Architecture & Design and other production companies to aid in design and production. To engage the viewer,

Figure 6.2  For this brewery’s Visitors’ Center, Carpenter Collective pulled the composition together with a limited color palette, a dominant illustration, and set type neatly ordered along a grid, as if it were a brochure enlarged to human scale. Client: Boulevard Brewing Co. Design and illustration: Carpenter Collective

not only wall art and text-blocks, but also books, interactive panels and screens, viewfinders, and other devices are employed throughout the space (figure 6.3). The typography is varied in styles, serif and sans serif families recurring to give dynamic variety as well as overall harmony. For the display typography, Carpenter Collective often used a bold, italic, serif font in upper- and lowercase mixed with a simple, all caps, sans serif for the secondary words. Sometimes the titles are presented at a titled angle or with an inline, the lines of type shifting and tucking into the negative spaces of adjacent lines, creating attractive lockups. The hierarchy is clear, underscored by overlapping panels of varied sizes and shapes, some hung and others rising from the floor. Die cuts are used to create purely decorative sheaves of grain; illustrations intersperse with typography on the

Figure 6.3  Signage and text blocks vary in size, overlap, and are die-cut to break up the space and draw the visitors in, to encourage them to physically interact with the information. Client: Boulevard Brewing Co. Design and illustration: Carpenter Collective

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panels. Die-cut illustrated figures are printed on the panels as well as attached on top, disrupting the flat surface. The illustrations are shape-based, often in a hieroglyphic profile stance, which helps balance with the complexity of information being communicated. It’s unified with a simple color palette of dark brown, medium gold, and a pale ivory, the three values of color allowing for variety by economical means. The designs and illustrations at the Boulevard Brewing Co. installation are conceived as pencil sketches, recreated digitally, and produced from the digital files. There are other forms of signage that require the hand to be in direct engagement with the surface. One specialty niche is chalkboard lettering, which has grown in visibility and appreciation in recent decades. Once the modest province of classrooms and childhood sidewalks, chalkboard signs are also seen in restaurants, cafés, bars, and shops: spontaneously drawn and easy to update. Often they’re created by an employee who enjoys doodling, however, there are practitioners who have made it a high art. One notable graphic artist who’s mastered chalkboard lettering and illustration is Dana Tanamachi. In 2009, an impromptu chalkboard installation for a Brooklyn party attracted attention—from Google, no less. She went on to work for Louise Fili, and subsequently founded her own design studio. Her craftsmanship with chalk is consummate; she’s created chalk installations and wall art globally for major clients. Her studio has branched into all manner of media, to include branding, book jackets, packaging, and other projects. Her work is sophisticated, with a strong sense of pattern and elegant typography. Videos of her working can be found online; it’s impressive. Another environmental specialty that incorporates lettering and illustration is sign painting. In today’s world, much of the signage we see is created and applied with digital and machined processes. Yet there remains a stalwart tribe of sign painters whose artistry and craftsmanship extend back in time for over a century. Sign painters may work directly upon the surface of a wall or window, or on a free-standing plaque of board or paper. Others focus their craft on vehicles: boats, trucks, and cars, with names, flames, pinstripes, and more.

The planning usually occurs on paper, with the forgiveness of an eraser to make corrections. The artwork can be transferred to the sign’s surface, often with a pounce wheel to trace the outline on the paper, puncturing a series of holes in a dotted line through which chalk can be dusted. In the actual painting process, there is incredible finesse in hand control over the brush and paint, with the assistance of a mahl stick to aid the hand’s movement and protect the painted sign from smudging. The brushes and paints are particular to the craft of sign painting. Unlike oil or watercolor brushes, sign painting brushes have long bristles that are able to hold a load of paint and exert great flexibility on the surface. They come in a variety of tips and sizes, whimsically named, suggestive of this art’s storied past: straight and angular, fitches and cutters, liners and highlighters, and not least, the Jenson Swirly Q. For paints, in the USA 1 Shot is a popular brand. It is oil-based and entails careful cleaning and storage of the brushes, but also, as the name suggests, has good coverage in one coat and is durable over time. For fancy gilt work, gold leaf is still used and involves a delicate and patient process to apply. There are journeymen sign painters who’ve endured changes in technologies, customer preferences, and budgets, who now teach their admiring enthusiasts. The rising population of younger sign painters includes Cayetano Valenzuela, formerly

Figure 6.4  Mighty Salt City mural. Cayetano uses color to communicate the meta message: Mighty Syracuse. Design and lettering: Cayetano Valenzuela

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THE WALL: GRAFFITI, MURALS, AND SIGNAGE

from Texas, now a resident in central New York state. Valenzuela’s studio is called The Black Rabbit Studio; from here he creates projects as large as the side of a building (figure 6.4), and as small as a No Smoking sign. Local businesses call on Valenzuela to create signs for them, often on the exterior of the building for identification, or interior signage for communication, or simply for fun. Impassioned about the history of type in general and of sign painting specifically, Valenzuela collects and pores over vintage, reissued, and new lettering books. Valenzuela’s passion for lettering and illustration can also be seen on logos and branding, t-shirts, prints, and music packaging. Valenzuela creates and markets his own products too, including portable signs for home decoration, sold at craft fairs and at a local artists’ collective, Wildflowers Armory. In his personal work, he can riff on themes that amuse him: carnival side shows, tattoos, coffee, books, and so on. For his Coffee or Death sign, he places the art in a circle, a comic character of a coffee cup walking along, his eyes’ squiggly pupils indicating he is wired on caffeine, gray steam pluming out of his head (figure 6.5). The word “Coffee” is drawn in a hand lettered

Figure 6.5  Coffee or Death, personal work. Not only is the art of sign painting a vintage craft, so is the cartoon style of the coffee character. Design and illustration: Cayetano Valenzuela

vintage style with curved cross strokes and a black drop shadow. The rest of the lettering is written calligraphically, naturally, with a brush. For the series of The Secret Order of Librarians signs, Valenzuela’s informal photo reveals not only variations on a theme, but also the spatter of his studio walls (figure 6.6). The fastidiously painted signs give no indication of the mess they leave behind. It’s fun to see the subtle design variations, such as the rising smoke from the candle, and the more dramatic alternatives: pointing hand or no pointing hand? The lettering is virtually the same on all four signs, except for the inline embellishments and dramatic “S” added to the bottom two. It is a testimonial to the rising appreciation for the sign painter’s craft in general, and Cayetano Valenzuela’s artistry in particular, that his signs regularly sell out.

Figure 6.6  The Secret Order of Librarians, personal work. This series of signs, all on the same subject, are variations on a theme with subtle differences. Note the immaculate quality of his work contrasting with the mess it leaves in his studio. Design and illustration: Cayetano Valenzuela

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Sequential: Comics, Graphic Novels, and Zines The world of comics and graphic novels is a specialty area where letters and images are invariably adjacent, in unison to tell a story. In this parallel duet, creators have explored a wide range of ways the two forms of communication can interrelate.

“In comics at its best, words and pictures are like partners in a dance and each one takes turns in leading.” Scott McCloud

Historically, comics began in the late nineteenth century with the funny papers, but gained steam in the late 1930s and on, from the magical worlds of Winsor McKay to the surreal humor of George Harriman and his Krazy Kat, to the dawn of the superheroes. The growing popularity of superheroes, Westerns, horror, humor, romance, and other forms of comics was unstoppable throughout the twentieth century in spite, in the USA, of the mid-century hysteria that led to accusation that comics contributed to the delinquency of youth. In Europe, comics were shown greater respect, with adults enjoying them as freely as children did, and do. There has been continued and broad evolution of the form into current times: from the leap into film narratives to the inventiveness of graphic novels. The covers of comics have always shown a lively interaction between the nameplate type and the cover illustration. One distinction about comics, as opposed to other forms of illustration, is the separate roles and skills varying artists bring to the task; there’s the writer, the pencil artist, the inker, the colorist, the letterer. This example of a 1951 comic cover shows a wonderful graphic rendering

Figure 6.7  Eerie #2: Tales of Horror and Suspense. While the lettering is a great complement to the illustration, it was rendered by another, unknown artist. Illustration: Wallace “Wally” Wood

of the genre, with an illustration by Wally Wood (figure 6.7). There is set type for the cover lines, but the comic’s nameplate is marvelously drawn by hand: a spooky, spectral center hovers darkly in the wavering, white letters, a black drop shadow lifting it off the page. Wood’s illustration overlaps Eerie with a flying monkey riding the shoulders of a deathly figure who holds a bone as his walking stick, marching, chained to a buxom, desolate captive, and other grim figures. Starting in the 1960s, more graphic artists collapsed the comics’ creators’ roles into one, assuming some or all of the tasks: writing, drawing, coloring, and lettering their own tales. Zap Comix and the works of R. Crumb, Victor Moscoso, Rick Griffin, etc. were among the most widely known

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SEQUENTIAL: COMICS, GRAPHIC NOVELS, AND ZINES

comics of the psychedelic era. In the 1980s, Françoise Mouly and Art Spiegleman compiled numerous comic artists’ works and produced a publication called Raw, for which they set a high bar for production values, inventiveness in design, and the array of artists they represented within. Spiegleman’s own comic Maus was excerpted in Raw and later published in full as a book (and later, a second volume) by well-regarded mainstream publisher, Pantheon. Maus attracted wide-spread acclaim for the strength of its writing and the novelty of Spiegelman’s artistic approach, winning a Pulitzer Prize and Eisner Award, among others. In the ensuing decades, other impressive and admirable comics artists have been accepted for their work: in self-published zines, comics, and graphic novels. Contemporary comic artists typically set digital type that resembles hand lettering for the speech balloons or panels. For the cover and other display type, as well as special effects (BAM!), many choose to hand draw the lettering. A few remarkable comic artists are themselves accomplished letterers. Consider Chris Ware, in Chicago, Illinois. Ware’s exceptional, inventive lettering demonstrate his clear understanding of typographic history. His lettering references Art Deco, vernacular sign painting, 1930s trade cards, and wilder futuristic mash-ups. The prodigious originality of Ware’s work includes the way he packages his comics: compilations in over-sized hard cover tomes with gold debossed patterns, elaborate decoration, paper inventively folded into dust jackets, or in the case of Building Stories (2012), numerous books, strips, booklets, game boards, and so on all tucked into a large box. Ware’s writing is by turns heart wrenching and hilarious; his drawing style tightly fastidious; his page layouts fascinatingly varied. The pleasures of seeing and reading Chris Ware’s work run deep. He is not alone. There is extraordinary work being created in this genre by many other great artist/ writers: Emil Ferris’s masterful My Favorite Thing is Monsters cites vintage horror comics and movies, Jillian Tamaki’s One Hot Summer marries her adept brushwork illustration to the lettering, Roz Chast’s comic images and words share a neurotic line. . .

the list is endless. If you’re not a fan of this genre already, check it out. Not unlike the underground comics of the 1960s, zines (short for magazine or fanzine) were—and are—produced by independent creatives with zero budgets. The first of them can be found in the 1930s but they became hugely popular in the 1970s and on. Usually created by a single person or small group, zines are a way to obsess and rant about music, culture, politics—whatever subject the creator wishes (figure 6.8). Cheapness of reproduction in small runs on mimeographs or photocopiers means these booklets can be printed in multiples and shared at little cost. Zines are usually of standard letter page size, folded in half—though anything goes. The graphics can be scribbled, collaged, or doodled with equal parts passion and lack of finesse. The accessibility of the form makes it a natural for the budding illustrator or comic artist. A more recent technology that’s perfect for the creation of zines and prints is the Risograph. The Risograph is a duplicator that can print in color cheaply, although usually no more than two colors at a time. The colors available are mostly brilliant, even garish, and artists have found creative ways to compose their pictures and blend colors, making fresh and modern work that can be sold at reasonable prices.

