π
π
VIII ‥ Eight Texts
Carlos E. Oliveras Colom
Table of Contents Part I ‡ Classic Typography Three Key Ideas
1-8 1
Jean Piaget Untitled
2
e.e. cummins Spoken and Written
3
Ferdinand de Saussure Excerpts from, The Year of Magical Thinking
4
Joan Didion Einstein’s Dreams Excerpt
5
Alan Lightman Victory Speach: November 4, 2008
6
Barack Obama Eleventh Aphorism
7
Lao Tse Design
8
Erik Spiekermann Part II ‡ Typographic Variables & Constants Part III ‡ Form & Space Variables
11-18 21-28
Part 1 ‥ Classic Typography
Optimum reading experience
Jean Piaget ‡ Three Key Ideas As a first approximation, we may say that a structure is a system of transformations. In as much as it is a system and not a mere collection of elements and their properties, these transformations involve laws: the structure is preserved or enriched by the interplay of its transformation laws, which never yield results external to the system nor employ elements that are external to it. In short, the notion of structure is comprised of three key ideas;
‡ the idea of wholeness,
‡ the idea of transformation,
‡ the idea of self-regulation.
1
e. e. cummings ‡ Untitled Buffalo Bill’s defunct who used to ride a watersmooth-silver stallion and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
Jesus
he was a handsome man and what i want to know is how do you like your blueeyed boy
‡
Mister Death
2
Ferdinand de Saussure ‥ Spoken and Written Language and writing are two different systems of signs; the only purpose of the latter is to represent the former. Linguistics is not concerned with the connection between the written and spoken word– its sole object is the latter: the spoken word. But the written word is so closely bound up with the spoken, whose image it is, that it is increasingly arrogating the main role to itself/ Ultimately the point is reached where more importance is attached to representation of the spoken sign than to this sign itself. It’s like thinking that to know someone, It is better to look at his photograph than his face.
3
Joan Didion ‡ Excerpts from, The Year of Magical Thinking “Grief turns out to be a place none of us know until we reach it. We anticipate (we know) that someone close to us could die, but we do not look beyond the few days or weeks that immediately follow such an imagined death. We misconstrue the nature of even those few days or weeks. We might expect if the death is sudden to feel shock. We do not expect this shock to be obliterative, dislocating to both body and mind. We might expect that we will be prostrate, inconsolable, crazy with loss. We do not expect to be literally crazy, cool customers who believe their husband is about to return and need his shoes.” “I’m not telling you to make the world better, because I don’t think that progress is necessarily part of the package. I’m just telling you to live in it. Not just to endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it, but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take pride in it. To seize the moment. And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell you that the grave’s a fine and private place, but none I think do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children. And that’s what there is to do and get it while you can and good luck at it.”
4
Einstein’s Dreams Excerpt Alan Lightman ‡ 14 April 1905 In the world in which time is a circle, every handshake, every kiss, every birth, every word, will be repeated precisely. So too every moment that two friends stop becoming friends, every time that a family is broken because of money, every vicious remark in an argument between spouses, every opportunity denied because of a superior’s jealousy, every promise not kept. And just as all things will be repeated in the future, all things now happening happened a million times before. Some few people in every town, in their dreams, are vaguely aware that all has occurred in the past. These are the people with unhappy lives, and they sense that their misjudgments and wrong deeds and bad luck have all taken place in the previous loop of time. In the dead of night these cursed citizens wrestle with their bedsheets, unable to rest, stricken with the knowledge that they cannot change a single action, a single gesture. Their mistakes will be repeated precisely in this life as in the life before. And it is these double unfortunates who give the only sign that time is a circle. For in each town, late at night, the vacant streets and balconies fill up with their moans.
5
Victory Speech Barack Obama ‡ November 4, 2008 Hello, Chicago. If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer. It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen, by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference. It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled. Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states. ‡
‡
We are, and always will be, the United States of America
It’s the answer that led those who’ve been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day. It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment change has come to A m e r i c a .
