Copyright © 1947 by Paul Rand.

Foreword to the New Edition copyright © 2014 by Michael Bierut.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available.

ISBN: 978-0-8118-7544-8 (pb)
ISBN: 978-1-4521-3065-1 (ebook)

Original edition published by Wittenborn Schultz, New York, 1947.
Third edition published by Studio Vista, London, 1970.
This edition published by Chronicle Books, San Francisco, 2014.

Set in Linotype Bodoni Book

Chronicle Books LLC
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www.chroniclebooks.com

Contents

Foreword to the New Edition 6

Preface to the Third Edition 7

Preface to the First Edition 8

The Beautiful and the Useful 9

The Designer’s Problem 11

The Symbol in Advertising 13

Versatility of the Symbol 18

The Role of Humor 22

Imagination and the Image 36

Reader Participation 48

Yesterday and Today 74

Typographic Form and Expression 76

About the Author

Foreword to the New Edition

When Paul Rand sat down in 1947 to write the book that would become Thoughts on Design, he was thirty-three years old. The designer, born in Brooklyn and largely self-taught, was already a sensation. Appointed chief art director at the agency William H. Weintraub & Co. just six years before, he was credited with revolutionizing the clichéd and buttoned-down world of Madison Avenue by introducing the bracing clarity of European modernism. His signature appeared on book covers, posters, and ads.

He was young. His logos for IBM, ABC, and Westinghouse—all would be incorporated in the book’s subsequent editions—were still in the future. So were his induction into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame, his position on the faculty at the Yale School of Art, the AIGA Medal, and all the accolades that would establish him as his country’s greatest designer by the time he died in 1996. Thirty-three years old was, perhaps, early for a book, but Rand was ready.

Paul Rand admitted all his life that he was insecure as a writer. It was his passion for his subject that made him such an effective one. In his day job on Madison Avenue, he had learned the virtues of saying more with less. As a result, Thoughts on Design is almost as simple as a child’s storybook: short, clear sentences; vivid, playful illustrations. Ostensibly, it is nothing more than a how-to book, illustrated with examples from the designer’s own portfolio. But in reality Thoughts on Design is a manifesto, a call to arms and a ringing definition of what makes good design good. This, perhaps, has never been said better than in the book’s most quoted passage, the graceful free verse that begins Rand’s essay “The Beautiful and the Useful.” Graphic design, he says, no matter what else it achieves, “is not good design if it is irrelevant.”

László Moholy-Nagy said of Paul Rand, “He is an idealist and a realist, using the language of the poet and business man.” That balance between passion and practicality was never displayed better than in Thoughts on Design. Its message is still relevant. We are lucky that the designers of today and tomorrow have this new edition.

Michael Bierut, New York City 2014

Preface to the Third Edition

In this edition of Thoughts on Design, the writer has made certain emendations. However, these do not materially alter his original thoughts or intentions. It is for the purpose of clarifying some of the ideas and enriching the visual material that a portion of the text has been revised and a number of illustrations have been replaced.

When this book was first written, it was the writer’s intention to demonstrate the validity of those principles which, by and large, have guided artists (designers) since the time of Polycletus. The author believes that it is only in the application of those timeless principles that one can even begin to achieve a semblance of quality in one’s work or understand the transient nature of the “fashionable.” It is the continuing relevance of these principles that he wishes to emphasize, especially to those students and designers who have grown up in a world of pop and minimal art.

The author is indebted to all the advertisers, publishers, and manufacturers who have provided the opportunities for creating the visual material shown in this book. He also wishes to express his thanks to the typesetters and proofreaders for their help, and to the publishers for making a new edition of this book available.