Figure 6.8  Zines were—and are—inexpensive, selfpublished mini-magazines that the creator(s) can devote to whatever topic they choose: often music, politics, culture. The lack of polish is a proud attribute of a zine.

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In Motion: On-Screen Animations: Large and Small In the early days of silent cinema, typography was seen on title cards that would appear and disappear, simple and still. As film technologies advanced, with sound and later color added, title designs became an essential part of the viewer’s experience, a way to set the stage for the story to follow. In the mid-twentieth century American designer Saul Bass created memorable titles for movies and directors, such as for Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo and Otto Preminger’s Anatomy of a Murder. These days, typically, a studio rather than a sole graphic artist is responsible for the considerable task of designing titles for movies. Drawing on the full battery of visual culture, title graphics are not just the listing of the film’s creators but become part of the story itself. Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse is an animated film that begins with producers Sony and Marvel’s company logos flashing with the halftone dots of old comics and glitches of crude video, signifying the history of comic and cartoon reproduction. The film’s young protagonist Miles is introduced drawing a graffiti sticker with a lettering style that helps situate the story in contemporary Brooklyn. Animation and movement aren’t just for feature length films. As modern technologies have made the craft of typesetting available to everyone, so too has animating one’s work become accessible and affordable. In addition to aspects such as scale, position, color, and texture, graphic artists can incorporate the dimensions of time and sound. The

added components of sound and music enhance, and literally amplify, the viewer’s experience. Graphic shapes, illustrations, and lettering use scale and position for the illusion of depth on the flat space of the screen. Software programs that illustrators and designers use, such as the Adobe Creative Suite and Procreate, include features to animate their work. Simple gif frame animation in Adobe Photoshop or Procreate is easy to learn, or one can create more elaborate actions in Adobe AfterEffects and other programs. Because of the speed with which software innovations appear in the marketplace, the best advice is to see what the current technology and availability is, depending on one’s own setup for hardware and software. Many illustrators and designers now include at least simple animations on their websites and social media platforms. Clients use them in a multitude of industries, in publishing promotions, online media, advertising, etc. Graphic artists have another selling point for their work if they’re able to put it into motion. Looking at our screens, at the onslaught of attractors for the human gaze, movement is a waving hand: “Yo! Look over here!” Graphic artists have also been using animations to demonstrate how they work, showing steps in their process from rough to finish, giving the viewer insight into how things are made. Youtube, Skillshare, and other websites have tutorials on how to do anything and everything, but some artists lift the curtain on their magic and show glimpses into the act of creation, posting teasers into their process on their own social media.

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Projects: Putting Inspiration into Action

7

After looking at the work of all the inspiring illustrators and designers throughout this book, don’t you want to make something yourself? Maybe you have a specific passion, like music, and your friend is in a band, knows you’re artistic, and wants you to make a gig poster for her. Maybe you have a story to tell and want to draw it and do the lettering by hand. Maybe you’re a designer who loves to draw, or an illustrator who’s always liked typography. Maybe you’re an illustration or design student. It doesn’t matter your age or experience: we can all build on what we already know and enjoy the process. Here are some ideas for projects for home, in the studio, or in an art class. These projects have been given as assignments to students in my Lettering for Illustrators class at Syracuse University in Syracuse, New York. Featured below will be some samples of student work as well as examples of professional practitioners. It must be said that some former students did these pieces several years ago, and they are now thriving graphic artists working professionally in the field. Bravo to all of them.

“There are many ways to activate the creative vortex and enter the talented mind.” Steven Heller

The Alphabet Choose an Old Style or Transitional font and typeset the alphabet at 72’. Use very open letter spacing so you can really see each letterform. Typeset all of the capital letters and all the lower case letters in alphabetic order. Print out the page so that you’re drawing from a piece of paper, not from the screen.

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CHAPTER 7: PROJECTS: PUTTING INSPIRATION INTO ACTION

Expressive Typography Often called expressive typography, this is a popular and clever project that makes typography pictorial and conceptual. It entails seeing letterforms as shapes, using variables such as position and size as narrative components. There can be additional shapes and alterations but, successfully, they are no more complex in form than the letters themselves. The best of these employ visual wit. This sounds complicated in description, but is utterly clear when seen (figure 7.2). Render in black and white. Figure 7.1  Alphabet layout. Font: Bembo regular (Monotype foundry).

On an 11 x 14” sheet of paper, draw out, with light pencil lines, the baseline, descender line, x-height, and cap line for your alphabet. Lightly pencil in drawings of the letters, copying the typeset versions. Allow for sufficient space between letters. Follow the printed alphabet for layout. First, draw the skeleton, the basic shape; then draw the outlines of each stroke. Pay attention to thick and thin strokes, the stress of the strokes, the stress and axis of the curves. Be consistent with the proportions. Study the letterforms and details. Finally, ink in the letters. Use the right tools: a fine nib pen for the outlines and interior edges and a wider nib pen for the inner black areas of the letters. Some people like Micron pens, others favor Graphik; find what works for you. Use black ink only and keep the white background clean.

Calligraphy or Brush Lettering Have fun doing warm-ups to see which tools you prefer and what scale artwork those tools dictate. You should try everything you can at first; you might be surprised. You can write small and refined calligraphy with a flexible nib, like the Hunt 108 and calligrapher’s ink. Or you can get a large pad of newsprint and some cheap paint and write enormous letters with a chisel sponge brush (figure 7.3). Practice writing straight lines (vertical, horizontal, and slanted), circles, and loops (both upright and downward facing). Study existing calligraphy alphabets and pay attention to the recommended stroke directions. Bear in mind that, especially with formal calligraphy styles, it can take a lifetime of practice to get the forms right. The purpose of this assignment is to expose you to it so you can start to develop an appreciation and understanding of the art form.

Neatness counts! Let the ink dry thoroughly before erasing the pencil marks. Don’t rush this. It will take a while to do it all properly. This exercise will build your hand skills as well as your eye for the details of letters (figure 7.1).

Figure 7.2  Expressive typography. Simplicity and conceptual problem solving are key to successful expressive typography.

Figure 7.3  Johannes Geyer. Using a dry brush technique will add texture and spontaneity to the mark.

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Choose a word or phrase. Do thumbnail sketches first to plan the whole design, calligraphy plus illustration, placed attractively on the page. The relationship of your artwork to the page’s edges is part of the design, the size of the page will be determined by your medium and the scale of the tool. Write with a brush or calligraphy pen in a style that is expressive of the meaning and tone of the phrase. Make a conscious decision as to whether the phrase is best represented by a formal or informal script. Use a surface and tool that best demonstrates your chosen lettering style. If you’re using a rough brush and heavy paint, go large and use sturdy and textural paper. If you’re writing in a refined Spencerian script, a smaller page and smoother stock, like a hot-press Bristol, would be better. Do test strips with your media to see how well it works on that chosen surface. Integrate a spot illustration or decoration as part of the design. Embed it, entwine it, and make it a part of the whole. The letters can fill out a shape but don’t force it. Use size and spacing to resolve awkward arrangements. For your final artwork, lightly pencil in the general placement of your letters, words, and illustration— the lockup of your design—but don’t carefully outline each letterform. That will rob you of the spontaneity of making the mark with ink. I’ve said nothing about using color, and won’t. That’s your judgment call. A successful solution could be done simply with black on white. If you do add color, the artwork should not rely on the prettiness of the color. The concept, design, and lettering are the central focus.

Figure 7.4  The line is the same weight and texture in the words and shoe drawing, uniting the two. Illustration and calligraphy: Elvis Swift

For Example Elvis Swift’s work is seen in chapter 3; his work is an excellent example of a solution for this project (figure 7.4). His concept of using the writing to occupy the space of a leg could be readily determined at the thumbnail stage. In the final rendering, there is a fresh spontaneity to his line, using the same swirls, blots, and loops in the calligraphy and in the drawing. The judicious pop of red makes the high heel stand out. Student Alex Woolfolk draws with great detail, and he brought this aspect to his calligraphy project (figure 7.5). Using a wide nib pen is an

Figure 7.5  Calligraphy project. Woolfolk used a wide nib pen for the drawing and the writing, exploring the weight variation in the stroke. The drawing’s augmented with a fine-line mono-weight Micron pen. Student illustrator/designer: Alexander Woolfolk

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alien experience for many students, and it is to Woolfolk’s credit that he also drew his dragon with the distinctive varied weight the nib pen offers. He added texture and detail with a finer line using a Micron pen. The word Exodus is not written in a specific calligraphic style, but has grace notes that suggest old manuscripts, such as the diamonds in the open counters and the extended top of the “S” that leads into the dragon’s mane.

The Sketchbook Designate a particular sketchbook for your lettering explorations. Doodle words and letters: conservatively, creatively, and experimentally. Invent letter shapes and expand on them to form alphabets. Integrate letters into your drawings and illustrations. If you’re drawing from life in a public space, allow overheard words to filter into your ears, through your hand and onto the page; how do the text and image interrelate? Draw signage, packaging, posters, and book covers that you see, that inspire you. You can draw them in the context of the environment where you see them, or isolate them as singular objects. Consider drawing objects with lettering on them, still lives where the type is shapes just as the object is. Play with lots of different media. Glue letters and things with letters on them into your sketchbook, draw them, draw around them. Study how different letters look and how they look in relation to one another. What is it that makes that sign, that poster, that thing beautiful or compelling?

For Example Lynn Pauley (who’s work is featured in chapter 4) is prodigiously productive in her sketchbooks and experimental work, as well as her finished pieces (figure 7.6). Her Ridley Carwash sketchbook was an homage to her hometown and the sites she revisited decades after she’d moved away. Her style is expressive, and in her sketches she allows for even greater looseness. One can see the pencil through the paint, and how she observes and documents the street signage, the script, the sans serif, the illustration of the chef on the family restaurant sign, the broken plastic. Even

Figure 7.6  Ridley Carwash sketchbook. Lynn gessoes each page so that she can draw and paint over it, and it will maintain a degree of durability. Artist: Lynn Pauley

as a sketch, there’s a beautiful sophistication in this composition of reds, black, and white shapes against the blue sky.

Illuminated Initials Illuminated initials are the ornamental letters that begin a story or chapter, visually indicating the start of something new. The term “illuminated” signals the point of origin, in illuminated manuscripts hand-scribed centuries ago. With the advent of wood engravings and, later, metal type, these illustrated initial letters were created in new modes of expression and designs. Another, more contemporary term for these is “Drop cap,” as seen with Jessica Hische’s Drop Caps project in chapter 4. Drop caps can also simply be an enlarged typeset letter to begin a passage. Our interest here is in the illustrated form of an initial letter. Illuminated initial letters can be part of a larger project, uniting a storybook cover and interior illustrations to the text pages, where every part of the book works together in a harmonious whole. They can be free form, the illustration interacting with the shapes that compose the letter, or residing inside the counter of the letter. The letter can be framed or boxed in a rectangle, oval or round shape, with the illustration or ornamentation

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occupying the negative space around the letter. Or, the letter can be built of illustrated parts, for example, as if branches formed a letter “K.” For this project, create an illuminated initial (or several). During your sketch process, explore stylistic options. Bear in mind what medium you’ll be doing your final art in and ask yourself, can it withstand the amount of detail you are planning? Envision the final reproduction size and check that the letter will be legible at that scale. Bear in mind the color palette, or consider creating black and white artwork that could be colored in a multitude of ways.