6
Lao-Tse ‡ Eleventh Aphorism Thirty spokes meet the hub, but it is the emptiness between them that makes the ‡ Essence of the wheel. From clay pots are made, but it is the emptiness inside them that makes the ‡ Essence of the pot. Walls with windows and doors form the house, but it is the emptiness between them that makes the ‡ Essence of the house. The principle: The material contains usefulness, the immaterial imparts essence.
7
Erik Spiekermann ‡ Design
“Design
is first and foremost an intellectual process. Contrary to popular belief, designers are not artists. They employ artistic methods to visualize thinking and process, but, unlike artists, they work to solve a client’s problem, not present their own view of the world. If a design project, however, is to be considered successful– and that would be the true measure of quality– it will not only solve the problem at hand, but also add an aesthetic dimension beyond the pragmatic issues. I consider design not to be a series of creative one-offs, but an integrated process, from planning the appropriate communications strategy to designing functional and beautiful objects as well as for example implementing electronic stationery on client’s systems. What clients say and what designers hear are too often very different things. Design is a powerful tool to help clarify the problem. It is only when a common understanding has been established between client and designer that effective results can be achieved. Design quality needs an integrated approach: look more closely than expected, ask many questions, think laterally, get involved in things you shouldn’t, do more than you are supposed to and have fun doing it. Problem-solving is one thing, aesthetic pleasure another. Combine the two, make the engineer sketch like an artist and make the artist analyze like an engineer, and you are half-way there.”
8
Part II ‥ Typographic Variables & Constants Unity & Diversity
Jean Piaget ‡ Three Key Ideas As a first approximation, we may say that a structure is a system of transformations. In as much as it is a system and not a mere collection of elements and their properties, these transformations involve laws: the structure is preserved or enriched by the interplay of its transformation laws, which never yield results external to the system nor employ elements that are external to it. In short, the notion of structure is comprised of three key ideas;
‡ the idea of wholeness,
‡ the idea of transformation,
‡ the idea of self-regulation.
11
e. e. cummings ‡ Untitled Buffalo Bill’s defunct who used to ride a watersmooth-silver stallion and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
Jesus
he was a handsome man and what i want to know is how do you like your blueeyed boy
‡
Mister Death
12
Ferdinand de Saussure ‥ Spoken and Written Language and writing are two different systems of signs; the only purpose of the latter is to represent the former. Linguistics is not concerned with the connection between the written and spoken word– its sole object is the latter: the spoken word. But the written word is so closely bound up with the spoken, whose image it is, that it is increasingly arrogating the main role to itself/ Ultimately the point is reached where more importance is attached to representation of the spoken sign than to this sign itself. It’s like thinking that to know someone, It is better to look at his photograph than his face.
13
Joan Didion ‡ Excerpts from, The Year of Magical Thinking “Grief turns out to be a place none of us know until we reach it. We anticipate (we know) that someone close to us could die, but we do not look beyond the few days or weeks that immediately follow such an imagined death. We misconstrue the nature of even those few days or weeks. We might expect if the death is sudden to feel shock. We do not expect this shock to be obliterative, dislocating to both body and mind. We might expect that we will be prostrate, inconsolable, crazy with loss. We do not expect to be literally crazy, cool customers who believe their husband is about to return and need his shoes.” “I’m not telling you to make the world better, because I don’t think that progress is necessarily part of the package. I’m just telling you to live in it. Not just to endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it, but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take pride in it. To seize the moment. And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell you that the grave’s a fine and private place, but none I think do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children. And that’s what there is to do and get it while you can and good luck at it.”
14
Einstein’s Dreams Excerpt Alan Lightman ‡ 14 April 1905 In the world in which time is a circle, every handshake, every kiss, every birth, every word, will be repeated precisely. So too every moment that two friends stop becoming friends, every time that a family is broken because of money, every vicious remark in an argument between spouses, every opportunity denied because of a superior’s jealousy, every promise not kept. And just as all things will be repeated in the future, all things now happening happened a million times before. Some few people in every town, in their dreams, are vaguely aware that all has occurred in the past. These are the people with unhappy lives, and they sense that their misjudgments and wrong deeds and bad luck have all taken place in the previous loop of time. In the dead of night these cursed citizens wrestle with their bedsheets, unable to rest, stricken with the knowledge that they cannot change a single action, a single gesture. Their mistakes will be repeated precisely in this life as in the life before. And it is these double unfortunates who give the only sign that time is a circle. For in each town, late at night, the vacant streets and balconies fill up with their moans.