P. R., Weston, Connecticut January 1970

Preface to the First Edition

This book attempts to arrange in some logical order certain principles governing contemporary advertising design. The pictorial examples used to illustrate these principles are taken from work in which I was directly engaged. This choice was made deliberately and with no intention to imply that it represents the best translation of these principles into visual terms. There are artists and designers of great talent whose work would be perhaps more suitable. But I do not feel justified in speaking for them nor secure in attempting to explain their work without any possibility of misrepresentation. This is not to say that this book is purely the result of my efforts alone. I am indebted to many people—painters, architects, designers of past and present—for many theories and concepts. Many philosophers and writers, particularly John Dewey and Roger Fry, have helped to crystallize my thinking on the subject and to accelerate such progress as I have made. I have tried to pay my debt by quoting some of them.

P. R., New York City January 1946

The Beautiful and the Useful

Graphic design —

which fulfills esthetic needs,

complies with the laws of form

and the exigencies of two-dimensional space;

which speaks in semiotics, sans-serifs,

and geometries;

which abstracts, transforms, translates,

rotates, dilates, repeats, mirrors,

groups, and regroups —

is not good design

if it is irrelevant.

Graphic design —

which evokes the symmetria of Vitruvius,

the dynamic symmetry of Hambidge,

the asymmetry of Mondrian;

which is a good gestalt;

which is generated by intuition or by computer,

by invention or by a system of co-ordinates —

is not good design

if it does not co-operate

as an instrument

in the service of communication.

Visual communications of any kind, whether persuasive or informative, from billboards to birth announcements, should be seen as the embodiment of form and function: the integration of the beautiful and the useful. In an advertisement, copy, art, and typography are seen as a living entity; each element integrally related, in harmony with the whole, and essential to the execution of the idea. Like a juggler, the designer demonstrates his skills by manipulating these ingredients in a given space. Whether this space takes the form of advertisements, periodicals, books, printed forms, packages, industrial products, signs, or TV billboards, the criteria are the same.

That the separation of form and function, of concept and execution, is not likely to produce objects of esthetic value has been repeatedly demonstrated. Similarly, it has been shown that the system which regards esthetics as irrelevant, which separates the artist from his product, which fragments the work of the individual, which creates by committee, and which makes mincemeat of the creative process will, in the long run, diminish not only the product but the maker as well.

John Dewey, commenting on the relationship between fine art and useful or technological art, says: “That many, perhaps most, of the articles and utensils made at present for use are not genuinely esthetic happens, unfortunately, to be true. But it is true for reasons that are foreign to the relation of the ‘beautiful’ and ‘useful’ as such. Wherever conditions are such as to prevent the act of production from being an experience in which the whole creature is alive and in which he possesses his living through enjoyment, the product will lack something of being esthetic. No matter how useful it is for special and limited ends, it will not be useful in the ultimate degree—that of contributing directly and liberally to an expanding and enriched life.”[1]

The esthetic requirements to which Dewey refers are, it seems to me, exemplified in the work of the Shakers. Their religious beliefs provided the fertile soil in which beauty and utility could flourish. Their spiritual needs found expression in the design of fabrics, furniture, and utensils of great esthetic value. These products are a document of the simple life of the people, their asceticism, their restraint, their devotion to fine craftsmanship, and their feeling for proportion, space, and order.

Ideally, beauty and utility are mutually generative. In the past, rarely was beauty an end in itself. The magnificent stained-glass windows of Chartres were no less utilitarian than was the Parthenon or the Pyramid of Cheops. The function of the exterior decoration of the great Gothic cathedrals was to invite entry; the rose windows inside provided the spiritual mood. Interpreted in the light of our own experiences, this philosophy still prevails.

Parthenon, Athens 447–432 B.C.

1. John Dewey, Art as Experience, “Ethereal Things,” p. 26.

The Designer’s Problem

An erroneous conception of the graphic designer’s function is to imagine that in order to produce a “good layout”[1] all he need do is make a pleasing arrangement of miscellaneous elements. What is implied is that this may be accomplished simply by pushing these elements around, until something happens. At best, this procedure involves the time-consuming uncertainties of trial and error, and at worst, an indifference to plan, order, or discipline.

