TIMELINE SECTION FOR MAIN FEATURE STORY

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN

Victorian 1800's
Victorian design emerged in the early 1800's in England. Artwork was created to
celebrate progress and social/economic advancement. More wealth = more ornament =
more social status. The Industrial Revolution created surpluses in production and the birth
of Advertising emerged— Posters were flourishing by 1870. Victorian design bastardized
type, marking them flamboyant and elaborate. Bold poster style types, like slab serifs
were designed to grab attention. Victorian design is inspired by the decorative
illuminations and ornate styles of the scribes, Gothic and Baroque.

Arts and Crafts Movement 1880~1890
The Industrial Revolution separated humans from their own creativity and individualism; 
the worker was a cog in the wheel of progress, living in an environment of shoddy
machine-made goods. The Arts and Crafts Movements sought to reestablish the ties
between beautiful work and the worker, returning to honesty in design not to be found in
mass-produced items. The Arts & Crafts Movement was a reaction against the pompous
style of High Victorian, and emerged through small workshops in England. Writer,
designer and central figure of the Arts & Crafts Movement, William Morris
ultimately set new standards for type and composition as well as tapestries, furniture
and stained glass.

Aesthetic Movement 1890’s

This movement was a loose knit group of “book builders” and typographers whose goal
was to revive historical models for contemporary applications. They reprised Old Style
faces that had been lost to earlier movements. Medieval references were present in
decorative letterforms, but new serifs, san serifs and swash alphabets were being
developed for type foundries.

Art Nouveau 1890~1914

The first international design style inspired by nature and richly ornamental. Type was
not a static medium, but entwined in the design. Art Nouveau’s graceful integration of
type and art is clearly one of its most memorable qualities. This style is a derivative of
Baroque and Rococo indulgences and the Arts and Crafts Movement of William Morris,
Art Nouveau became popular across Europe and in the United States. Art Nouveau
remained popular until about the time of World War I, and was ultimately replaced by the
Art Deco style.
* Aubrey Beardsley, Gustav Klimt, Alphonse Mucha.

Expressionism 1900’s
Expressionism was distinguished by its raw, simple, almost crude, primitivism that was
very subtractive—deformation was used to heighten the emotion level/response. It
espoused that life should be stripped bare and reduced to it essentials. This movement
was influenced by the inevitability of world war in Germany, the rise of industrialization,
and the new power of capitalism.
Note: In Germany, 1905 the Sachplakat (object poster) was a reaction to the
excesses of Art Nouveau; this minimalist poster genre is a simple, clean, straightforward
approach to advertising product. Its elements consist of, the product, a logo and a bold
line of type.

Fauvism 1905-1908
The first of the major avant-garde movements in European, Fauvism was characterized
by paintings that used intensely vivid, non-naturalistic and exuberant colors. Paul
Gauguin's style and his use of color were especially strong influences on future
movements.

Cubism 1907~1920
This highly influential style began an immense creative explosion—created principally
by the painters Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque in Paris, it emphasized the flat, two-
dimensional surface and used multiple angles of vision and simultaneous representation
of disjointed planes—stretching the notion of space. Cubist strongly influenced design by
the introduction of collage techniques, which quickly became popular in poster design—
termed “mixed medium.” Cubism had run its course by the end of World War I, but
among the movements it directly influenced Futurism, Constructivism, and, to
some degree, Expressionism.

Futurism 1909~1924
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti founded futurism in 1909. Futurists were closely networked
with poets and writers. Some of the most interesting graphic experimentation came not at
the hands of painters and graphic artists, but from Futurists poets who rejected
typographic conventions. They supported the war, the machine age and were fascinated
with speed. Futurists were strongly influenced by the capabilities of the camera and its
shutter speed—echoing their preoccupation with motion. The futurists' representation of
forms in motion influenced many painters, including Marcel Duchamp and Robert
Delaunay, and such movements as Cubism and Russian Constructivism.
Note: This is where David Carson’s extreme, radical post-modern design is
inspired.

