After today’s class, remember to write and post your 250-word summary of the reading–Charles Kostelnick’s “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication.” Something to keep in mind at this point in the semester is how the readings are bending towards technical communication issues informed by critical theory. Find connections between these new readings and those that have come before.
For Tuesday’s class, read J. David Bolter and Richard A. Grusin’s “Remediation” (linked from the syllabus). In addition to the reading, think about new technologies that have an old “look” or iconography that gestures to past media without being necessary. Bring these examples to our discussion on Tuesday.
In his article, Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication, Charles Kostelnick writes about the increasing role of professional communicators in desktop publishing and have greater participation in document design. Kostelnick writes from the period after the introduction of the Macintosh computer. He looks at the increasing capabilities of desktop publishing. Desktop publishing is the idea that computers, aided by design software, do publishing work. The technology of in-house publishing is dramatically shifting the responsibility for document design from graphic artists to individual writers. To apply this new technology, professional communicators need to comprehend the foundations constructing typographical design, and their origins in modernism. With emphasis of functionalist principles, modernist aesthetics applied a philosophy for solving practical design problems. Modern graphic designers today owe conceptual, modern design of text and design to the Bauhaus concept. Since the beginning of the 20th century, no other style in architecture and design has influenced the modern style like the Bauhaus style has, both the classical modern style and the avant-garde. And the resonance is still present today, continuing to inspire architects and designers worldwide to fill the Bauhaus credo of “less is more” with new life. The Bauhaus converted modernist theories into real forms by applying innovation in typography, text arrangement, and graphics to books, advertising, and informational materials. The Bauhaus tenets of the unity of text and form, economy, universal objectivity, and faith in intuition continue to exercise enormous influence on visual design principles. With desktop publishing, the sphere of these principles have been extended beyond the graphic designer and typographer to the workplace in business, education, and government. Professional communicators will constantly meet the enduring effects of modernism. The unanimity between aesthetics and functional use that modernists conceive may find its most productive interpretation in the visual language of technical documents.
In the article “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication.” Charles Kostelnick talks about in-house publishing. Due to in-house publishing, the responsibility of designing documents is changed from the graphic specialist, now to the individual writer. With new technology available on computers and the invention of a laser printer, business can now let professional communicators to become more controlling in terms of document designs. These new technologies allows the writers to enhance the font design, change the font size, design pages and insert pictures and graphics however they want. These advanced programs transfers designs from the graphic studio and printing shops to the desktops at offices, making it easier for the individual writer to have a greater facility on visual language. While desktop publishing is a major change in visual language, it is not the first technological innovation to do so. In the nineteenth century, typewriters were invented, and it changed the way that texts were displayed on a page, by spacing words out in exactly the same space throughout the entire text. The new technology that is accessible by professional communicators, will allow them to create documents in the way which they envision. Bauhaus is an international school of design that brought together the principles of modernism. It is a German art school that influenced art, architecture, industrial design and graphic design. Bauhaus provided the intellectual and creative and beauty based foundation for modernist design, not only in architecture but in all forms of visual expression.
In the article “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics and Professional Communication.” By Charles Kostelnick talks about the responsibilities of in-house publishing. One thing about in-house publishing is the designing of the documents and how they change from the graphic expert to the writer themselves. He explains the increasing role of how us professional communicators assist in the document design. He looks at desktop publishing which is an idea from the computer which publishes work. Computer also contain design software. To apply this type of technology the professional communicators need to understand that the foundations of design and how it applies to the modern time now. Modern graphic designers use different types of concepts for one they use the Bauhaus concept. This concept includes has both the classical modern style and the avant garde. When applying this concept we understand that writers start to use unique styles to write. They are allow to edit the font designs, bold letters, font size, design pages, and insert pictures along with graphics. This gives freedom to writers to create a document to how they feel its comfortable. These programs help assist us in creating the type of document we want. Back to the history of the Bauhaus conducted exercises on the unity of test and form, economy, universal objectivity and faith intuition. Professional communicators will constantly have to be update since the only way a document is to be read is when it has the visual design principles. Base off the history of the Bauhaus they explain that us professional communications will need to find productive interpretations of visual languages in documents.