The designer does not, as a rule, begin with some preconceived idea. Rather, the idea is (or should be) the result of careful study and observation, and the design a product of that idea. In order, therefore, to achieve an effective solution to his problem, the designer must necessarily go through some sort of mental process.[2] Consciously or not, he analyzes, interprets, formulates. He is aware of the scientific and technological developments in his own and kindred fields. He improvises, invents, or discovers new techniques and combinations. He co-ordinates and integrates his material so that he may restate his problem in terms of ideas, signs, symbols, pictures. He unifies, simplifies, and eliminates superfluities. He symbolizes—abstracts from his material by association and analogy. He intensifies and reinforces his symbol with appropriate accessories to achieve clarity and interest. He draws upon instinct and intuition. He considers the spectator, his feelings and predilections.

The designer is primarily confronted with three classes of material: a) the given material: product, copy, slogan, logotype, format, media, production process; b) the formal material: space, contrast, proportion, harmony, rhythm, repetition, line, mass, shape, color, weight, volume, value, texture; c) the psychological material: visual perception and optical illusion problems, the spectators’ instincts, intuitions, and emotions as well as the designer’s own needs.

As the material furnished him is often inadequate, vague, uninteresting, or otherwise unsuitable for visual interpretation, the designer’s task is to re-create or restate the problem. This may involve discarding or revising much of the given material. By analysis (breaking down of the complex material into its simplest components . . . the how, why, when, and where) the designer is able to begin to state the problem.

1. Because of its popular acceptance, the term layout is used. Unfortunately, a layout is deprecatingly interpreted as a blueprint for an illustration. I should prefer to use composition in the same sense in which it is used in painting.

2. The reader may wish to refer to R. H. Wilenski, The Modern Movement in Art, for a description of the artist’s mental processes in creating a work of art.

The Symbol in Advertising

Because advertising art, in the end, deals with the spectator, and because it is the function of advertising to influence him, it follows that the designer’s problem is twofold: to anticipate the spectator’s reactions and to meet his own esthetic needs. He must therefore discover a means of communication between himself and the spectator (a condition with which the easel painter need not concern himself). The problem is not simple; its very complexity virtually dictates the solution—that is, the discovery of an image universally comprehensible, one which translates abstract ideas into visual forms.

It is in symbolic, visual terms that the designer ultimately realizes his perceptions and experiences; and it is in a world of symbols that man lives. The symbol is thus the common language between artist and spectator. Webster defines the symbol as “that which stands for or suggests something else by reason of relationship, association, convention, or accidental but not intentional resemblance; especially, a visible sign of something invisible, as an idea, a quality or totality such as a state or a church; an emblem; as, the lion is the symbol of courage; the cross is the symbol of Christianity. ‘A symbol is a representation which does not aim at being a reproduction.’ (Goblet d’Alvielle).”

Words like simplified, stylized, geometric, abstract, two-dimensional, flat, non-representational, non-mimetic are commonly associated, sometimes incorrectly, with the term symbol. It is true that the depiction of most distinctive symbols does fit the image these words help to characterize visually; but it is not true that the symbol has to be simplified (etc.) in order to qualify as a symbol. The fact that some of the best symbols are simplified images merely points to the effectiveness of simplicity but not to the meaning of the word per se. In essence, it is not what it looks like but what it does that defines a symbol. A symbol may be depicted as an “abstract” shape, a geometric figure, a photograph, an illustration, a letter of the alphabet, or a numeral. Thus, a five-pointed star, the picture of a little dog listening to his master’s voice, a steel engraving of George Washington, or the Eiffel Tower itself—are all symbols!

Religious and secular institutions have clearly demonstrated the power of the symbol as a means of communication. It is significant that the crucifix, aside from its religious implications, is a demonstration of perfect form as well—a union of the aggressive vertical (male) and the passive horizontal (female). It is not too farfetched to infer that these formal relations have at least something to do with its enduring quality. Note the curious analogy between Occidental and Oriental thought from the following excerpts: Rudolf Koch, in The Book of Signs, comments: “In the origin of the Cross, God and earth are combined and are in harmony . . . from two simple lines a complete sign has been evolved. The Cross is by far the earliest of all signs and is found everywhere, quite apart from the concepts of Christianity.” In the Book of Changes (Chou Yih) it is stated: “The fathomlessness of the male and female principles (Yang and Yin) is called God.” This conception is illustrated by the Taichi symbol expressing the “two regulating powers which together create all the phenomena of Nature.” The essence of Chinese philosophy is revealed in the expression: “All things are produced by the action of the male and female principles.”

