Josef Müller-Brockmann was one of this first designers that really brought the Swiss style to light. He was a swiss designer and teacher who had studied architecture, design and the history of art himself at University. He opened his own design studio on 1936 and this is when he really started focusing on the style of design that made him such a big name in the art world in later life. He also wrote books on design, "The Graphic Artist and his Design Problems", "Grid Systems in Graphic Design" , the publications "History of the Poster" and "A History of Visual Communication".
I quote " I became a graphic designer by accident". At school I was loth to write much for compositions so I put in illustrations instead. My teacher enjoyed them and thought I had talent. He suggested that I should pursue an artistic career: gravure etching or retouching, for instance. So I was apprenticed as a retoucher in a printing works. I lasted one day because I said that this wasn’t artistic work. After that I was apprenticed to two elderly architects. With them I lasted four weeks. Then I went to see all the graphic designers I found listed in the telephone directory because I wanted to find out what they did. Afterwards I enrolled to study graphic design at the Zurich Gewerbeschule." - Josef Muller-Brokmann
He has been noted for his clean and simplistic style of design, his interesting use of geometry and colours and his love of the helvetica typeface. A sans serifed typeface, now widely used and developed by Max Miedinger in 1957. His skills included letterpress, silkscreen, and lithography.
Here are two famous posters that he made, the first for a Beethoven concert in Zurich. The were supposed to represent the flow and harmony of Beethovens music. It was made in 1955 and many people were impressed with the modern looking design. It was something a lot of people hadn't experienced before and it represented the future.
Again I quote "In my designs for posters, advertisements, brochures and exhibitions, subjectivity is suppressed in favour of a geometric grid that determines the arrangement of the type and images. The grid is an organisational system that makes it easier to read the message...The grid is an organisational system that enables you to achieve an orderly result at a minimum cost. The task is solved more easily, faster and better. It brings the arbitrary organisation of text into a logical system in keeping with the conflict. It can demonstrate uniformity that reaches beyond national boundaries, a boon to advertising from which IBM, for instance, has profited. Objective-rational design means legible design, objective information that is communicated without superlatives or emotional subjectivity."
I quote " I became a graphic designer by accident". At school I was loth to write much for compositions so I put in illustrations instead. My teacher enjoyed them and thought I had talent. He suggested that I should pursue an artistic career: gravure etching or retouching, for instance. So I was apprenticed as a retoucher in a printing works. I lasted one day because I said that this wasn’t artistic work. After that I was apprenticed to two elderly architects. With them I lasted four weeks. Then I went to see all the graphic designers I found listed in the telephone directory because I wanted to find out what they did. Afterwards I enrolled to study graphic design at the Zurich Gewerbeschule." - Josef Muller-Brokmann
He has been noted for his clean and simplistic style of design, his interesting use of geometry and colours and his love of the helvetica typeface. A sans serifed typeface, now widely used and developed by Max Miedinger in 1957. His skills included letterpress, silkscreen, and lithography.
Here are two famous posters that he made, the first for a Beethoven concert in Zurich. The were supposed to represent the flow and harmony of Beethovens music. It was made in 1955 and many people were impressed with the modern looking design. It was something a lot of people hadn't experienced before and it represented the future.
Again I quote "In my designs for posters, advertisements, brochures and exhibitions, subjectivity is suppressed in favour of a geometric grid that determines the arrangement of the type and images. The grid is an organisational system that makes it easier to read the message...The grid is an organisational system that enables you to achieve an orderly result at a minimum cost. The task is solved more easily, faster and better. It brings the arbitrary organisation of text into a logical system in keeping with the conflict. It can demonstrate uniformity that reaches beyond national boundaries, a boon to advertising from which IBM, for instance, has profited. Objective-rational design means legible design, objective information that is communicated without superlatives or emotional subjectivity."
The second one, made in 1959, pictures the overlapping of the two words which is meant to remind our brains of the flicker you get on the film, much more common in older black and white films. And this is why he has used the black and the grey also. Apart from anything I think it is just a really nice example of what you can do with text and the idea of text being the main object of a picture not just the support. I think it is a impressive thing to be able to make a poster look good without the use of any imagery at all and this I think is something that I would be really interested in doing in my own work.
I really like the swiss styles and the idea of simplicity as a form of beauty. It is also something I think that is coming back into light quite a lot in design recently especially since we have the importance of being eco-friendly and not using so much packaging or paper or ink. You see a lot of packaging today that has taken obvious influence from the swiss style and the phrase 'a little is a lot' springs to mind in both areas.
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