In the article “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication” by Charles Kostelnick, Kostelnick begins by discussing desktop publishing. He says that with computers aided by design software the software in the computer allows you to do the design from the comfort of your desktop. He then introduces the Bauhaus concept. Bauhaus was a highly influential German art school which influenced art, graphic design, typography and industrial design. It practiced the idea that the things we design need to be functional therefore the form doesn’t need to be pretty. In Bauhaus, all human beings were the same and it believed that everyone should interpret their design the same way. There were four key Bauhaus ideas, the first is the unity of text and form. This idea said that there needs to be a unity of thought and consistency so there is an aesthetic appeal to make it more efficient and easier to read. The second idea puts an emphasis on economy and simplicity. This idea wanted simple straightforward documents. The third idea is the universal objective style and this is what Bauhaus was trying to achieve. This idea wanted to create a universal style that would be understandable to anyone in the world. But because we learn so much culture this was extremely difficult to achieve. The fourth idea was the faith in intuition both in terms of the innate perception of the individual and the collective intuition of a culture. This idea describes the innate feeling on what’s right. The Bauhaus although failed did bring a relation to technical communication. It wanted to integrate visual and verbal language to achieve the purpose of a document, consider strict economy to be as much as an aesthetic, use visual language that the audience is accustom to but adapt this language to the context of the document and combine intuitive and rational problem solving during the writing and design process.
In the article “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication” written by Charles Kostelnick, it talks about how the potential for desktop publishing is increased by design software. Now people are able to use their computer to make designs and you can physically see the work that you create in front of you. Also, instead of having to hand-draw designs the computer software does a majority of the workload, which increases work opportunities, increases wages, and decreases the need for hard manual labor. Bauhaus was a school dedicated to the fine arts and was a major contributor to the advancement of architecture, industrial designs, furniture design, etc. The school taught students to use basic materials in order to build art. Bauhaus came up with four ideas the first one unity of text and form, which means that you work that, is user-friendly. The second idea is an emphasis on economy and simplicity, meaning that designs need to be straightforward and documents that can be understandable to the reader. The third one is the search for universal objective style, which means making a document appeal to everyone in the world. Bauhaus wants to make everything into a homogeneous culture. The fourth idea is the faith and intuition both in turns of innate perception of the individual and collective intuition of a culture. This means that our intuition guides us, and it an unconscious feeling that we get from personal experience. These ideas are useful when it comes to combining visual and verbal language to make a document useful to users.
During last week’s lecture we reviewed Charles Kostelnick’s “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication”. Early on in the text Kostelnick informs us that the responsibilities associated with document design is shifting from the graphic designer to the professional communicator. On account of this, the professional communicator now needs to consider the document’s form and text, its visual rhetoric, along with the application of design principals when utilizing software applications to produce and publish a document.
Kostelnick explains that key factors that contribute to success with information design are grounded in modernism. Modernism’s foundation was laid during the Bauhaus movement. The Bauhaus was an international school of design in Germany that was opened in 1919 and closed in 1933. Influenced by Futurism, Constructivism, and Cubism, modernism’s key elements revolve around objectivity, functionality and efficiency. Kostelnick shares with us the four key ideas modernist design and how they relate to contemporary text and information design: 1) the unity of text and form, 2) the emphasis on economy and simplicity, 3) the search for a universal, objective style, and 4) the faith in intuition.
What Kostelnick states in his article rang true at the time when it was published back in 1990, but even more so today considering how much desktop publishing as a technology has improved. The influence that modernism has had on information design remains as relevant now as it did then. The key ideas of modernist design act as a framework to aid professional communicators in the field of information design. Professional communicators have even more control of not only the content of their message, but also in the medium chosen to convey the message.
Charles Kostelnick who demonstrates in his essay “Typographical Design, Modernist Aesthetics, and Professional Communication how important the Bauhaus was to modern design and give fours ways to use Bauhaus design in technical documents. An international school of design in Germany the Bauhaus drew upon principles of modernism. Classical modern style and avante-garde were invented, ushering a new architectural style in the twentieth century. Influences to the Bauhaus include graphic design, art, and typography. Responsibilities of in-house publishing and documents took a major turn. Stressing functionality over beauty in the art of design, modernists appealed to an aesthetic to form in solving practical problems. One – integrate visual and verbal language to achieve the purpose of the document, essentially maximizing interaction between word and image. Second, consider strict economy to be as an aesthetic and rhetorical as a functioning criteria. Third use visual language that the audience is accustomed to but adapt this language to the context of the document.This is where he breaks from the Bauhaus universal, visual language Kostelnick retorts that when it comes down to is visual language you learned from your culture. Then finally, combine intuitive and rational problem-solving during the writing design process because professional communicators create documents for specific audiences and specific situations they need to evaluate rationally the visual processing task of their users. The arrival of in-house publishing shifts the roles of writer to graphic designers along with software on the desktop allowing you to design from the comfort of your home office – providing greater freedom.