For Example Eleonora Kolycheva, whose work can be seen in chapter 3, paints beautiful initial caps (figures 7.7 and 7.8). On the black background, Kolycheva has rendered the outline of a bold, italic Bodoni capital “R,” unmistakable with hairline serifs and the pronounced variation of stroke width. Flower stems and a bud wind up the stem of the letter and a blossom blooms on the rounded upper portion, petals bursting past the constraint of the letter’s bowl. In the example on white, the simple stem and leg of a cap “R” are flat fills of color. The counter and bowl are implied by illustrated leaves and a bird, which conforms to the curve of the bowl just enough for us to read the letter. This pair of illustrated capitals share a color palette of lovely teal and coral hues on the dark page in lighter tints and on white, deeper shades.

ABeCeDarium An ABeCeDarium is either a book for teaching the alphabet, or an inscription of an entire alphabet with the letters in order. For this project, create twentysix illustrated designs of the entire English language alphabet, letters A–Z, inclusive. Choose either upper- or lowercase letters, or what’s called a mixed case alphabet with both upper and lower case in one alphabet. It must work visually and conceptually as a single, unified, pictorial alphabet. This project is like an entire alphabet of illuminated initials. The illustration component can be decorative (swashes, ripples, geometric shapes, polka dots, etc.) or it can be figurative (kittens, leaves, buildings, etc.). If it’s figurative and pictorial, ask yourself, will it have a meaning relative to the letter, i.e., K is for Kitten? Or will there be skylines of different cities, like S is for Sydney? Will the letterforms be based on an existing font, or a modified one? Or will it be entirely original? If you choose to hand letter, it’s useful to look at typeset alphabets just to see where the stroke stress is or where serifs usually belong. Whatever your idea, it will have to work through twenty-six different shapes. For initial sketches, start with an “I,” an “O,” an “S,” and “W” so you can explore how well your idea will work with straight lines, curves, and angled lines. You can use pure geometric shapes to build your letters or typeset the letters to guide the basic shapes you’re going to decorate and elaborate on. But don’t just stick polka dots on an existing font. Do more, much more. Work in any medium you like, in full color or a limited color palette, but use at least 2 colors.

Figures 7.7, 7.8  “R” initial caps. Kolycheva’s illustration breaks and conforms to the letter’s confines, leaving just enough of the shape that we can discern what it is. Illustrator: Eleonora Kolycheva

Final presentation will take two forms. The initial presentation is the full alphabet nicely arranged on an 11 x 17” poster. The final project is a 6” square booklet with 32 pages. Place one letter on each page, making sure that all letters are to the same scale and on the same baseline. Design a cover, title page, and a personalized colophon with a brief explanation of your alphabet. For the cover design, consider using your alphabet letters for at least “A” and “Z,” naming the booklet A to Z. The cover and interior pages should be designed in harmony with the alphabet.

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For Example Jennifer Katz researched movies to find titles representing each letter of the alphabet (figure 7.9). She chose iconic pictorial elements to epitomize each film. Her ultra-bold, geometric sans serif letters were custom built digitally, their sturdy stems providing thick enough frames in which to park the images. She synthesized a color palette that collectively references key colors from the films’ posters, with an attractive array of split complementary blues and oranges, light and dark. Her alphabet attracted a lot of attention as classmates tried to name all twenty-six movies. It also earned the honor of acceptance into the

Figure 7.9  ABeCeDarium. Jenny chose the first (usually the first) initial of a well-known movie and embedded an iconic image from the film into each letter. It’s fun to try and figure out what each one is. Student illustrator/designer: Jenny Katz

Society of Illustrators Student Exhibition. Her ABeCeDarium booklet has a useful key to the movies in the back. The Art Deco movement in the early twentieth century was the source of inspiration for Emily Gunn’s ABeCeDarium (figure 7.10). In her sketchbook she explored motifs from this era, drawing a multitude of alternates with elegant geometry, fanning rays, and repeating shapes. Her palette of gold and deep blue is softened with a slight texture that implies marble or stone. On their own, some of the letters look like decorative

Figure 7.10  ABeCeDarium. The sketchbooks for this project showed a marvelous array of alternates all with the Art Deco stylings shown in the finished choices. Student illustrator/designer: Emily Gunn

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abstractions; in unison, they form a handsome alphabet reminiscent of the Jazz Age. Nature was the inspiration for Alexander Woolfolk’s alphabet (figure 7.11). His illustration work tends to be elaborately detailed, and with this series, created with pen and paint, he had much to work with: frost for “F,” leopard fur for “L,” Man O’ War jellyfish for “M.” and so on. The bodies of the letters are based on simple sans serif forms, in contrast to the intricate density of the patterns. The silhouette is rarely broken except, for example, with the quartz on the “Q.” Lauren Mc Lenithan did extensive research on mental health disorders for the theme of her

Figure 7.11  ABeCeDarium. Intricate textures and patterns from nature embellish Woolfolk’s alphabet. Student illustrator/designer: Alexander Woolfolk

alphabet (figure 7.12). She chose syndromes and conditions whose names contained each letter and in the booklet’s description, bolded that letter. Mc Lenithan’s drawings were rendered in pencil, scanned, and manipulated to heighten contrast, emphasizing the texture of the line. The rawness of the stylized figures suits the emotional nature of her subject. She customized digital brushes to write the letters themselves, the chalky texture sympathetic with the spirit of her drawings. Kasey O’Rourke’s alphabet is illustrated with children’s story motifs (figure 7.13). O’Rourke designed each letter to depict something that began with the letter, i.e., “D” for deer. The base letters are sturdy with ballooning serifs and generous proportions, giving her ample space to apply patterns and to place nests, gemstones, flowers, etc. around them. These letters would be well suited as illuminated initials in a children’s storybook.

Figure 7.12  ABeCeDarium. The textural marks and expressive line embody the theme of the alphabet: mental health disorders. Student illustrator/designer: Lauren Mc Lenithan

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Figure 7.14  ABeCeDarium. Gordon inked a decorative graphic pattern, which she scanned and digitally applied to the stems and terminals of her alphabet. Student illustrator/designer: Jen Gordon

Figure 7.13  ABeCeDarium. This alphabet embodies storybook themes, each letter patterned as well as illustrated. Student illustrator/designer: Kasey O’Rourke

Jen Gordon studied Fat Face fonts that have an exaggerated stroke weight variance; she added squarish counters and torqued the teardrop terminals on some of the letters (figure 7.14). She hand drew in ink an elaborate ornamental pattern in a rectangle, scanned it, and manipulated it to fit the thickened stems and terminals of the letters. Becka Shaktman designed her ABeCeDarium modeled on a geometric sans serif, using Washi tape and colored markers to render the forms (media she often uses to render human and otherworldly figures in her sketchbooks) (figure 7.15). She broke the geometry with eccentric details, such as bits of the Washi patterns extruding from the stems and bowls of the letters, varying stem weights, and the letters’ implied dimensionality shifting direction.

Figure 7.15  ABeCeDarium. The simple geometry, color palette, and patterns have a child-friendly charm. Student illustrator/designer: Becka Shaktman

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Storybook Choose a story, myth, or fable collection and illustrate the front cover and a chapter opener spread. Consider the cover a mini-poster. There will be display type (the title), secondary type (the author’s byline), and a dominant image, the illustration. The jacket should grab the eye from a distance and be legible up close. The page size should make sense for the targeted age the story is aimed towards. Rest assured, it will not be 8.5 x 11”. For adults, a standard hard cover size book is 6 x 9”. Picture books for young children come in all different sizes and shapes. Study existing books. Measure their sizes and make plans accordingly. The chapter opener will be the start of a story or chapter. The interior page design doesn’t need to look Victorian but will include some of the conventions of Victorian design: chapter title, illuminated initial letter, the first several paragraphs of body copy, fictitious page numbers. Make it look real. The style that is established on the cover will carry through to the interior page(s), both typographically and illustratively. The size and style of the type for the body copy of the story will be adjusted for the target audience: younger children need larger type since they’re just learning how to read. Font sizes for small children can be as large as 18/24. Older readers need body copy set anywhere from 8/10 to 11/14, depending on the font’s style, x-height, and other factors. For additional complexity, design a wrap jacket including spine, back, and flaps.

For Example Student Tyler Poyant rendered thorough sketches for his title lettering for Alice in Wonderland, exploring options for the overall shape of the title as well as the lettering style: should the baseline be straight but tilted, or curve, or be entirely irregular? (figures 7.16–7.18). He chose the bouncing baseline, which fit perfectly with his

cover illustration (figure 7.19). Folded as the front cover alone, we see Alice and the White Rabbit tumbling down the rabbit hole, yet one sees the marvelous reveal only when it’s laid flat: on the back the rabbit hole transforms into the Cheshire Cat’s tail, he’s huge, with his trademark wide grin and loony expression. The brush lettering is an unconnected script composed of swirls, adding to the vertiginous sensation of the illustration. The drop cap uses the same script “A,” appropriately framed in a playing card (figure 7.20). For the same assignment, William Smith IV completed two different book covers. His cover for The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen shows the Baron dressed resplendently and riding a horse with a tree surreally seated behind him, a dog elegantly leaping alongside (figure 7.21). The background is minimalist with faint texture, the color palette inventive: the Baron and his animals suffused with purple, the background in complementary golden tones. The hand lettered title is rendered in matching purple, a mono-weight serif with swashes on a rising wave baseline. For the interior, (the typography recedes into a neutrally classic layout to allow for the complexity of the text, with the long chapter opener and the richlycolored illustration of a peculiar stag (figure 7.22). The drop cap is kept simple, suggesting a wax seal with its irregular outline. For his Jules Verne book cover, William Smith IV uses a striking color palette of lime green water with deep blue rocks forming a chasm (figure 7.23). The composition is centered with the author’s name straddling the underwater abyss, “Jules Verne” rendered as narrow, serif-less letters with pronounced stroke weight difference and a whiff of Art Deco in the style. The title—hand lettered, tall, and thin—drifts down into the chasm with the final word “Sea” formed of curled tentacles. The tiny, submersible vehicle barely escaping on the cover is caught on the back. We don’t see the entire sea monster; the tentacles are suggestive enough.

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Figures 7.16–7.18  Alice in Wonderland. Poyant’s sketches show his consideration of options in the title lettering: straight baselines, curved baselines, bouncing baselines. Student illustrator/designer: Tyler Poyant

Figure 7.19  Alice in Wonderland. When laid out flat, the front cover is revealed to be not just the tunnel Alice tumbles into, but the tail of the manic, oversized Cheshire cat too. Student illustrator/designer: Tyler Poyant

Figure 7.20  Alice in Wonderland. For the drop cap, Poyant’s framing device of a playing card fits into the story line, referencing the Queen of hearts. Student illustrator/ designer: Tyler Poyant

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Figure 7.22  The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen interior. The interior typography has a clean classicism to it, which suits the literary style of the writing. Student illustrator/designer: William Smith IV

Figure 7.21  The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen cover. The floating title inhabits the negative space behind the Baron. The letters’ simple lines take on curved baselines and swashes. Student illustrator/designer: William Smith IV

Figure 7.23  Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea cover. The centered composition is disrupted by the irregular edges of the chasm. Student illustrator/ designer: William Smith IV

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Gig Poster Choose a performance, an event, or an artist that you know well. It could be a local band, even your friends for whom you promised a poster. Gig posters can be a great route to finding betterpaying work when you’re just starting out. You could also do, as personal work, a poster for a play or the circus, anything you wish you could design and illustrate for. Regardless what you choose, be familiar with the content you are promoting. The illustration will probably be the dominant element. It should mesh with the title type in a meaningful way. What if you made the title type an illustration of sorts? Try not to be Captain Obvious. Use metaphor, symbolism, magical thinking. If music, are there song lyrics that spark your imagination? Create something unexpected. If you do a portrait of the artist(s), what can you do to or with it? Pay attention to the information hierarchy: who, what, when, and where. The typography can be hand lettering or set type that is manipulated vectors or a combination of the above. Don’t simply use set type as is. For the illustration, take complete liberty in what media you choose. Consider original photography that is manipulated or collaged or painted or go digital or any combination of the above. Whatever you do should represent the client in the right spirit.