15
Victory Speech Barack Obama ‡ November 4, 2008 Hello, Chicago. If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer. It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen, by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference. It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled. Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states. ‡
‡
We are, and always will be, the United States of America
It’s the answer that led those who’ve been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day. It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment change has come to A m e r i c a .
16
Lao-Tse ‡ Eleventh Aphorism Thirty spokes meet the hub, but it is the emptiness between them that makes the ‡ Essence of the wheel. From clay pots are made, but it is the emptiness inside them that makes the ‡ Essence of the pot. Walls with windows and doors form the house, but it is the emptiness between them that makes the ‡ Essence of the house. The principle: The material contains usefulness, the immaterial imparts essence.
17
Erik Spiekermann ‡ Design
“Design
is first and foremost an intellectual process. Contrary to popular belief, designers are not artists. They employ artistic methods to visualize thinking and process, but, unlike artists, they work to solve a client’s problem, not present their own view of the world. If a design project, however, is to be considered successful–and that would be the true measure of quality– it will not only solve the problem at hand, but also add an aesthetic dimension beyond the pragmatic issues. I consider design not to be a series of creative one-offs, but an integrated process, from planning the appropriate communications strategy to designing functional and beautiful objects as well as for example implementing electronic stationery on client’s systems. What clients say and what designers hear are too often very different things. Design is a powerful tool to help clarify the problem. It is only when a common understanding has been established between client and designer that effective results can be achieved. Design quality needs an integrated approach: look more closely than expected, ask many questions, think laterally, get involved in things you shouldn’t, do more than you are supposed to and have fun doing it. Problem-solving is one thing, aesthetic pleasure another. Combine the two, make the engineer sketch like an artist and make the artist analyze like an engineer, and you are half-way there.”
18
Part III ‥ Form & Space Variables Experimental Investigation
& π
ferdinand de
language
writing
different systems of signs
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saussure
the only purpose of the latter is
to represent the former.
i
i i l ngu st cs is not concerned
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tten
wri
tten
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π
the
word–
ken k spo spo ken n o e k sp spo oken en n k e sp ke spo spok po en s k n ke en spo oken spo spok ken ken sp o po en n s p n k e s e ok ok en spo spok ken n sp spok n sp n o e n p e e k s e en k k spo spok ken po ken spo spok s o sp n en ken spo oken en en spok spoke spo spok ken p k s o n p en ke spo oken en s oken oken en ok p s p spo spok p n s k s sp ke po en ok en spo oken en s oken oken p k s sp k sp sp spo oken spo ken ken n en e sp k po k o n s o o p e s k sp sp en po n ok ken en s poke oken p s o s k sp sp spo ken ken n e po k o s o p s sp en ok ken oken p o s sp p solenobject is the latter: sits ke spo ken spo
π
with the connection between
spoh-kuhn word
But wr the itte
n
rwritten itte n
tword ten is so closely
Ultimately the point is reached
bound up with the spoken,
whose image it is
than to the sign itself.
But the written word is so closely
where more importance is attached to representation of the spoken sign
bound up with the spoken,
whose image it is
that it is increasingly arrogating the main role to itself/
π
π
It’s like thinking that to know
ht tuB ettirw lesolc os si drow ht htiw pu dnuob
,nekops
gami esohw i ti
i ti taht lgnisaercni iam eht gnitagorra lor flesti ot
som
eon
e
Ď€
his photograph it is better to look at, than
his face .
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VIII ‥ Eight Texts | Colophon Carlos Oliveras Colom GC 246, Designing with Type II Ringling College Of Art and Design Kim Elam, Instructor Spring 2013 Fonts Bodoni Svty Two ITC TT 9 pt/12 pt Book/Bookita/ Bold