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BODONI


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Bodoni


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GodisSeven.AgainstAnti-foundationalism


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Giambnattista Bodoni acheieved an unprecedented level of technicalrenement, allowing him to faithfully reproduce letterforms with very ne

harilines contrasted sharply with bolder stems, and serifs that are oftenun-bracketed. In addition to extreme contrast between thick and thin

strokes, the emphasis of stress is purely vertical. This typeface has aclean, graceful, and elegant appeal that lends a striking visual quality.

Bodoni is a seri typeace frst designed by Giambatts

5


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5

a Bodoni in 1798.


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rItalic

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When one is giving birth to a font not spawned directly from an existing model,

what is needed most is the establishment of a biological discourse

betweenlookinganddrawingbetweenretinaand

cortex. To be successful in this process, one learns

that the mind must be quieted. The hand and retina must

move in symbiotic lock step as they both trace the

physical line. Its through this process that one

can learn to trust not the mind, but the retina. I

stress that this process, in order to be

successful, is non-linguistic.

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AaBbCcDdEeFfGgHhIiJjKkLlMmNnOoPpQqRrSsTtUuVvWwXxYy

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Letterforms are in large measure governed by social contract and simple

optical principles, such as the ones preached by our now debased and

debunked High Priest of Visual Thinking, Rudolf Arnheim. And while there

are obviously far hipper and much more contemporary developments within

cognitive science and perceptual psychology, issues of balance, harmony, scale,

as well as principles of gestalt, all have a bearing on the function and legibilityof letterforms.Italic

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AbriedmomentwhenaFontographerapprochtoletterformdesignwasculturallyredeemable.

AccesstoFontographerenabledthedesigner,forbetterorworse,tocutthedevelopmenttime

andcostofcreatinganalphabettoalmostnothing.TheBlendmenuinFontographerwould

taketwofontsandmathematicallyextrapolate,toproduceathirdnewfont.Thisprocesstook

seconds,andtheresultswereuid,kinetic,andseemed,fromanhistoricalperspective,

refreshing.

December 1, 1991 - February 3, 1993

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The letterforms produced in this way were a complete rejection


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The letterforms produced in this way were a complete rejectionof everything that type design represented to this point.

Iam resolute in my belief that there is simply no correlation

between time and quality, and that all things historical are not

necessarily bad. The geezers didnt get everything wrong. Al-

though Modernism has become shorthand for dogmatic, imperi-

ous, doctrinaire, dry and anal, it is also rigorous, studied, quintessen-

tially optimistic and highly formal. In a recent Print magazine article,

Kathy McCoy encourages educators to abandon hand-based exercisesin favor of the computer. I would absolutely agree if it pertains to

typographic skills for tracking, kerning, leading, comping, font selec-

tion, etc. I would completely disagree when it comes to the typographic

skills of letterform design.

The ability to see, (not to eel) the

correlation between the ruling

pen, nib, chisel and/or brush and

the fnal letterorm is essential.

As a matter o act, some o themost interesting typographic

specimens bear no correlation to

these tools.

Does this imply that all letterorms must have

seris or strokes that are in some way inormed by

the ruling pen, nib, or chisel?

Of Coarse Not!

Roman

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As the letterorm progresse through

successive stages of development

and renement, the process becomes

increasingly optical.

When the impulse or the idea for

a font springs primarily from optical

phenomena, such as mark making,

drawing, handwriting, ormanipulation of formal elements, it may be

considered to have sprung from

exclusively formal extrapolation.

The resolution of a font,the successive development and

renement, is always an optical

endeavor. The simple process of

making marks on paper is less ofan intellectual process than a

biological process.

One must cultivate

a eel

for proportion, solidity, balance,

etc.


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.Excuse the digression, but whenI talk about developing a feel, I knowthat some of you are rolling your eyes.Some of you may think that the termfeel might be likened to the termtaste, with all of its class overtones

and attendant critiques. Well, back the

f@*k up. Im suggesting that one

develops a feel not magically, orthrough attendance at the nest

schools, but through rigorous

application, and through working

damn hard at acquiring a set

ofvery concrete

skills, then forgetting them.

And what would those skills be to which

one must dedicate him or herself

only to eventually forget?Manipulative skills, rst person,

hand/eye-coordinated, esh based

skills

What in jazz they call chops,

and in design they callfundamental graphic exercises

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heory is study understood and nally


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heory is study understood and nally

pplied. But the essence is that theory (or

hinking) is forgotten in the moment of

erformance. In the visual arts, as in

usic, it is important to follow a

evelopmental trajectory that after

iligent application ultimately includes

ot so much forgetting, as not paying

ctive attention to these principles. You

ust trust yourself, and work by feel. Rely

n the totality of your experience. Rely on

our history to guide you. Think through

he body. Arrive on the beautiful shores of

If at this point you feel th

need to accuse me of anti

intellectualism,youd be b

barking up the wrong tre

Im an advocate of practi

informed by theory and li

Its really a question of pr

and balance. And I like to

be clear here. I am not suthat the type desi process

necessaril adheres to a su

strict taxnoic progressionBoldCondensed16/34PosterItalic20/34


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Its my contention that the edge

condition, the tension that exists inthe gap, is where the action isBoldItalic18/14

f


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zkWalter Gropius was famous for his exhortation to hisstudents in Weimar to start from zero. Its whenyou invent the way a stroke terminates, or when youdevise a new armature, that you can benet most fromtraditional techniques. Its when you begin with the blankpage of purely formal extrapolation that the old skoolskills are most important. The geezers passed thesemethodologies down in a master/apprentice environment. s t a r t f r o m z e r o . . . BoldItalic32pt

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