Figure 7.24  Phish poster. The band’s psychedelic sound is captured by the surreal imagery and vibrant colors. Student illustrator/designer: Carly Wright

For Example Carly Wright’s style is perfect for gig posters: riotously colored and wildly imaginative, her graphics are eye-catching and fresh. For the band Phish, the oozing letters of the band’s name are appropriately evocative of music posters and LP covers from the 1960s, a big influence for the band’s sound (figure 7.24). The vibrating lines and patterns, the tentacled creature with eyes stacked like a totem pole, and the brilliant colors all conjure the band’s music. For the California pop punk band The Story So Far (figure 7.25), Wright’s illustration is a surreal amalgamation of a split face, forms snaking down the middle, shingled textures all over. The shape resembles a bustier as well; it is, very strangely, several things at once. The lettering for the title is tall, the edges of the letters shredded or aflame, the baseline following the top edge of the illustration. On both of her posters, Wright traditionally inks her artwork then colors it digitally.

Figure 7.25  The Story So Far poster. The title seems to quiver, as if aflame. Student illustrator/designer: Carly Wright

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ALTERNATE MEDIA

Alternate Media Create an 18 x 24” poster (preferably vertical), full color, featuring a word, a quote, or a song lyric. Sketch thumbnails of the design of the quote, knowing that it will not be rendered with traditional drawing or paint media, nor with digital media. The dominant element will be letterforms created from unusual materials. Use your hands. Look around your room, your kitchen, the junk drawer, the garage, outside, in the garden, or the park. What can you use to fabricate recognizable, legible, but surprising letters? There must be a conceptual link between the materials and the message; that relationship should be meaningful, not arbitrary. Do a test strip with the materials to make sure the materials, technique, and adhesives (if any) are working the way you want them to. Play with your material, be mindful and responsive to the way it behaves: what letter shapes could be formed organically from it? Art created of alternate media will ultimately need to be documented: scanned or, more likely, photographed. Take that fact into account while working. When documenting the set-up, bear in mind how your design will be framed within the rectangle of the poster. Think about lighting and camera angle. A student once used miso sauce as ink, a plate as the page, and a chopstick to write calligraphically. He set up a candle-lit, table top photo shoot; it was beautiful and apropos.

Figure 7.26  Love, personal work. The simplicity of the blue and white is sweetly balanced by the complexity and rhythm of the plants’ textures. The blue is distinctive of the cyanotype process. Illustrator/designer: Jill De Haan

The final poster art can be completed digitally, however, do not digitally copy and repeat letters, nor use software to assemble parts of letters, but rather just for a final clean up or to float the letters against a background.

For Example Jill De Haan’s work is discussed in chapter 4, but she’s also worked with alternate media is lovely ways. She made a sun-print photogram, using sprigs of foliage and fern to spell out “Love” (figure 7.26). This blue-toned paper can be easily found at craft and art stores. Place objects on the page and leave it out in the sun; the light will cause the paper to turn blue. If the objects are not flat to the surface of the paper, a middle tone will appear. Notice how sensitive De Haan is to the arcs of the sprigs, how gracefully they curve, how clearly they shape into legible letters. Among students who’ve done the alternate media assignment is Becka Shaktman, who chose to illustrate her phrase with the objects that she arrayed (figure 7.27). Shaktman chose a lyric from a song by rock band Fall Out Boy. She brought in pill capsules (empty ones), a bag of flour, and other props, and did the setup right on the studio classroom table. The middle tones of the brown wood and the beat-up surface made it an apt surface for the colors of the lettering media and

Figure 7.27  Alternate Media poster. This lyric is from a song by rock band Fall Out Boy. Shacktman flips the phrase, using flour to suggest cocaine spelling out “sometimes we take pills.” Student illustrator/designer: Becka Shaktman

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the cynicism of “Sometimes we take chances, sometimes we take pills.” Shaktman purposely chose to invert the two sections of the phrase rather than doing the obvious. She used the pills as segments of the letters’ stems and ensured that the white powder letters were created in straightline segments, as if they were lines of cocaine. The camera angle, with the baseline askew and table top receding, adds to the unsettled quality the quote inspires. Gabriella Hale used a squeeze bottle to extrude honey onto a flat surface, spelling out the phrase “Any day spent with you is my favorite day” (figure 7.28). The sweetness of the sentiment is amplified by the choice of honey. The letters are simple, sans

serif capitals, the strokes blobular with softly varied thickness, an occasional swash or curled terminal as grace notes. She digitally added soft patterns of honeycomb to the background, confirming her chosen medium of honey. Choosing a small unit from which to compose the letters is like doing low-resolution bitmap art, where each unit is like a pixel. Jen Gordon’s alternate medium was popcorn kernels: small enough to compile many and cheap enough to do it on a student budget (figure 7.29). The little kernels were used with precision: three kernels wide for the thick strokes, a single kernel wide for the thin, connecting strokes and ornamental swashes. Popped corn is a framing device in the corners.

Figure 7.29  Alternate Media poster. The silliness of the quote and medium of popcorn kernels are contrasted by the formality of the script. Student illustrator/designer: Jen Gordon

Figure 7.28  Alternate Media poster. The whimsy of the swashes and varied cap heights fit with the sweetness of the quote and of honey. Student illustrator/designer: Gabriella Hale

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Conclusion Every creative impulse will have, at heart, a natural way of being. One of the most important aspects of teaching is in helping each student find their own way of mark-making, their own organic process. It is the original, heartfelt idea that will make the work exceptional and bring the creator the purest satisfaction. Listen to the little voice in

your head. What do you want to say? How do you want to say it? This is not to suggest that good work is easy. It can be very hard indeed, especially early on when you’re starting to learn technique and craft. But don’t be joyless in your process. Go forth and play, make the world a brighter, wiser, and more interesting place.

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Glossary ABeCeDarium:  Either a book (or, in old fashioned terms, a primer) for teaching the alphabet, or an inscription of an entire alphabet, with the letters in alphabetic order. Apices:  Plural of “apex.” Typographically, the high point of the capital “A”. Brief:  On a design or illustration job, a summarized description of the project. Byline:  The name of the author in a magazine or newspaper, or on a book cover. Caps:  Capital letters. Character:  In typographic terms, a letter. Colophon:  In publishing, usually at the end of a book, a brief explanation about the publication, very often including a statement about the typography of the publication. Comp:  A comprehensive sketch, sometimes very close to a finished piece. It helps the client to visualize what the end product will look like. Debossed (debossing):  A die pressed into the surface of paper or board; the graphics are indented into the surface. The opposite is embossing, which is raised onto the surface. There can be blind debossing (no ink or color), foil stamping (metallic effects), or registered emboss with ink. Die cut:  The process of cutting a complex shape (i.e. not a simple square or rectangle) out of material. This process is often used for stickers and label designs. This increases production costs, since the printer/ producers needs to make a custom-shaped blade. Another process is called kiss cut, which leaves the backing paper of a sticker intact and only cuts through the sticker edges. Dingbats:  Ornamental characters or tiny illustrations; sometimes part of a font set, and sometimes as an entirely pictorial (non-alphabetic) font set. Display (or titling) typefaces:  Typeface designs intended for larger use, such as for headlines and titles. Often more decorative, elaborate, or with unusual proportions. Dominant element:  In design, the feature that stands out the most, through scale, color, and placement. Dropping out:  As a printer’s term, text or line art that is reversed out of the ink color, taking on the color of the paper.

Ersatz:  Fake, phony, artificial. Fat Face:  A style of display typefaces from the early nineteenth century with exaggeratedly heavy stems and thin serifs. Fin de siécle:  “End of the century,” particularly pertaining to the end of the nineteenth century, a time of artistic innovations throughout Europe. Floriated (floriation):  Decorated with floral shapes. Flush (left or right):  In typesetting, when text aligns either on the left or right margin, the other side left ragged. French curve:  A manual drawing tool, a template for drawing curved lines. Furbelows:  Showy ornaments. Grid:  In design, the grid is the underlying structure that brings cohesion to the layout, ensuring that components align—such as pictures, graphics, display type, and blocks of text. Gutter:  On two facing pages, as in a book or magazine, the gutter is the area where the two pages meet. Depending on the binding technique, the gutter is usually difficult to see into, so important design elements should not be placed there. Hierarchy:  In design, establishing the order of importance of the various components, using such qualities such as size, color, value, and visual weight. Ideogram:  A written character symbolizing an idea or a concept rather than a thing. Incised:  Mark or decoration cut into the surface. Justified:  In typesetting, when lines of text align on both left and right margins. Ligné clair:  A drawing style pioneered by Hergé (George Prosper Remi), the Belgian comics artist who created Tintin. Ligné clair means clear line, and is distinguished by a clean line of even weight and the absence of crosshatching. Lockup:  The designed arrangement of lettering or typography, perhaps including illustration or ornamental devices. Commonly used in logo design when the component parts of the logo have a specifically-designed relationship to each other. Lockup can be applied to other designs, such as titling treatments, phrases, etc. The original derivation is from the days of letterpress printing, when all of the metal type, rules, and ornaments would be assembled into a chase and then “locked up.”

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GLOSSARY

Mahl stick (or maul stick):  A stick with a padded end that painters and sign painters use to rest their painting hand on, to steady the hand and allow for smooth movement in drawing longer shapes, and to prevent the hand smudging the surface of the painting. Palette:  The range of colors chosen by an artist for a particular piece or project. A palette is also the (usually shaped) board on which a painter mixes their pigments. Palimpsest:  The barely-seen tracery of erased writing. Pastiche:  A work of art inspired by another source or sources. Pictograph (pictogram):  A pictorial symbol for a word or a phrase. Pict from Latin, for “painted;” Graph from Greek, graphos for “writing.” Rep:  Representative, agent or agency, who has a group of illustrators for whom they manage portfolio development, self-promotion, and contract negotiation. Reps work for a percentage (usually 30%) of the total fees the illustrator earns of the contracts the rep works on. Rules:  In graphic terms, lines used as part of a design; they can be simple single lines or more ornamental, composed of several lines of varying weights. For example, a Scotch rule is a pair of lines, one thick and one thin, separated by a bit of space. Salon des Refusés:  From the 1863 exhibition of artists who were rejected from the officially sanctioned artistic showcase at the Paris Salon and then defiantly mounted their own exhibition. Many of these artists created ground-breaking work, including Edouard Manet, Paul Cézanne, and Gustave Courbet.

Scriptorium:  The room where medieval manuscripts were written, typically in a monastery by monks. Scumble:  To drag a brush across the surface, leaving a rough, textural mark; typically done in a way to allow the underlying color to show through. Spread:  In editorial terms, for both design and illustration, two facing pages in a magazine or book. Swash:  In typographic terms, an ornamental stroke that embellishes a letterform. Thumbnail sketches:  Quite literally, no larger than your thumb, these initial sketches are an economical way to plan your design. Rendered quickly and loosely, thumbnails are intended to convey concept and composition. The page edges should be drawn as a box so you can imagine the relationship between your illustration/design to the edge of the page. Value:  Relative lightness or darkness of a color (even if black!). Vernacular:  As pertains to graphic arts:  ordinary, everyday, commonly found. Vignette (vignetted, vignetting):  An image with a soft, faded edge (verb:  Framing an image with a soft faded edge.) YA:  Young Adult, a sector of the book publishing industry targeted to adolescent and teen age readers. Zine:  Short for magazine, an independently created, published, and marketed publication printed in multiples, usually cheaply.

