Class #8 - February 27, 2013

Summary:
Art Nouveau:

• Starts within the Arts and Craft's movement
• Begins in France
• Youth style: Style for young people/kids/teens
• Influences of asian aesthetic
• Around until about 1914
• 1914: WWI

• Branding is starting to develop 
• Starts in Europe and takes a long time to come to America
• Covers/art created in Europe and shipped to USA
• Popularity and growth of art journals
• Flat panels of color were popular
• What id dimension?
• What is flat?
• Abstraction
• Overlapping
• Copy + Paste

• Harper's Covers
• Illustration based
• Starts to become more abstract
• Playing with spacial relationships
• Lippencott's Covers
• Flat backgrounds
• Influenced by Harper's

Aubrey Beardsley:

• Influenced by Morrison
• Used Morrison's works as inspiration for his work
• Influenced, also, by asian design 
• Flat
• Negative space
• Abstract form
• Dark sensuality to his work

Alphonse Mucha:

• Gets a big job that changes art
• Sarah Bernard commissioned Mucha
• Mucha got his reference from past art
• Didn't finish project= new aesthetic
• Mucha was influenced by asian design
• Mucha draws amazingly
• Abstraction is a dominant

Charles Ray Macintosh: 

• Working with abstraction
• Androgyny was popular
• Sexual experiments in art
• "The Four"
• 4 students with similar art-forms and techniques
• Immediately click when put together
• Purvy artists
• The Glasgow School
• Rectilinear structure
• Uses Curvilinear structure for interior 
• Very spiritual -- it shows in their motifs 
• Purvy artists

Versacrum:

• Versacrum = Magazing
• metaphors within artwork
• Tree busting out of the pot
• The fruit>three=three guys> phallic symbols
• Influenced by French Art Nouveau
• A lot of experimentation
• Going against "The Man"

Peter Barrings

• Circles and Squares
• 1st Identity logo
• geometric shapes
• typography
• metaphors in designs
• honeycomb motif
• "it takes more than one man"

Personal Thoughts:

Questions and Research:

Class #6: February 13, 2013

Summary:

Art Nouveau:

• Starts within the Arts and Craft's movement
• Around until about 1914
• 1914: WWI

Aubrey Beardsley:

• Influenced by Morrison
• Used Morrison's works as inspiration for his work
• Influenced, also, by asian design 
• Flat
• Negative space
• Abstract form
• Dark sensuality to his work

Test Review:

1. First communication
2. Clay tablets before paper
3. Greek letterforms
4. Roman letterforms
1. Formal
2. Nonformal
5. Celtic letters: Book of Cels
6. Uncials: rounded letterforms
7. Carol letters
8. Playing cards: first form of printing
1. Block printing
2. Xylography
3. Devotionals
4. Though bubbles
5. Letterforms are becoming more refined
9. Guttenburg: printing press
1. Letter "punch"
10. Early manifestation of printing:
1. Letter of indulgence
11. Words to know:
1. Xylography
2. Ligature
3. Incunabla
4. Fleurons
12. Negative space interacting with text
13. Examplar page: thumbnails/layouts/example page
14. First book printed in the colonies:
1. The Whole Book of Psalms (1640)
2. Printed by Steven Daye
3. Just guys trying to make a living
1. It's for the money
15. Examples of letters with the grid system
16. Rococo design -- French
1. Rococo ended with the French Revolution
17. Neo Classism: the french bat porn page 
18. Copper plate printing = more designs - easy to engrave
19. Bodoni: early forms of Rococo design
1. Fat face fonts
2. Egyptian type face
3. Tuskin letters: cowboy letters
20. Power: machine wood-type
21. Pragmatic letters on advertisements: it is what fits
22. KNOW THESE:
1. Old style
2. Traditional
3. Modern
4. Egyptian
5. San serif
23. Be able to identify:
1. Cap Height
2. Ascender line*
3. X-height
4. Base line
5. Descender line
24. Leading: space between two lines
25. Linotype machines
26. Victorian Era
1. Aesthetic confusion
2. Ephemera: printed objects not meant to be collected
3. Scrap cards
4. Entertainment: money
5. Packaging design
6. Manipulation in media
7. Children entertainment: toy books
8. Letterpress, woodcut, mixture of the two
27. Thomas Nast: political cartoons
28. First large scale electric sign -- New York

Personal Thoughts:
Test next class!

Class #5: February 6, 2013

Summary:

The Victorian Era (1800s):

• is characterize by "aesthetic confusion"
• a lot of consumerism at this time
• This is similar to Rokoko design 
• Type and design was advancing: curved type and blending colors
• Typography moved around space 
• A lot of textures, details, travel inspired design -- a lot of stuff
• Nationalism influenced/inspired their design
• Circus/traveling entertainment with slots to "write-in" information 
• People were hungry for entertainment
• Packaging design started to flourish around this time era
• Printing on tin was established by printing backwards
• Products/logos influenced by people
• Advertising becomes manipulative
• Magazines and papers wouldn't endorse certain products
• Competition started arising with subliminal messaging
• It wasn't about the art, it was about the sale/money
• Type faces became bigger and bigger and more obnoxious
• Turf wars with billboard posting and advertisement-- government was involved
• A shift in children's literature -- for the entertainment purposes
• Imagination came to play 
• Gave more entertainment during leisure time
• Modern political cartooning flourished
• Thomas Nast was a political cartoonist 
• Harper's Weekly -- around 1871
• Heinz pioneered the idea of corporate image
• Had the first electronic sign
• "Took care of his people"
• Invested in art for hallways
• John Ruskin
• The son of a wealthy merchant
• Rejected the mercantile economy
• Believed there's a downside to capitalism
• Influences other people
• William Morris
• The son of a wealthy merchant
• Published 1st set of poems at the age: 24
• Known for textile design
• A very big "overachiever" 
• Reignited book arts and private book movement
• Carved in wood typefaces -- very detailed designs
• Had a very classical look to his designs
• "Rebellion" was looking towards the past
• Looked back to the old ways of doing things as an artisan
• Doing everything by hand again
• "The good old days"
• Knights, kings and honor
• Flaw in this view: time and money = $$$
• The average person couldn't afford that kind of labor

Ephemera: printed material

• Items that shouldn't be collected
• Not produced for art, but for function

Personal Thoughts:

This idea of change is a very familiar feeling. We have those who want to keep things the way they are, and those who want to change those ways and "advance". It's interesting to see how in the beginning of  the design timeline, it wasn't about the perfection of aesthetics but purely about the function and sales.

Questions/Research:
Was there anything William Morris couldn't do?