Ellen Lupton and J. Abbott Miller are the founders and directors of the graphic design program at the Maryland Institute of Art, as well as the authors of numerous books on design (Mixing Messages, Dimensional Typography, Mechanical Brides, see pages 25-26). This collection of their essays on graphic design, winner of a Design Destinction Award from I.D. Magazine's Annual Design Review, is now available for the first time in paperback format.
"In these theoretical essays, the author-designers create their most challenging, playful, and original work". -- Michael Rock, I.D. Magazine
"It is striking not just in ambition, range, and detail, but also in their attempt to embody ideas in and through design, taking seriously the fact that form and content intertwine". -- Robin Kinross, Eye
"A pleasure to look at, to read, and to go back to over and over again. The writing is well researched, offers new ideas, and even a little controversy now and then. This is what contemporary design, writing, and research look like". -- Erik Spiekermann, Blueprint
"Serious, considered, and provocative". -- Tod Lippy, Print
This critical study of graphic design and typography is a source for anyone interested in the art and history of books, letterforms, symbols, advertising, and theories of visual and verbal communication. A section on theory considers the centrality of the written and printed word to post-structuralism and deconstruction. A wide range of design practices are discussed, from the history of punctuation and the origins of international pictograms to the structure of modern typography. A section on media looks at the role of design in mass communications with essays on stock photography, visual journalism, illustration, advertising and vernacular design cultures. The book closes with history, a section organised as a time line spanning 200 years of design in America. These historical case studies show how the modern profession of graphic design emerged in response to cultural, political and economic developments in the US.