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Artists Natalya Balnova https://natalyabalnova.com/ Instagram: @natalya_balnova Rep: Marlena Agency www.marlenaagency.com Marian Bantjes http://bantjes.com/ Instagram: @bantjes Melinda Beck http://melindabeck.com/ Instagram: @melindabeckart Chris Campe http://allthingsletters.com/ Instagram: @allthingsletters Carpenter Collective, Tad and Jessica Carpenter https://carpentercollective.com/ Instagram: @carpentercollective David Carson http://davidcarsondesign.com/ Instagram: @davidcarson Allen Crawford https://allencrawford.net/ Instagram: @allencrawfordillustration Trina Dalziel http://trinadalziel.com/ Instagram: @trinadalziel Rep: Lilla Rogers Studio Jill De Haan http://jilldehaan.com/ Instagram: @jill_dehaan Rep: Snyder New York Roger De Muth https://rogerdemuthdesign.com/ Instagram: @rogerdemuth

Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich https://devicq.com Instagram: @robertodevicq Lola Dupre https://loladupre.com/ Instagram: @loladupre John S. Dykes https://jsdykes.com/ Rep: RappArt, Nancy Moore Louise Fili https://louisefili.com/ Instagram: @louisefili Kimberly Glyder http://kimberlyglyder.com/ Instagram: @kglyder Jen Gordon https://jennifergordondesign.myportfolio.com/work Instagram: @jennifergordondesign Jon Gray gray318 http://gray318.com/ Instagram: @gray.318 Agent: Dutch Uncle, www.dutchuncle.co.uk Emily Gunn http://emgunn.com Instagram: @emgunnart Gabriella Hale https://gabriellahale.com/ Instagram: @gabihale.design John Hendrix https://johnhendrix.com/ Instagram: @johnhendrix

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ARTISTS

Jennifer Heuer http://jenniferheuer.com/ Instagram: @ jenheuer

Andrea Pippins https://andreapippins.com/ Instagram: @andreapippins

Jessica Hische http://jessicahische.is/ Instagram: @jessicahische Rep: Frank Sturges

David Plunkert http://davidplunkert.com/ Instagram: @davidplunkert

Linzie Hunter https://linziehunter.co.uk/ Instagram: @linziehunter Zoë Ingram https://zoeingram.com/ Instagram: @zoe_ingram Rep: Lilla Rogers Studio Jenny Katz Instagram: @stitch.onesie Viktor Koen https://viktorkoen.com/ Instagram: @viktor_koen Eleonora Kolycheva https://eleonorakolycheva.com/ Instagram: @eleonora_kolycheva Ross MacDonald https://ross-macdonald.com/ Instagram: @brightworkpress Lauren Mc Lenithan Instagram: @mackieart Kasey O’Rourke Instagram: @kaseyorourkedesign Lynn Pauley https://lynnpauley.com/ email: [email protected] Daniel Pelavin https://pelavin.com/ Instagram: @dpelavin Lisa Perrin http://madebyperrin.com/ Instagram: @madebyperrin Rep: Frank Sturges

Tyler Poyant https://typoyant.com/ Instagram: @tylerpoyant Eduardo Recife Misprinted Type http://misprintedtype.com/ Instagram: @eduardorecife_ Lilla Rogers Artists’ representative for Katie Vernon, Trina Dalziel, and Zoë Ingram (among many talented others). https://lillarogers.com/ Instagram: @lillarogers Stefan Sagmeister http://sagmeister.com/ Instagram: @stefansagmeister Becka Shaktman https://beckamadesomething.com/ Instagram: @becka.made.something Steve Simpson https://stevesimpson.com/ Instagram: @stevesimpson Rep: Mendola Artists in the US William Smith IV https://thespacecraft.net/ Instagram: @willsmithx4 Jordan Sondler http://jordansondler.com/ Instagram: @jordansondler Will Staehle http://unusualco.com/ Twitter: @unusualcorp Elvis Swift https://elvisswiftdrygoods.com/ Rep: Joanie Bernstein: https://joaniebrep.com/artists /elvis-swift/

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ARTISTS

Dana Tanamachi http://www.tanamachistudio.com/ Gina Triplett and Matt Curtius https://ginaandmatt.studio/personal https://ginatriplett.studio/work Instagram: @ginatriplett Rep: Frank Sturges Cayetano Valenzuela Black Rabbit Studio http://theblackrabbitstudio.com/ Instagram: @cayetanovalenzuela

Katie Vernon https://katievernon.com/ Instagram: @ katievernonart Rep: Lilla Rogers Studio Alexander Woolfolk Instagram: @alexwoolfolk Carly Wright https://carlywrightillustration.com/ Instagram: @carlywrightillustrations

Martin Venezky https://martinvenezky.com/ Instagram: @martinvenezky

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Bibliography I Wonder by Marian Bantjes; Thames & Hudson; 1st edition (October 1, 2010), isbn-10: 0500515298, isbn-13: 978-0500515297 Marian Bantjes: Pretty Pictures by Marian Bantjes; Metropolis Books; First Edition edition (September 30, 2013), isbn-10: 1938922220, isbn-13: 978-1938922220 Becoming a Successful Illustrator by Derek Brazell and Jo Davies; Bloomsbury Visual Arts; 2 edition (November 30, 2017),s isbn 10: 1474284248 The Golden Secrets of Lettering by Martina Flor; (English Edition) 2017 Princeton Architectural Press, isbn 978-1-61689-573-0 Little Book of Lettering by Emily Gregory; 2012 Chronicle Books, llc, isbn 978-1-4521-1202-2 Typography Sketchbooks by Steven Heller; Princeton Architectural Press; F First Edition edition (December 28, 2011), isbn-10: 1616890428, isbn-13: 978-1616890421 Drawing is Magic; Discovering Yourself in a Sketchbook by John Hendrix; Stewart, Tabori and Chang; 1 edition (March 24, 2015), isbn-10: 1617691372, isbn-13: 978-1617691379 In Progress; See Inside a Lettering Artist’s Sketchbook and Process from Pencil to Vector by Jessica Hische, 2015 Chronicle Books llc, isbn 978-1-4521-3622-6 How to Draw Type and Influence People; An Activity Book by Sarah Hyndman; 2017 Laurence King Publishing Ltd., isbn 978-1-78067-975-4 Thinking with Type, 2nd revised and expanded edition: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students by Ellen Lupton; Princeton Architectural Press; Revised, Expanded edition (October 6, 2010) isbn-10: 1568989695, isbn-13: 978-1568989693

Illustration: A Theoretical & Contextual Perspective by Alan Male; 2017 Bloomsbury Visual Arts, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc: isbn 978-1-4742-6302-3 Understanding Comics; The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud; William Morrow Paperbacks; Reprint edition (January 1, 1900); isbn-10: 006097625X, isbn-13: 978-0060976255 Hand-Lettering Ledger by Mary Kate McDevitt; 2014 Chronicle Books llc, isbn 978-1-4521-2558-9 Hand Job: A Catalog of Type by Michael Perry; 2007 Princeton Architectural Press, isbn 978-1-56898-626-5 Letter by Letter; an Alphabetic Miscellany by Laurent Pfluhaupt; (English Edition) 2007 Princeton Architectural Press, isbn 978-1-56898-737-8 Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far by Stefan Sagmeister; 2013 Abrams; isbn 978-1-4197-0964-7 Written Letters: 33 Alphabets for Calligraphers by Jacqueline Svaren (Revised, Subsequent Edition), Taplinger Pub Co; Revised, Subsequent edition (January 1, 1986), isbn-10: 0800887352, isbn-13: 978-0800887353 The Essential Guide to Hand Painted Signs by Wayne Tanswell; 2016, Tanswell Publications; isbn 10: 0956246397 isbn 13: 9780956246394 Handstyle Lettering: From Calligraphy to Typography by Viction Workshop (editor), Victionary (October 1, 2017), isbn-10: 9887714844, isbn-13: 978-9887714842

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Picture Credits Fig. 0.1: Photographer: Marc Ryckaert Fig. 0.2: Photo by Michel BARET/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images Fig. 0.3: Design, Katherine McCoy Fig. 0.4: Design, Katherine McCoy Fig. 0.5: Print Collector / Getty Images Fig. 1.4: Heritage Images / Getty Images Fig. 1.9: Malcolm Grear Designers Fig. 1.10: Fine Art / Getty Images Fig. 1.14: By Hannes Wolf / Unsplash Fig. 1.15: David Carson Fig. 2.1–2.6: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich Fig. 2.7: They Eat Puppies, Don’t They? Designed and illustrated by Will Staehle / © Quirk Books + Unusual Co. Fig. 2.8: Shawshots / Alamy Stock Photo Fig. 2.9–2.11: Warren the 13th and the All Seeing Eye Designed and illustrated by Will Staehle / AD: Anne Twomey for Twelve Books Fig. 2.12: Carpenter Collective Fig. 2.13, 2.14: Carpenter Collective Fig. 2.14: Brothers typeface Designed by John Downer Published by Emigre Fonts. Fig. 2.15: Carpenter Collective Fig. 2.16–2.18: Daniel Pelavin Fig. 3.4 South China Morning Post / Getty Images Fig. 3.6–3.10 Elvis Swift Fig. 3.11: Eleonora Kolycheva Fig. 3.12–3.15: 2020 Natalya Balnova Fig. 3.16–3.18: Artwork, lettering and design by Kimberly Glyder Fig. 3.20: Rosmarie Wirz / Getty Images Fig. 4.1–4.3: Artwork by Jill De Haan Fig. 4.4–4.9: © John Hendrix 2020 Fig. 4.10–4.12: Jordan Sondler Fig. 4.13–4.16: © Melinda Beck Fig. 4.17–4.20: © Allen Crawford Fig. 4.21–4.23: John S. Dykes Fig. 4.24–4.26: Jennifer Heuer Fig. 4.27–4.29: Ross MacDonald Fig. 4.30–4.31: Lynn Pauley Fig. 4.32–4.36: Copyright Steve Simpson Fig. 4.37–4.39: Roger De Muth Fig. 4.40–4.41: Gina Triplett & Matt Curtius images Fig. 4.42–4.43: Gina Triplett Fig. 4.44–4.48: Chris Campe, All Things Letters, Hamburg Fig. 4.49–4.53: Lisa Perrin Fig. 4.54–4.57: © Zoë Ingram Fig. 4.58–4.62: © gray 318 / Jon Gray Fig. 4.63–4.64: How to Write a Great Story by Caroline Lawrence (Piccadilly Press, 2019), illustrated by Linzie Hunter