Constructivism 1913~1919
A Russian art movement advocating the use of clean design. Constructivist art is very
geometric. It is usually experimental, rarely emotional. The art is often very reductive as
well, paring the artwork down to its basic elements. Constructivists sought an art of order,
which would reject the past and lead to a world of more understanding, unity, and peace.
Modern avant-garde found kindred sensibilities in Dada, Futurism, Cubism and other
isms.
Note: Constructivists typography developed its distinctive look—letters and
words at right angles framed by bold rules and boarders printed in one or two colors—in
part because the limited typecase materials. After the war, the nation was plagued with
shortages of printing material, paper, ink and type.
* El Lissitzky
Dada 1916~1922
Dada was a literary and artistic movement born in Zurich, Europe. Dada used
photomontage in publication layouts eschewing conventional formats and established
hierarchies of headlines and subheads. Columns of justified type were skewed beyond
conventional margins, multiple type weights and faces from different type families were
used unharmoniously in a single composition. This willful typographic anarchy reflected
the chaos in the wake of the most devastating war to date, the Great War. Artists used any
public forum they could find to (metaphorically) spit on nationalism, rationalism,
materialism and any other -ism that they felt had contributed to a senseless war. Dada
was, officially, not a movement, its artists not artists and its art not art.
Dada work emphasized the absurdity of life. For example, Marcel Duchamp
"improved" the Mona Lisa by painting a copy and adding a mustache. He also signed his
name on a snow shovel and called it art. Dada self-destructed when it was in danger of
becoming "acceptable".
Note: For something that supposedly meant nothing, Dada certainly created a lot
of offshoots. In addition to spawning numerous literary journals, Dada influenced
Constructivism and was directly responsible for Surrealism. Dadaists are credited for
inventing photomontage, and have had a strong influence on Pop Art, which was
sometimes called neo-Dada.
Dada is derivative of Abstraction and Expressionism followed by Cubism and, to
a lesser extent, Futurism. Dada’s most notable contribution to art, that assemblage,
collage, photomontage and the use of ready made objects all gained wide acceptance due
to their use.
John Heartfield, Kurt Schwitters Hannah Höch

Merz 1924
Kurt Schwitters, not an accepted Dadaist, created a nonpolitical offshoot called "Merz." 
Schwitters work applied visual techniques to his sound poetry, making
the language malleable, unusual and even amusing. His art was that
collected from the streets. His studio, Merzbau was cover from top to bottom with 
montages, collages and assemblages. He influenced the way graphic designers thought 
about type and composition. 
* Raoul Hausmann, Kurt Schwitters

Bauhaus 1919~1933
A school of art and design founded in 1919 in Germany with the aim of producing new 
architecture that combined artistic design, craftsmanship and newly emerging machine 
technology. Their concerns included urban planning, housing, and the development of 
high­quality, utilitarian mass production of consumer goods. Bauhaus was the mecca for 
progressive designers, including Constructivist El Lissitsky and Duch de Stijl, founder 
Theo van Doesburg. Germany at the time favored the serif, and the more complicated 
gothic fonts, the Bauhaus typography and design was based in the combination of simple 
optical forms—san serif fonts, geometric shapes, diagonal rules and primary colors. Its 
influence in design has lasted to this day. The Nazis closed the school in 1933, and many
of the artists subsequently immigrated to the United States in search of intellectual
freedom.

Supremetism  1913~1919
Russian art movement founded by Kasimir Malevich in Moscow, parallel to
constructivism. Malevich drew Alexander Rodchenko and El Lissitsky to his
revolutionary, nonobjective art. In Malevich's words, suprematism sought "to liberate art
from the ballast of the representational world. It consisted of geometrical shapes flatly
painted on the pure canvas surface. Malevich's white square on a white ground embodied
the movement's principles. Suprematism, through its dissemination by the Bauhaus,
deeply influenced the development of modern European art, architecture, and industrial
design.

