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E X H IB IT
Clockwise from top: Non-Linear Editing, design by Will Holder (2002). Kay Rosen (1988). Judson Group by Claes Oldenburg (1959). The Perfect Fool by David Robbins (1989). The Store of Claes Oldenburg by Sturtevant (1967).
desktop oct/nov 14 — desktopmag.com.au
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Clockwise from top: The Street by Claes Oldenburg (1960). Richard Hamilton: Paintings etc (1964). The Store by Claes Oldenburg (1961). Roy Lichtenstein, photo by Dennis Hopper (1964). Kay Rosen: Ed Paintings (1989).
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F E ATU RE
ALL AUSTRALIAN GRAPHICS C U LT U R A L
Nearly 30 years separate the practices of All Australian Graphics (originally founded by Mimmo Cozzolino and Con Aslanis) and Toko (Eva Dijkstra and Michael Lugmayr), and their visual principles sit at opposite ends of the style spectrum. Yet there are a couple of points where the studios intercept. Both are formed of uprooted immigrants with work that circulates the idea of identity – Toko, which tests localised styles with each project, and All Australian Graphics, which actively interrogated Australian identity as a whole, taking what its founders saw in society and reinterpreting it playfully through their work.
Left: Mimmo Cozzolino with AAG Kangaroo folio case designed by Con Aslanis (1976). Photograph: Tim Handfield. Right: Toko’s exhibition design and environmental graphics for the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale, Australian Pavillion with Anthony Burke, and Gerard Reinmuth.
desktop oct/nov 14 — desktopmag.com.au
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TOKO IDENTITY
“Our beliefs... have combined to form an intellectual identity based on professional progress, one that is often challenged in an increasingly traditional Australian environment.” — Michael Lugmayr
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How has the role of the ‘immigrant’ identity (as an outsider) affected your work? Toko: For us, it is an interesting, challenging and seriously complex idea – the absorption of operating in context. We worked in three continents, of which Europe (more specifically The Netherlands) sculpted us the most – it was, after all, where we were educated and where we enjoyed our first steps as designers. After The Netherlands, we moved to Chicago, and it was there that we experienced working in an ‘alien’ environment for the first time.
Like sponges, we absorbed all the US stood for and rather quickly incorporated US vernacular into our graphic output. We truly enjoyed this new insight and spent hours documenting street life and visual cultures, but when we moved back to The Netherlands something was askew. We realised that our ‘new’ work really did not resonate with prospective Dutch clients and, eventually, ourselves. We had let ourselves get carried away. In the US, we only adjusted to context and simply forgot about our creative principles and our conceptual education. This is
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F E ATU RE This page: Ed Fella has archives hundreds of his posters designed for art galleries, university announcements and cultural events. Opposite: Hey Studio’s event programs for Agenda CCCB.
desktop oct/nov 14 — desktopmag.com.au
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“…if I were 45 years younger, I’d being doing something altogether different. I would be a 21st century designer and you would see me on trendlist.org…” — Ed Fella
this awareness. On the other hand, I had a very good education in a Detroit arts high school, during the mid 50s, in the ideas of the Bauhaus and the experimental formalism of early 20th century modern art – taking things apart and rearranging them in different (and sometimes contradictory) ways, always in search of ‘new’ styles. My two years at Cranbrook in 1985 to 87 allowed me full-time access to this ‘deconstructivist’ practice, as it came to be called. By now, doing commercial projects was no longer necessary for me, so I continued building a body of work using this approach and do so to this day. But if I were 45 years younger, I’d being doing something altogether different. I would be a 21st century designer and you would see me on trendlist.org! Already, we have begun talking about trends, which is one of the main
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‘symptoms’ of a design principle or theory. From both of your ‘principles’, there are derivative trends – new collections of minimalist posters are almost daily occurrences online, and the most superficial aspects of deconstructivism are also very popular approaches for young designers. What would you say an awareness of theory and principle – in a historical and practical sense – does to the integrity of a finished piece of work? Fella: I don’t have much of a problem with trends, in fact I always rather liked them. I have certainly followed them, and been part of some of them. In a way, they give you a view into the larger wave of all the work that’s being produced in the time between the recent past and the present. You can be part of a ‘trend’, in needing to do something necessarily recognisable or, if you choose, by trying to find a way around
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