Fig. 4.65–4.66: Turn up and Vote illustrations and gifs Linzie Hunter Fig. 4.67: Drink Your Way Around the World from Londonist Drinks (AA Publishing, 2019) - Linzie Hunter Fig. 4.68–4.71: Katie Vernon Fig. 4.72–4.76: Artwork copyright © 2020 David Plunkert Fig. 4.77: DEA PICTURE LIBRARY / Getty Images Fig. 4.78: Artwork copyright © 2020 David Plunkert Fig. 4.80–4.84: Andrea Pippins Fig. 4.85–4.87: Trina Dalziel Fig. 4.88–4.92: Jessica Hische Fig. 5.2: Universal History Archive / Contributor Fig. 5.3: Creative Direction: Stefan Sagmeister. Design: Richard The & Joe Shouldice. Photography: Jens Rehr Fig. 5.4–5.8: © Marian Bantjes Fig. 5.9–5.10: Lola Dupre Fig. 5.11–5.14: Eduardo Recife / eduardorecife.com Fig. 5.15: Martin Venezky / Appetite Engineers Fig. 5.16: Rudolf Koch Fig. 5.17–5.19: Martin Venezky / Appetite Engineers Fig. 5.20–5.23: Viktor Koen Fig. 6.1: Photo by Linda Fletcher. https://commons.wiki media.org/w/index.php?search=Graffiti%2C+NYC &title=Special:Search&profile=advanced&fulltex t=1&advancedSearchcurrent=%7B%7D&ns0=1&ns6=1& ns12=1&ns14=1&ns100=1&ns106=1#/media /File:Graffiti_Art._in_NYC..jpg Fig. 6.2–6.3: Carpenter Collective Fig. 6.4–6.6: © 2019 Cayetano Valenzuela All Rights Reserved Fig. 7.3: Johannes Geyer / Getty Images Fig. 7.4: Elvis Swift Fig. 7.5: Alexander Woolfolk Fig. 7.6: Lynn Pauley Fig. 7.7–7.8: Eleonora Kolycheva Fig. 7.9: Jenny Katz Fig. 7.10: © 2020 Emily Gunn Fig. 7.11: Alexander Woolfolk Fig. 7.12: © 2019 Lauren Mc Lenithan Fig. 7.13: Kasey O’Rourke Fig. 7.14: Jennifer Gordon Fig. 7.15: © Becka Shaktman Fig. 7.16–7.20: Tyler Poyant Fig. 7.21–7.23: William Smith IV Fig. 7.24–7.25: © Carly Wright Fig. 7.26: Artwork by Jill De Haan Fig. 7.27: © Becka Shaktman Fig. 7.28: Courtesy of Gabriella Hale Fig. 7.29: Jennifer Gordon

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Pull Quote Credits Pg. X: Lupton, Ellen (1996). Mixing Messages: Graphic Design in Contemporary Culture, Princeton Architectural Press, Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, New York, p. 51. Pg. 1: Lupton, Ellen and Miller, J. Abbott (1996). “Language of Vision”, in Lupton, Ellen and Miller, J. Abbott (writers and editors), Design Writing Research: Writing on Graphic Design, London: Phaidon Press Limited, p. 62. Pg. 15: Bringhurst, Robert (1997). The Elements of Typographic Style. 2nd ed. Hartley & Marks: Point Roberts, p.17. Pg. 17: de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto (2000). Bembo’s Zoo: An Animal ABC Book. 1st ed. New York: Henry Holt and Company. p. 32. Pg. 29: Svaren, Jacqueline (1975). Written Letters: 22 Alphabets for Calligraphers. 4th Ed. Freeport: The Bond Wheelwright Company, p. v. Pg. 41: Hische, Jessica (2015). In Progress: See Inside a Lettering Artist’s Sketchbook and Process, from Pencil to Vector. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, p. 17. Pg. 53: Crawford, Allen, from email correspondence with the author, June 16, 2020. Pg. 60: MacDonald, Ross, from email correspondence with the author, December 2, 2019. Pg. 64: De Muth, Roger, from email correspondence with the author, November 11, 2019. Pg. 70: Campe, Chris, from email correspondence with the author, November 13, 2019.

Pg. 72: Perrin, Lisa, from email correspondence with the author, October 28, 2019. Pg. 79: Gray, Jon, https://www.itsnicethat.com/articles/jon -gray-graphic-design-130519. Pg. 85: Vernon, Katie, from email correspondence with the author, November 20, 2019. Pg. 101: O’Reilly, John (2015). Illusive; Contemporary Illustration, Part Four, Introduction by John O‘Reilly. Berlin: Gestalten, p. 3. Pg. 112: Recife, Eduardo, from email correspondence with the author, November 7, 2019. Pg. 113: Venezky, Martin, https://letterformarchive.org/news /martin-venezky Pg. 115: Venezky, Martin, from email correspondence with the author, December 6, 2019. Pg. 123: Dowd, D. B. (2018). Stick Figures: Drawing as a Human Practice. St. Louis: Spartan Holiday Books, in association with Rockwell Center for American Visual Studies, Stockbridge, MA, p. 15. Pg. 128: McCloud, Scott (1993). Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art. New York: A Kitchen Sink Book for Harper Perennial, p. 156. Pg. 131: Heller, Steven (2014). Foreword. Wilde, Judith and Richard. The Process; A New Foundation in Art and Design. London: Lawrence King Publishing.

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Online Resources American Institute of Graphic Arts https://www.aiga.org/

The Graphic Artists Guild https://graphicartistsguild.org/

Association of Illustrators https://theaoi.com/

It’s Nice That https://www.itsnicethat.com/

Brown Paper Bag https://www.brwnpaperbag.com/

Illustration Age https://illustrationage.com/

Communication Arts https://www.commarts.com/

Journal of Illustration https://www.intellectbooks.com/journal-of-illustration

Creative Review https://www.creativereview.co.uk/

Print https://www.printmag.com/

Dear Art Director https://dearartdirector.tumblr.com/

Society of Illustrators https://www.societyillustrators.org/

Eye Magazine http://www.eyemagazine.com/

Uppercase Magazine https://uppercasemagazine.com/

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Index A A Publishing, 82, 84 ABeCeDarium, project assignment, 135–38, 146 Addams, Charles, 21 Adobe, 63, 64, 116, 117 Adobe AfterEffects, 130 Adobe Creative Suite, 130 Adobe Garamond, 10 Adobe Photoshop, 111, 122, 130 Adobe software banner art, 63, 64 After Alice (Maguire), Lisa Perrin, 72, 73, 74 AGIdeas, Marian Bantjes, 107 Aichele, Monika, 103 AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts) Student Portfolio Review, Martin Venezky, 115 Albertus typeface, 42 Alcade magazine, 47 Aldus Manutius, 17 Ali, Muhammad, 93 Alice in Wonderland, 73 Tyler Poyant, 139, 140 Alphabet, project assignment, 131–32 alternate media Bantjes, Marian, 104–8 Dupre, Lola, 108, 109 illustration and, 101–3 Koen, Viktor, 117–20 projects, 143–44 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13 Sagmeister, Stefan, 103–4, 105 tips and tricks, 121–22 Venezky, Martin, 113–17 American Greetings, Ohio, 72 American Museum of Natural History, 53 Amulet Books, 46 Anatomy of a Murder (film), 130 animations, on-screen, 130 Anthropologie, 74 Antoinette, Marie, 35, 36 Appetite Engineers, 113 Art Deco, 95, 97, 129, 136, 139 art directors Carpenter, Tad, 22–25 de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto, 16–19

artists, contact information, 148–50 Artphabet, Viktor Koen, 118 Art Print Japan, 48 asymmetry, 2 Attic Child Press, 119 audience, notion of, xii Avant Garde, 12 B Baby’s Day Out (film), 60 Balnova, Natalya, 35–37, 148 Banksy, 124 Bantjes, Marian, 103, 104–8, 148 Baskerville, 11 Basquiat, Jean Michel, 81, 124 Bass, Saul, 130 BBH London, 54 Beach Culture (magazine), 8 Beall, Lester, 102, 103 Bearden, Romare, 102 Beck, Melinda, 50–52, 148 Bee Gees song, 49 Bembo, 10, 17 alphabet layout, 132 Bembo’s Zoo (de Vicq), 17, 18 Benton, Morris Fuller, 12, 90 Bernhard Gothic Bold, 60 Bestiary, Viktor Koen, 119, 120 Bezalel Academy of Arts, 117 Bible, 15, 31 Bickham Script, 12, 31 Bing font, 25 Black Grape, Pop Voodoo, 81 Blackletter, 13, 30, 31, 68, 107, 115, 118 Blake, Sir Peter, 102 Blue Q, 37 Boardwalk Empire (television show), 60 Bodoni, Giambattista, 11 Bonhoeffer, Dietrich, 45 book jacket designers Beck, Melinda, 50–52 Campe, Chris, 69–72 Carpenter, Tad, 22–25 Crawford, Allen, 52–54 De Haan, Jill, 42–43, 44 de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto, 16–19 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39 Gray, Jon (Gray318), 78–81, 82

Hendrix, John, 45–46, 47 Heuer, Jennifer, 57–58 Hische, Jessica, 95–99 Hunter, Linzie, 82–83, 84 MacDonald, Ross, 58–60 Perrin, Lisa, 72–76 Pippins, Andrea, 90–93 Plunkert, David, 87–90 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13 Staehle, Will, 19–21 The Book of Kells, xii book publishing industry, 38–39 The Boston Globe (newspaper), 34 Boulevard Brewing Co., 125, 126 Braque, 101 Breaulove Swells Whimsy, 52 Brightwork Press, 59 Bringhurst, Robert, 15 Brothers Bold typeface, 22, 24 Bruant, Aristide, 89 brush lettering, 32 Balnova, Natalya, 35–37 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39 project assignment, 132–34 tips and tricks, 40 brushwork, Chinese, 29–30 Buckley, Christopher, 20 Buckley, Paul, 97 Building Stories (Ware), 129 Burke, Jim, 55 Butterfield 8 (O’Hara), Jessica Hische, 97 C Cage, John, xiii Cain drawing, 45 calendar cover, John S. Dykes, 55 calligraphy, 7, 8, 29–31 Bickham Script, 12 Kolycheva, Eleonora, 34–35 metal nib, 40 pen, 31–32 pen and brush lettering tools, 32 project assignment, 132–34 Swift, Elvia, 32–34 tips and tricks, 40 Calvin Klein’s logo, 11 Campe, Chris, 69–72, 148 Canongate Books, 80

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INDEX

Carlsen Verlag, 70 Carpenter, Jessica, 22–24, 148 Carpenter, Tad, 22–25, 148 Carpenter Collective, 22, 25, 125, 148 Carson, David, 8, 148 Cassandre, 22 cast metal type, 7 Centaur, 10 Centrala publishing house, 37 Century Gothic, 12 Century Schoolbook typeface, 60 Century typeface, 60 Chast, Roz, 129 Chicago Design Museum, 105, 106 Chinese brush lettering, 29–30 Chinese Communist poster, 20 Christianity, xii chromolithography, 14 Clarendon, 10, 11 Cloister Black, 13 closure, visual perception, 4–5 Coetzee, J.M., 19 Coffee or Death, Valenzuela, 127 collage, 101–3, 122 collage artists, 102 Dupre, Lola, 108 Koen, Viktor, 117–20 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13 Venezky, Martin, 113–17 Collage Greetings, 77 coloring book, I Love My Hair, 89, 90 ComiCon, xi comics, 128–29 Comics Cookbook illustration, 37 Communication Arts magazine, 61 contact information, artists, 148–50 continuation, visual perception, 5 Cornell, Joseph, 102 Cornell University Press, Spring catalog, 67 Cranbrook Academy of Art, x Crawford, Allen, 52–54, 148 Crawford, Susan, 52 Creatures of Want & Ruin (Tanzer), Eduardo Recife, 111 Crow Quill, 32 Crumb, R., 128 Cunningham, Merce, xiii Curtius, Matt, 66–68, 150 D Da Capo Press, 38 Dada art movement, 102 Daily Drop Caps Project, Jessica Hische, 67, 95, 97, 134 Dalziel, Trina, 93–95, 148 Dass, Ram, 43