de Stijl 1917~1931
The de Stijl movement, Dutch for “The Style,” was launched in the Netherlands, founded
by Theo van Doesburg, Piet Mondrian and several others. Europe was a bit of a mess
after WWI and in response to the environment of chaos came a Movement where
order was valued above all else. Mondrian paintings are the wellspring from which de
Stijl’s philosophy and visual forms developed. They advocated a purification of art,
eliminating subject matter in favor of vertical and horizontal elements, and the use of
primary colors and non-colors, black, gray and white. The prime figures, Mondrian
and van Doesburg, had a falling out over the contentious issues of diagonal lines
and use of the color green. Still, De Stijl’s imprint has lasted the longest, the GRID
became the adopted underpinning for nearly all modern print, asymmetrical placement,
clean, organized, straightforward, no-nonsense presentation and the use of rules, boxes,
lines and tinted blocks to create balance and space. Their work exerted tremendous
influence on the Bauhaus and the International Style.
NOTE: De Stijl Theo van Doesburg, published “The End of Art,” in 1926 and
David Carson published “The End in Print,” 1995. Ironically, the results of both and their
rebellion are considered exemplary.

Swiss Design/ International Typographic Style’s 1950
A group of artists from Switzerland founded the Swiss School of the Swiss Movement.
They adopted the de Stijl approach to visual design. Their goal was to further refine it and
in the process reduce it to its most minimal components. Sometimes referred to as Swiss
Design or ITS, International Typographic Style, their legacy to today’s contemporary
design is their clean, minimal sans serif typography and grid.
Note: Swiss design influenced the New York School of Design in the 1960, Paul
Rand, Milton Glaser, Bradbury Thompson and Soul Bass.
The ITS objective clarity won converts throughout the world. The visual characteristics of 
this international style included a visual unity of design achieved by asymmetrical 
organization on a mathematically constructed grid, using only sans­serif type. In this 
paradigm, the designer defined his or her role not as an artist but as an objective conduit 
for spreading important information between components of society. Achieving clarity 
and order was the ideal. The roots of the International Typographic Style grew from de 
Stijl, Bauhaus, and the New Typography of the 1920s and 1930s.

The New Typography
This movement surfaced after World War I, and reflected a utopian view that art was not 
an entertainment for the elite but a utilitarian product for the masses. Type, which became 
both a symbol and a tool of transformation, was one of the first indicators of this “new 
spirit.”  Its underlying principles were the rejection of tradition, the use of geometric 
types, design following content, organized and structured pages, and a preference for 
photography over illustration. The design style, which flourished in Russia, Germany, 
Italy, and Eastern Europe was heavily influenced by Constructivism and Futurism.

Art Deco 1920-1930

Emphasized sleek, linear decorative designs that reflected modern technology. An art
movement involving a mix of modern decorative art styles that’s main characteristics
were derived from various avant-garde painting styles of the early twentieth century. Art
Deco works exhibit aspects of Cubism, Russian Constructivism and Italian Futurism—
with abstraction, distortion, and simplification, particularly geometric shapes and highly
intense colors. The letters were bold and in many cases type served as a surrogate
illustration. Type was used as a frame or boarder— letters were geometric and stylishly.
* Tamara de Lempicka, Cassandre.

Surrealism 1924~1950
Surrealism, founded in Paris was an art movement influenced by Freudianism and
dedicated to the expression of imagination as revealed in dreams, free of the conscious
and free of convention.
* Joan Miro, Salvador Dali, Jean Arp, Max Ernst, Giorgio de Chirico, Man Ray, Rene
Magritte.

Abstract Expressionism 1946~1960

Emerging in the 1940s in New York City and flourishing in the Fifties, Abstract
Expressionism is regarded by many as the golden age of American art. The movement is
marked by its use of brushstrokes and texture, massive canvases, and powerful emotions
through the act of painting itself.

The movement was enormously successful both critically and commercially. The result
was such that New York came to replace Paris as the center for contemporary art and the
repercussions of this extraordinarily influential movement can still be felt thirty years
after its heyday.
• Franz Kline, Jackson Pollack, William de Kooning, Robert Motherwell.

The New York School 1940~1960
A group of American poets, painters and musicians active in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s 
in New York City. The poets, painters, composers, and musicians often drew inspiration 
from Surrealism and the contemporary avant­garde art movements, in particular action 
painting, abstract expressionism, Jazz, improvisational theater, avant­garde music, and the 
interaction of friends in the New York City art world's vanguard circle.
* Paul Rand, Alexey Brodovich, Henry Wolf, Herb Lubalin, George Lois

Minimalism~1950
A painting style that attempted to throw off any need for social comment, self-expression
and allusions to history, politics and religion—in fact, imagery of any kind—in favor of
paintings that stood on their own as objects of interest and beauty.
Minimal Art emerged as a movement in the 1950s and continued through the
Sixties and Seventies. It is a term used to describe paintings and sculpture that thrive on
simplicity in both content and form.
* Ellsworth Kelly, Frank Stella.

