Read Karl Gerstner, Designing Programmes pg55-61, Joseph Muller-Brockman, “Grid and Design Philosophy” pg62-63 found in our main text Graphic Design Theory: Readings From the Field by Helen Armstrong; and Margaret Rhodes, The Swiss Designers Breaking Tradition. 

  • How do each of these designers/authors think you should approach design?
  • Include an example of contemporary typography/layout that embodies the two design systems or philosophies described by Karl Gerstner and Joseph Muller-Brockman. And explain why!
  • How do the contemporary Swiss designers described in the Margaret Rhodes’ essay “flirt with breaking the rules of the International Typographic Style“?

After reviewing the assigned readings, I found the following on the questions above. Karl Gerstner’s approach to design was, “To pick out determining elements and combine them”. He felt, “designing calls for method’.  So he developed two types of programmes. The “morphological box of the typogram” came about after paralleling his design theory to the methods of Fritz Zwicky, a scientist, and astronomer. This typogram gave basic rules for combing all content in a design. Sort of like a branding guideline. He then created a 1 – 6 column grid (mobile grid) that can provide endless layout possibilities. He felt the graphic design layouts should be mathematically structured.

Josef Muller-Brockmann’s approach was like Gerstner who believed in the grid but with a heavy influence on swiss typography. He says, “Working with the grid system means submitting to the laws of universal validity. The designer’s work should have the clearly intelligible, objective, functional, and aesthetic quality of mathematical thinking. He felt that even with an asymmetrical layout and color palette, there must be tight constraints on the design.Alexander Tochilovsky and his team, current designers of our time believe in the swiss approach as well. However, he leans more toward breaking the rules on the “International Typographic Design”. He states, “Everyone has his own approach, and it’s really personal from each studio.” He gives examples such as a student’s work titled “ it is all in the detail” and his piece Anne Babi im Sali.

Annotation Links

1.) AIG Reading

2.) Graphic Design Theory Readings 1

3.) Graphic Design Theory Readings 2