portfolio task 2. modernist graphic design

 

Herbert Bayer (1900-1985) ‘’CCA -  Save waste paper” http://library.rit.edu/gda/designer/herbert-bayer

This piece of graphic design demonstrates the usual modernist convention of ‘function before form’. It uses typical san-serif type. There are only two block colours used in the composition and the piece delivers the message as efficiently as it possibly can.  

 

Bayer, H  (1900-1985) ‘’Container Corporation of America: Billions of powdered eggs’’ http://library.rit.edu/gda/designer/herbert-bayer

This piece features Bayer’s own sans-serif type known as “universal” which helped to define the Bauhaus aesthetic. Again the piece conveys it’s message as efficiently as it possibly can. It does this using only one colour making it cheap and simple to reproduce.

The image is also composed of an egg/glob depicting the America’s, of course – however the sun is shining on the globe from the western side and casting a stark shadow towards the east. This creates a uniform right angle in the middle of the poster and perhaps conveys some hidden message or idea.

 

metropolis - silent science fiction film created by the famed director Fritz Lang and released in 1927. Set in the year 2000. http://www.popartuk.com/film/metropolis/metropolis-hr15555-poster.asp

the piece fits the modernist graphic design vernacular quite well with its strong industrial feel, sans-serif type and basic yet effective imagery. The film that it is advertising has very modernist ideals throughout. It depicts the perfect industrial prosperous metropolis.

 

Games, A (1940’s) ‘’grow your own food” http://www.bbc.co.uk/cumbria/content/image_galleries/artists_abram_games_gallery.shtml

This piece exercises the modernist ‘function followed by form’ ethos very definitely. The whole image is a product of the functionality of the poster i.e. the  form of the spade and the form of the ship are manipulated to convey the idea/function of the poster.

Games, A (1940’s) “brush the cobwebs away” http://www.benuri.org.uk/Games.htm

This propaganda poster shows off Game’s ‘maximum meaning, minimum means’ technique quite well. The imagery/form is completely striped down to draw maximum attention to the message/function of the work.