Why Graphic Culture Matters by Rick Poynor
Why Graphic Culture Matters is the title of the newest book by British design writer, critic and lecturer Rick Poynor. Published by Occasional Papers, the book is a collection of 46 “essays, polemics and proposals about art, design and visual communication”.
Topics include the commercial takeover of design, design criticism and history, the interplay of word and image, design celebrity, the canon, graphic authorship, critical forms of practice, and the enduring intimacy between art and design.
Sara De Bondt provided the book design, assisted by Leroy Meyer. For the cover, they brought together three contemporary typeface designs that all happen to have names starting with the letter M.
The title makes use of the power of Maax Raw Stencil (2017), a graphic variant of Damien Gautier’s extensive sans-serif series. It’s set with one word per line, and in alternating line colors, putting emphasis on every single word. The double t ligature with its shared and unbroken crossbar feels like a band aid that brings some relief to the sliced-up letterforms. The subtitle in Muoto (2021), another release by French foundry 205TF, echoes the four colors of the title, here in the form of a horizontal gradient fill. Lastly, the author’s name is added in Mule. This smoothened interpretation of a Modern/Scotch takes inspiration from an early-20th century specimen by the Inland foundry. Mule was designed by Samira Schneuwly at ECAL in 2022.
