The design is whatever you say it is

Welcome! This is the new Thursday issue Animation Obsessive bulletin. This time, we’re taking a look at a lesser-known book.

Intentional graphic design ruled the Middle Ages. Every magazine ad was a design solution to the problem of selling a product, and there were reasons for every angle and curve. Saul Bass poster. Animation followed the trend. on UPA And at other studios, a lot of the film’s meaning came from the design.

Online, it’s easy to see the look of that era in stray clips and images. However, they are now taken out of context, which obscures the meaning behind the work. Mid-century art directors rarely pursued atmosphere alone.

As a top magazine designer wrote in the 1950s:

… just a nice arrangement of elements … is never an adequate solution to a layout problem. Only when the design becomes a visual and typographic synthesis of the main editorial idea, projected in a dynamic form, does it fulfill its true function.

These words will appear Art director at workA collection of writings of more than ten art directors of the late 50s. Most considered their own, then newly awarded animation, editorial layout, album covers and more.

It is a fascinating book, but forgotten and hard to come by. So we keep our own copy in the Internet Archive – available at the link below. For more thoughts on its content, read on.