David Godine, 18, 19 Dean, Gina, 75 Death Trembles drawing, 45 Decorative Titling font, Gallia, 10 Degas, Edgar, 3 De Haan, Jill, 42–43, 44, 148 Dellas Graphics, 55, 56 del Rio, Tania, 20, 21 De Muth, Roger, 64–65, 66, 148 designers, ix Bantjes, Marian, 104–8 Beck, Melinda, 50–52 Campe, Chris, 69–72 Carpenter, Jessica, 22–24 Carpenter, Tad, 22–25 Crawford, Allen, 52–54 De Haan, Jill, 42–43, 44 De Muth, Roger, 64–65, 66 de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto, 16–19 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39 Gray, Jon (Gray318), 78–81, 82 Hendrix, John, 45–46, 47 Heuer, Jennifer, 57–58 Hische, Jessica, 95–99 Koen, Viktor, 117–20 MacDonald, Ross, 58–60 Pelavin, Daniel, 25–27 Perrin, Lisa, 72–76 Pippins, Andrea, 90–93 Plunkert, David, 87–90 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13 Sagmeister, Stefan, 103–4, 105 Simpson, Steve, 62–64 Sondler, Jordan, 48–49 Staehle, Will, 19–21 Valenzuela, Cayetano, 126, 127 Venezky, Martin, 113–17 de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto, 16–19, 148 DiBisceglie, Gregory, 74 Didot, Firmin, 11 doodlers, ix Dowd, D. B., 123 Downer, John, 24 Drawing is Magic (Hendrix), 45 Dubonnet, 22 Dubuque, Iowa, map of, 86 du Maurier, Daphne, 42 Dupre, Lola, 108, 109, 148 Dust to Digital, 116 Dykes, John S., 55–56, 148 E Eagle Bold typeface, 90 Edgar Allan Poe: Stories & Poems, David Plunkert, 87

Eerie (comic), 128 Eisner Award, 129 Emigre Fonts, 24 equilibrium, visual perception, 2 Ericson, Martha, 72 Ernst, Max, 102 Everything is Illuminated (Foer), 78, 79 exhibition poster, Beck, 51 experimental alphabets, Gina Triplett, 69 expressive typography, project assignment, 132 Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (Foer), 78, 79 F The Faithful Spy (Hendrix), 45, 46, 47 Fall Out Boy, 143 familiarity, 6 Family Circle (magazine), Trina Dalziel, 94 fancy handwriting, 7 Fat Face font, 115, 138, 146 Feel It Out (Sondler), 48 Fenice, 11 Ferris, Emil, 129 Fête du Graphisme, 88, 89 figure/ground contrast, 2 color variations of, 3 visual perception, 2–3 Fili, Louise, 95, 126, 148 Five Children and It (Nesbit), Jessica Hische, 97 Fletcher, Linda, 124 Foer, Jonathan Safran, 78, 79 font sizes, 7 For That Which Returns, David Plunkert, 88 foundation, vocabulary, 1 Fraktur, 13, 30, 31 Frankie Rose poster, 22, 23 French Script, 25 Frogfolio calendar, 55, 56 Futura Medium, 12 G Gallia, 13 Gang, graffiti, 124 GEO Special (travel magazine), 72 German Expressionism, 89 Gestalt principles, 107 visual perception, 2–6 get-out-the-vote campaign, 82, 83 Geyer, Johannes, 132 gig posters Carpenter, 22, 23 project assignment, 142 Gill Sans Medium, 12

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INDEX

glossary, 146–47 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39, 148 Golden Paint Liquid Acrylics, 45 Golden Type font, 26 Gordon, Jen, 138, 144, 148 Gorey, Edward, 21 Gospel of John, xii Gothic, 13 Goudé, Jean-Paul, 108 Goudy Text, 13 Graduate Program in Design, Cranbrook Academy of Art, poster for, xi graffiti, lettering and illustration, 123–24 graphic arts, 1 graphic design, illustration and, 15 graphic designers Bantjes, Marian, 104–8 Beck, Melinda, 50–52 Campe, Chris, 69–72 Carpenter, Jessica, 22–24 Carpenter, Tad, 22–25 Crawford, Allen, 52–54 De Haan, Jill, 42–43, 44 De Muth, Roger, 64–65, 66 de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto, 16–19 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39 Gray, Jon (Gray318), 78–81, 82 Hendrix, John, 45–46, 47 Heuer, Jennifer, 57–58 Hische, Jessica, 95–99 Koen, Viktor, 117–20 MacDonald, Ross, 58–60 Pelavin, Daniel, 25–27 Perrin, Lisa, 72–76 Pippins, Andrea, 90–93 Plunkert, David, 87–90 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13 Sagmeister, Stefan, 103–4, 105 Simpson, Steve, 62–64 Sondler, Jordan, 48–49 Staehle, Will, 19–21 Valenzuela, Cayetano, 126, 127 Venezky, Martin, 113–17 graphic novels, 128–29 Grateful Palate poster, Martin Venezky, 113–14 Gray, Jon, 78–81, 82, 148 greeting cards, Zoë Ingram, 77 Griffin, Rick, 128 Griffo, Francesco, 17 Grim Reaper, 62 Grotesque, 11–12 Guided by Voices poster, 22, 23 The Guillotine Letter, 35, 36

Gumbo, David Plunkert, 88 Gunn, Emily, 136, 149 Guralnyk, Gleb, 111 Gutenberg, Johannes, 7, 13, 15, 31 Gutenberg Bible, 6 H hair salon, Ivory Coast, ix Hale, Gabriella, 144, 149 Half Price Books, 55 Half-Uncial typeface, 30, 31 Hamburgefonts, word for design, 9, 10 Hamilton, Richard, 124 Hamish Hamilton UK, 79 Handbuch Handlettering (Campe), 69 hand drawn, term, 42 hand lettering, 7, 8, 41–42 tips and tricks, 100 see also letterers Haring, Keith, 124 Harper, 57 HarperCollins, 16, 19, 25 Harriman, George, 128 Hatch Show Print, 15 Hateful Eight (movie), 60 Headline Publishing, 73 Heartfield, John, 102 Heller, Steven, 131 Hello Sunshine, Heuer, 58 Hendrix, John, 45–46, 47, 149 Henry Holt and Company, NYC, 17 Hessleberth, Joyce, 87 Heuer, Jennifer, 57–58, 149 hieroglyphic writing systems, 29, 29–30 Highline Map, 49 hip-hop graffiti, 124 Hische, Jessica, 41, 95–99, 134, 149 Hitchcock, Alfred, 130 Hitler, Adolf, 13, 31 Höch, Hannah, 102 Holzer, Jenny, 103 Hooper, Siobhan, 73 Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 38, 39 Houghton Mifflin US, 79 How to Write a Great Story (Lawrence), Linzie Hunter, 82, 83 Hudson Valley Seed Library, 74, 75 Hughes, John, 60 Hughes Entertainment and 20th Century Fox, 60 Humanist, 10, 11, 12, 13, 31 Humanist Bookhand, 30, 40 Hunter, Linzie, 82–83, 84, 149

I I Am So Impressed With Myself (Balnova), 36 illuminated initials, project assignment, 134–35 illustration alternate media and, 101–3 context of lettering and, 123–30 term, 41 tips and tricks, 28 see also lettering and illustration illustrators, ix alternate media for, 101–3 Balnova, Natalya, 35–37 Beck, Melinda, 50–52 Campe, Chris, 69–72 Carpenter, Tad, 22–25 Crawford, Allen, 52–54 Curtius, Matt, 66–68 Dalziel, Trina, 93–95 De Haan, Jill, 42–43, 44, 143 De Muth, Roger, 64–65, 66 de Vicq de Cumptich, Roberto, 16–19 Dupre, Lola, 108 Dykes, John S., 55–56 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39 Gordon, Jen (student), 138, 144 Gray, Jon (Gray318), 78–81, 82 Gunn, Emily (student), 136 Hale, Gabriella (student), 144 Hendrix, John, 45–46, 47 Heuer, Jennifer, 57–58 Hische, Jessica, 95–99 Hunter, Linzie, 82–83, 84 Ingram, Zoë, 76–78 Katz, Jennifer (student), 136 Kolycheva, Eleonora, 34–35 MacDonald, Ross, 58–60 Mc Lenithan, Lauren (student), 137 O’Rourke, Kasey (student), 137, 138 Pauley, Lynn, 60–61 Perrin, Lisa, 72–76 Pippins, Andrea, 90–93 Plunkert, David, 87–90 Poyant, Tyler (student), 139, 140 Shaktman, Becka (student), 138, 143–44, 150 Simpson, Steve, 62–64 Smith, William, IV (student), 139, 141 Sondler, Jordan, 48–49 Staehle, Will, 19–21 Swift, Elvis, 32–34 Triplett, Gina, 66–69

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INDEX

illustrators (continued) Vernon, Katie, 84–85, 86 Woolfolk, Alexander (student), 133–34, 137 Wright, Carly (student), 142 I Love My Hair, Andrea Pippins, 90, 91 Imagine Dragons poster, 22, 23 Immaculate Heart College Art Department, ten rules for working, xiii Indestructible, Bantjes, 105 Industrial Revolution, 124 Ingram, Zoë, 76–78, 149 inlines, 14 The International New York Times, Eduardo Recife, 112 isomorphic correspondence, visual perception, 6 ITC Berkley Oldstyle, 10 ITC Bodoni 72, 11 ITC Goudy Sans, 12 Ivory Coast, hair salon in, ix J Jessica Hische’s Daily Drop Cap project, 67 Johnson, Katherine, 93 John the Evangelist, xii Jones, Grace, 108 Junius Verlag, 70, 71 K Kabel Bold typeface, 114 Kalfas, Andrea, 88 Katz, Jennifer, 136, 149 Kent, Sister Corita, xiii Kitching, Alan, 15 Knopf Books for Young Readers, 57 Koen, Viktor, 117–20, 149 Koffka, Kurt, 2 Kolycheva, Eleonora, 34–35, 135, 149 L Lawrence, Caroline, 82 L’Engle, Madeleine, 39 Leonhardt flexible pen nib, 32 Les Condamines perfume packaging, Daniel Pelavin, 25, 26 letterers Bantjes, Marian, 104–8 Campe, Chris, 69–72 Carpenter, Jessica, 22–24 Dalziel, Trina, 93–95 De Haan, Jill, 42–43, 44 De Muth, Roger, 64–65, 66 Dykes, John S., 55–56 Glyder, Kimberly, 38–39

Gray, Jon (Gray318), 78–81, 82 Heuer, Jennifer, 57–58 Hische, Jessica, 95–99 Hunter, Linzie, 82–83, 84 Ingram, Zoë, 76–78 Pauley, Lynn, 60–61 Perrin, Lisa, 72–76 Pippins, Andrea, 90–93 Plunkert, David, 87–90 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13 Simpson, Steve, 62–64 Sondler, Jordan, 48–49 Triplett, Gina, 66–69 Vernon, Katie, 84–85, 86 letterforms anatomy of, 9–10 creation of wood, 7 lettering and illustration context of illustration and, 123–30 in motion, 130 sequential, 128–29 typography and, 6–9 walls, 123–27 Lettering for Illustrators, class at Syracuse University, 131 Letts, Tracy, 61 Let Your Heart Guide You, Eduardo Recife, 112–13 The Library of America, 39 Life magazine cover, 5 Lilla Rogers Studio, 85, 86, 148 Lincoln Center Out of Doors Summer Festival, Andrea Pippins, 92 Lines (Beck), 50 lines of continuation, 5 Listen All Around, Martin Venezky, 116 Little, Brown, 42 Little Simon, 50 Londonist Drinks, AA Publishing, Linzie Hunter, 82, 84 Los Angeles Magazine, Daniel Pelavin, 26 lowercase alphabets, evolution of, 30–31 Lubalin, Herb, 12 Lupton, Ellen, x, 1 M McCloud, Scott, 6, 128 McCoy, Katherine, x, xi, xii MacDonald, Ross, 58–60, 149 McKay, Winsor, 128 Mc Lenithan, Lauren, 137, 149 Macy’s Flower Show, 67, 74 Macy’s holiday season, 22, 24 Madonna quote, Zoë Ingram, 76