Pop Art 1950~1960

Art using commonplace objects, such as soup cans, comic strips and hamburgers, as
subjects. The movement was marked by a fascination with popular culture reflecting the
affluence in post-war society. It was most prominent in American art but soon spread to
Britain. Pop Art is a direct descendant of Dadaism.
*Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Roy Hamilton, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg,
Claes Oldenburg.

Op Art~Psychedelic Art 1950~1960

Op Art relies on optical tricks or illusions to evoke visual responses. Inspired by
psychedelic drugs, music and the counter culture. Op artists used bold colors and
geometric designs in ways that made their pictures seem to move or vibrate. Op Art is a
form of abstract art and is closely connected to the Kinetic and Constructivist Art
movements.
NOTE: After 'The Responsive Eye' exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in
New York in 1965 the term became a household name and the style was soon
appropriated by fashion designers and high street stores.
Victor Moscoso created powerful posters influenced by Art Nouveau for Bob
Dylan, Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix, Rolling Stones, and The Doors.

Conceptual Art 1960~1970

Conceptual artists used nontraditional art media and materials in order to focus on ideas
rather than objects. Conceptual artists used text as well as photography, publications,
drawings, video, film, and performance to focus on an inquiry into art practice and
meaning. Conceptual works could be seen in nontraditional art contexts like books,
magazines, mail, advertisements, and billboards.

Photorealism 1960~1970
This movement emerged in the United States and Britain in the late 1960s and 1970s. The
subject matter, usually everyday scenes, is portrayed in an extremely detailed, exacting
style.
* Chuck Close, Richard Estes

Graffiti Art 1980

The practice of writing or drawing on public spaces such as walls, sidewalks, billboards
and subways. In the early 1980s, graffiti was embraced by contemporary artists, and
moved from the street to the gallery—the Museum of American Graffiti opening in 1989.
* Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring.

Massurrealism 1992
Coined by the American Artist James Seehafer, Massurrealism stands for a fusion of the
dream like visions of Surrealism, Pop Art and New Media Technology—as well as for an
expression of the Hyper-real. Influenced by the postmodern time mass-media
communications where examples of surreal imagery is present in print media, movies and
music videos without the conscious notice of the observer that he is looking at a surreal
image/scene.
* James Seehafer, Salvatore Lodico, F. Michael Morris, Salvatore Lodico, Jr, Marketta
Leino, Ginnie Gardiner, Domenic Ali, Caplyn Dor, Alex Filipchenko, Peter Steinlechner,
Cecil Touchon

Thrasher 1994
An American art movement founded by David Carson, called “Thrasher,” “Beach
Culture,” or sometimes, “ Skateboard Culture.” David Carson shook the industry in the
early nineties with his radical design and in Ray Gun magazine, garnering nearly equal
amounts of criticism and acclaim—detractors initially deemed his style a fad.
Carson is a master of collage; he melds the typographic with the visual—breaking just
about every typographic rule ever written. He has been quoted by, Print magazine,
“brilliant,” and Graphis magazine, “Master of Typography.” He is famous for his personal
quote, “Don't mistake legibility for communication.”
Carson’s book published in 1996, “The End of Print” is now in its fifth printing
and has sold over 125,000 copies worldwide, making it the biggest-selling design book of
all time.

2000 and Beyond

The variety of materials and formats that contemporary artists use to make their work 
reflect the diverse and complex ways in which they experience and respond to American 
life and the issues and concerns of our times are in contrast very similar to the explosive 
turn of the century. Today, art is influenced by technology, global networking, war, and 
the ability to alter and transform human appearance through plastic surgery. Hypertext 
has become a new medium, and cyberspace a new public space for art. As the millennium 
progresses, the questions of what is art and what is American continue to preoccupy 
artists and society at large.