type tuesday: forming words at Flow Gallery

Susanne Matsche

I recently heard from Flow Gallery, located in London's Notting Hill. Their current exhibition entitled "Forming Words" includes work by issue 16 cover artist Debbie Smyth. Though I'm on the other side of the ocean, the exhibition has introduced me to some intriguing artists such as Susanne Matche, featured in this post.

If you are fortunate enough to be in London, a visit to this exhibition promises to be an experience of note:

Flow has asked selected artists to create new work based on a piece of writing of their choice, from poetry to a letter to lyrics. Whether it is the shapes, lines and curves which letters create that inspire the work, as in vibrant wall pieces by Debbie Smyth that motivate the work. Or simply the fluidity of the writing, artists exploring this theme express the diverse approaches and outcomes this one theme can manifest. Many of the artists have chosen to utilise the meaning of their selected text or the message that the text communicates to inform their work. Other artists, such as Aino Kajaniemi take a personal approach to using text with particular memories woven in thread. The work in this exhibition traverses disciplines. Jewellery will be exhibited alongside silver teacups, ceramic vessels and enamel plates. The variety in material has resulted in an exhibition that intends to capture the endless inspiration of the written word.

The exhibition continues until May 17.

Susanne Matsche

Susanne Matsche

Susanne Matsche

beautiful bitmaps: X

Louise Fili: When asked to create a bitmapped letter, I began to brainstorm on what forms bitmapping could take. Of course, there are pixels and grids, but how could I transform a harsh, gridded letterform into something beautiful? I began looking into the process of filet lacemaking, and I loved how simple, small squares of thread can translate into lush patterns, forms, and in this case, letters. 

Here are some other images of filet lacemaking, showing the grid and pixel-like patterns common to this technique.

beautiful bitmaps: Dominique Falla

From a detailed plan…

to the intricate layering of coloured ribbon.

Dominique Falla: When I think of beautiful bitmaps, I think of pixels and I wanted to create a blurry pixellated effect with my letter. Each “pixel” that makes up the letter Q is the bottom of a strip of ribbon and I overlaid hundreds of different coloured ribbons to build up a multi-coloured effect. I wasn’t expecting the little bits of fluff at the end of each ribbon to appear, but it adds to the overall shimmering effect and I also love how the colours underneath show through the ribbons above. 

For issue 15, we invited 26 typographers, designers and illustrators to make beautiful bitmaps by taking this vestigial part of digital type—the bitmap—and making it into something to be newly appreciated.

This issue will be arriving in your mailboxes shortly, and we will be celebrating its release with a gallery exhibition of Beautiful Bitmaps here in the UPPERCASE studios (Thursday, October 4 from 5-8pm). All of the artworks are available to view online and will be sold as digital prints. A portion of proceeds from Beautiful Bitmaps will go to creating an UPPERCASE scholarship fund to assist a reader in pursuing education in design, illustration, typography or craft.

type tuesday: Elegantissima by Louise Fili

We send our congratulations to Louise Fili and the talented people at her studio on the release of the new monograph about Louise's design and typography. I received a copy of Elegantissima last week and it has been my constant companion, sitting beside me at my desk. During breaks from designing issue #15, I'd turn to its pages for visual and mental refreshment. (Ah, such delicious food packaging!)

There is a short and sweet foreword written by Steven Heller, Louise's husband. He shares a typewritten letter from 1982 that he wrote to Louise, complimenting her on her book designs. At the time, he was art director of the New York Times Book Review. "I had never met [Louise] and, in fact, had never laid eyes on [her] before. A little more than a year later we were married," he writes.

The works presented in Elegantissima are beautiful examples of the romance between designer and letterform. Louise's life-long passion for beauty, perfection and play is evident page after page.

portrait of Louise Fili by Jordan Provost, issue 9

I am honoured that one of my design heroines has been part of UPPERCASE—we featured Louise in issue 9 in an article written and photographed by Jordan Provost. (See additional photos from the article below.) Louise is also one of the designers who participated in Beautiful Bitmaps, so we can all look forward to seeing her submission in issue 15.

Elegantissima is published by Princeton Architectural Press. Issue 9 is available in our online shop along with other back issues—quantities are dwindling and back issues won't be reprinted.

type tuesday: Jan Middendorp visit

JAN MIDDENDORP VISITS THE UPPERCASE STUDIO, JULY 30, 2012

If you don't already receive the occasional transmissions from My Fonts entitled "Creative Characters", you should definitely sign up. With in-depth profiles and lots of visuals, these mailings go beyond your typical e-newsletter. "Creative Characters" is written by Jan Middendorp, a designer and writer currently based in Berlin. Jan was travelling through Calgary to visit some family before heading off to TypeCon this week—I was honoured that he stopped by UPPERCASE.

Jan is the author of an amazing typographic tome, Dutch Type, released in 2004. The 300+ page book is an excellent guide to the many prolific Dutch typographers both historical and contemporary. I'm lucky enough to have a copy that I ordered from the Netherlands back when it was first released; the book is quite rare now and Jan himself has just a couple copies left. 

Jan shared a preview of his newest work, Shaping Text. Published in two editions (Dutch and English) this book is an overview of typography with a very current and appropriate slant: whether in print or on the web examples of good design are shown with equal importance rather than relegating web- or multimedia-based design projects to an afterthought chapter.

Open publication - Free publishing - More design

Thanks, for stopping by, Jan. Have fun at TypeCon!

type tuesday: stampede posters

For those of you not familiar with the Calgary Stampede, it is an annual exhibition and rodeo with midway rides, nightly fireworks and associated free pancake breakfasts scattered throughout the city (apparently there's an app for finding the breakfast nearest you). For ten days each summer, the city transforms into a strange cowboy and western set: hay bales are public seating, barnwood is tacked up on restaurant doorways, downtown office windows are painted with "yeehaws" and "howdy, partners". Not to mention the fashion: all shades of denim, bandanas, cowboy hats and boots (the more tassels, pattern and snaps the better)—it really aims to be the greatest outdoor show on earth. This year, the Stampede is marking its 100th year. I've lived in Calgary for 20 of them now, so I consider myself a proud Calgarian.

But Stampede is not quite my cup of tea... The Stampede is loud; I'm quiet. Beer tents and drinking is advertised as a featured activity; I don't drink. The midway offers bigger thrill rides; I have a weak stomach. Other than the fireworks and the photographic appeal of the midway at dusk, there's not a lot about Stampede that I can relate to.

I wonder what the early years of Stampede were like... I'd love to attend Stampede 1912 rather than 2012. Thanks to an exhibition in Art Central, I was able to a step back in time with the poster graphics of years gone by.

The exhibition is presented by AXIS Contemporary Art and Quintaro Graphic Reproduction and features digital poster reproductions on various substrates such as metal and rawhide. In addition to the typographic interest of the earliest posters, from a design standpoint it is interesting to see how versatile digital printing technology is. The show gave me lots of ideas of how I could reproduce graphic art and posters.

The posters will be on display until July 20th on the main level of Art Central, Calgary. (UPPERCASE's studio is on the upper level of Art Central.)