Maguire, Gregory, 72, 73 Make Art That Sells (MATS), 85, 86 Making Fonts (Campe), 69 Malcolm Grear Designers, 4 Mao (Chairman), 20 maps Bavaria, Chris Campe, 71, 72 California, John Dykes, 56 Dubuque, Iowa, Katie Vernon, 86 Highlin, HYC, Jordan Sondler, 49 illustrators and, 72 Londonist Drinks, Linzie Hunter, 84 Vernon’s lettering skills on, 85 Wharton, Texas, Trina Dalziel, 95 Mariner Books, 111 Martin, David Stone, 32 Martin, Shantell, 124 Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), 48, 66, 72 The Masque of the Red Death (Poe), 87 Matchbook Wine Company, 32, 33 Matilda und Die Sommersonneninsel (Matilda and the Summer Sun Island), Campe, 69–70 Matisse, Henri, 102 Maus (comic), 129 Memoria Visual, Brazil, 16 Men of Letters and People of Substance (de Vicq), 19 metal moveable type, 7 Mic’s Chilli, Damn Hot Sauces, 62, 63 Midsummer Soirée products, 94 Mighty Salt City mural, 126 Miller, J. Abbott, 1 Milstein Hall of Ocean Life, 52 Mimosa font, 25 miniscule alphabet, evolution of, 30–31 Minted, 49 Misprinted Type, 108, 149 Miss Treadway and the Field of Stars, Heuer, 57, 58 Mistral, 13 Moby Dick (Melville), Jessica Hische, 97 modern typeface, 11 Modest Mouse, 22, 23 Monotype Corporation, 17 monotype print, Edgar Degas, 3 Morison, Stanley, 17 Moscoso, Victor, 128 Mouly, Françoise, 129 moveable type, first system in China, 6 Mumfest poster, 27 murals, lettering and illustration, 124–26 Mutu, Wengechi, 102 My Cousin Rachel book cover, 42 My Favorite Thing is Monsters (Ferris), 129

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INDEX

N Naga Knockdown label, 62, 63 Nature Print, Jill De Haan, 43, 44 Nemesis, Viktor Koen, 120 New Bedford Whaling Museum, logo for, 4 The New Yorker (magazine), 82 The New York Times (newspaper), 13 O Obsessions Make My Life Worse and Make My Work Better (Sagmeister), 103, 104 October 16. 1793 / The Guillotine Letter, 35, 36 Old Style caps, 43 Old Style fonts, 30 Old Style typeface, 10, 17 One Hot Summer, Tamaki, 129 on-screen animations, 130 Open Type, calligraphic font, 31 O’Reilly, John, 101 ornamentals, 14 O’Rourke, Kasey, 137, 138, 149 outlines, 14 P Pakistan, embellished bus, ix Parks and Rec (television show), 60 Parsons School of Design, 35 Patience. Yea, No socks, 37 Pauley, Lynn, 60–61, 134, 149 PCMA Convene magazine, 33 Pelavin, Daniel, 25–27, 149 pen calligraphy, 31–32 Penguin Books, 19, 97 Penguin Drop Caps, Jessica Hische, 97 Penguin Workshop, 98 Penn Gazette, 34 The Pennsylvania Gazette, 50 Perpetua, 11 Perrin, Lisa, 72–76, 149 Phenotypes, Viktor Koen, 117, 118 Phillips, Coles, 5 Phish poster, Carly Wright, 142 phototypesetting, 16 Picasso, 101 Piccadilly Press, 83 picket fencing, 13, 31 pictographic communication, 29 The Pink House (Curtis), Jon Gray, 81, 82 Pippins, Andrea, 90–93, 149 pizza, familiarity, 6 Plankton Art Company, 52 Plunkert, David, 87–90, 149

Poe, Edgar Allan, 87 Pop Voodoo (album), Black Grape, 81 Poyant, Tyler, 139, 140, 149 Praxisbuch Brush Lettering (Campe), 69 Preminger, Otto, 130 Prince, Richard, 121 Procreate, 130 projects ABeCeDarium, 135–38 alphabet, 131–32 alternate media, 143–44 calligraphy or brush lettering, 132–34 expressive typography, 132 gig poster, 142 illuminated initials, 134–35 sketchbook, 134 storybook, 139–141 Prom Night (movie), 9 proximity, visual perception, 4 public transport bus, ix Pulitzer Prize, 129 Q Quadrata, 30, 31 Quirk Book, 21 R Racine, 18, 19 Rand, Ayn, 18, 19 Rand, Paul, 102 Random House, 16, 90 Rauschenberg, Robert, 102, 121 Raw (comic), 129 Ray Gun (magazine), 8 Recife, Eduardo, 108–9, 110–13, 149 Rehr, Jens, 104 Reid, Jamie, 103 Renner, Paul, 12 Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), 38, 50 Richard The and Joe Shouldice, 103, 104 Ridley Carwash sketchbook, 134 Risograph, 129 Rockport Publishers, 87 Rockwell, 11 Rogers, Lilla, 85, 86, 149 Room 17B, David Plunkert, 88 Russian Communist propaganda poster, 20 Ryan, Rob, 101 S Saar, Betye, 102 Sage and Sand Motel sign, 60, 61 Sagmeister, Stefan, 103–4, 105, 149

Salon des Refusés, 38 San Diego State University, 8 sans serif: Grotesque, 11–12 sans serif: Humanist, 12 sans serif font, 115 sans serif typefaces, xi Santa Clara (magazine), 55, 56 Santa poster, 22, 24 SAVEUR Magazine, 34 School of Visual Arts (SVA), 35, 45, 117, 118, 120 Schwitters, Kurt, 102 Science Experiments You Can Eat (Carpenter), 25 Sciphabet, Viktor Koen, 118 script: informal, 12–13 seasonal cards, Zoë Ingram, 77 The Secret Order of Librarians, Valenzuela, 127 The Seed Collectors (Thomas), 79, 80 seed packaging, 74, 75 serifs, 14 Sex Pistols, 103 Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Beatles, 102–3 shadows, 14 Shaktman, Becka, 138, 143–44, 150 Shimizu, Yuko, 103 Shouldice, Joe, 103, 104 signage, lettering and illustration, 125–27 similarity, visual perception, 4 Simon & Schuster, 58 Simone, Nina, 92, 93 Simpson, Steve, 62–64, 150 sketchbook, project assignment, 134 Skillshare, 130 Slab Serif Clarendon, 10, 11 Smith, William IV, 139, 141, 150 Smoking Typeface, 111 Snoop Dogg poster, 22, 23 Society of Illustrators Crawford, Allen, 53 De Muth, Roger, 65 Katz, Jennifer, 136 Hendrix, John, 45 Society of Illustrators Student Exhibition, 136 Sondler, Jordan, 48–49, 150 song title print, 49 Southern Living (magazine), 59 Spencerian Script, 32 Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse (film), 130 Spiegleman, Art, 129 SpotCo, 61 spot illustration, Elvis Swift, 34

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INDEX

Spur Design, 87 Spur Gallery, 51 Square Fish, 52 squirrels poster, De Muth, 65, 66 squirrel toast, 65 Staehle, Will, 19–21, 150 Steam Punkphabet, Viktor Koen, 118 Stone Sans, 12 storybook, project assignment, 139–41 Story So Far poster, Carly Wright, 142 Summer Girls (series), 69–70 Superior Donuts (Letts), 61 The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen, William Smith IV, 139, 141 Svaren, Jacqueline, 29 Swift, Elvis, 32–34, 133, 150 symmetry, equilibrium, 2 Syracuse University, 131 T Tamaki, Jillian, 129 Tanamachi, Dana, 126, 150 Tanzer, Molly, 111 tattooing, human body as canvas, 123 Tema Cantante, 19 Temple University, 90, 95 ten rules for working, Immaculate Heart College Art Department, xiii Texas Highways (magazine), Trina Dalziel, 95 Textualis, 30, 31 The, Richard, 103, 104 Theatre Project, 87, 88 They Eat Puppies Don’t They? (Buckley), 20 Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far (Sagmeister), 103, 105 The Things She’s Seen, Heuer, 57 The 13th Sign (O’Donnell Tubb), 52 Thomas, Scarlett, 79, 80 Thor (movie), 9 The Tin Drum (film), 89, 90 Tin House, 53, 54 Tipocracia Tenth Anniversary poster, 109, 110 Titanic (movie), 9 Toller Ort, Chris Campe, 70–71 Tombow brush pens, 32 Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave, Jessica Hische, 97–98, 99 Toulouse-Lautrec, Henri de, 88–89 Toyphabet, Viktor Koen, 118, 119 Trajan, font, 9 Trajan Column, 9, 14, 30 Trajan letterforms, 31 Tree Lighting poster, 22, 24

Trinity College in Dublin, xii Triplett, Gina, 66–69, 150 Twelve, Hachette Book Group, 20 Twombly, Carol, 9 Twomey, Anne, 20 Tyler School of Art, 66, 90, 95 type classification, 10–14 decorative, 13 inlines, outlines, shadows and ornamentals, 14 modern, 11 Oldstyle, 10 sans serif: Geometric, 12 sans serif: Grotesque, 11–12 sans serif: Humanist, 12 script: Blackletter, 13 script: informal, 12–13 serifs, 14 slab serif, 11 transitional, 11 Type Directors Club (TDC), 117–18 typeface designers, Hamburgefonts, 9, 10 typefaces, evolution of miniscule (lowercase) alphabet, 30–31 typesetting, 16 typographers Bantjes, Marian, 103, 104–8 Sagmeister, Stefan, 103–4, 105 typography, x, 7 lettering and, 6–9 project of expressive, 132 tips and tricks, 28 writing by hand predated, 9 Typography Annual, Communication Arts magazine, 61 Typography as Discourse diagram, x Typo Upright, 25 U Uncial typeface, 30, 31 Understanding Comics (McCloud), 6 Universal Music, 81 University of the Arts, 66 Unusual Corporation, 19 V Valenzuela, Cayetano, 126, 127, 150 Vampire Weekend poster, 22 Varoom (magazine), Marian Bantjes, 107 Venezky, Martin, 113–17, 150 Verne, Jules, 83, 139, 141 Vernon, Katie, 84–85, 86, 150 Vertigo (film), 130 Victorian-era scrapbook, 102 Victorian letterforms, 68 Vietnam War, xiii

Violent Femmes poster, 22, 23 Virgil, 123 Virginia Quarterly Review, 58, 59 visual communication, developing critical eye for, 1 visual perception closure, 4–5 continuation, 5 equilibrium, 2 figure/ground contrast, 2–3 Gestalt principles of, 2–6 isomorphic correspondence, 6 proximity, 4 similarity, 4 vocabulary, foundation, 1 Vogue magazine nameplate, 11 Voodoo Reaper, 62, 63 W Walker, Kara, 102 wall graffiti, 123–24 murals, 124–26 signage, 125–27 The Wangs Vs. the World, book cover, 38, 39 Ware, Chris, 129 Warhol, Andy, 32 Warren the 13th and The All-Seeing Eye (del Rio), 21 The Washington Post (newspaper), 13 Wharton, Texas, map of, 95 Whitman, Walt, 53 Whitman Illuminated: Song of Myself (Whitman), 53, 54 Whole Foods, 68 Wicked (musical), 73 William Maxwell, 59 Wilson, Jamia, 92 Windsor, 59 wine label, 33 Wood, Wallace “Wally”, 128 Woodford, Tanner, 105 wood letterforms, 7 Woolfolk, Alexander, 133–34, 137, 150 word processing, 16 Wright, Carly, 142, 150 A Wrinkle in Time, book package, 39 Y Young Gifted and Black, Andrea Pippins, 92, 93 Youtube, 130 Z Zap Comix, 128 zines, 128–29, 147

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