. . . In this illustration the form is intensified by dramatic narrative association. The literal meaning changes according to context; the formal quality remains unchanged.

Magazine cover red and black on white 1940

Booklet cover black and white 1939

Magazine advertisement Alfred A. Knopf February 1945

Versatility of the Symbol

The same symbol is potentially a highly versatile device, which can be used to illustrate many different ideas. By juxtaposition, association, and analogy, the designer is able to manipulate it, alter its meaning, and exploit its visual possibilities.

Distinguishing between the literal and plastic meaning of images, Ozenfant declares: “Every form has its specific mode of expression (the language of plastic) independent of its purely ideological significance (language of the sign).”[1] The circle as opposed to the square, for instance, as a pure form evokes a specific esthetic sensation; ideologically it is the symbol for eternity, without beginning or end. A red circle may be interpreted as the symbol of the sun, the Japanese battle flag, a stop sign, an ice-skating rink, or a special brand of coffee . . . depending on its context.

Perfume bottle, gold wire and crystal 1944

Trademark Colorforms 1959

Trademark Consolidated Cigar Co. 1959

Trademark American Broadcasting Co. 1962

Brochure black and yellow, Autocar 1942

Illustration GHP Cigar Company 1952

1. Amedee Ozenfant, Foundations of Modern Art, p. 249.

The Role of Humor

Readership surveys demonstrate the magnetic force of humor in the field of visual communication, in advertising, editing, and in a multitude of miscellaneous design problems. The reference is not principally to cartoon strip advertisements, nor to out-and-out gags, but to a more subtle variety, one indigenous to the design itself and achieved by means of juxtaposition, association, size, relationship, proportion, space, or special handling.

The visual message which professes to be profound or elegant often boomerangs as mere pretension; and the frame of mind which looks at humor as trivial and flighty mistakes the shadow for the substance. In short, the notion that the humorous approach to visual communication is undignified or belittling is sheer nonsense.

This misconception has been discredited by those advertisers and publishers who have successfully exploited humor as a means of creating an atmosphere of confidence, goodwill, good fellowship, and the right frame of mind toward an idea or product. Radio and TV commercials have made tremendous strides in the use of humor as a potent sales device. And, as an aid to understanding serious problems in war training, as an effective weapon in safety posters,[1] war bond selling, and morale building, humor was neglected neither by government nor civilian agencies during the Second World War.

Stressing the profound effects of entertainment, Plato, in The Republic, declares: “Therefore do not use compulsion, but let early education be rather a sort of amusement . . .” The arts of ancient China,[2] India, and Persia reflect a humorous spirit in the design of masks, ceramics, and paintings. American advertising in its infancy also demonstrated this tendency toward humor: the cigar store Indian, the medicine man. And that humor is a product of serious contemporary thought is revealed in the significant paintings and sculpture of our time. “True humor,” says Thomas Carlyle, “springs not more from the head than from the heart; it is not contempt, its essence is love, it issues not in laughter, but in still smiles, which lie far deeper.”

Cover design, red and green American Institute of Graphic Arts 1968

One sheet poster full color, Interfaith Movement 1954

Magazine cover pink, tan, and black 1954

Illustration Smith Kline & French 1945

Exhibition poster IBM Gallery, full color 1970

Newspaper advertisement GHP Cigar Company 1957

The kind of humor expressed by the “Dubonnet man” (originated by Cassandre) is inherent in the design itself. The “funny” face and general attitude seem to suggest rather than illustrate a quality of conviviality. To adapt this figure for an American audience, the problem was to impart this same spirit without altering the original visual conception.

Magazine advertisement detail, Dubonnet Corporation 1942

Magazine advertisement montage, full color 1943

Poster color montage, Apparel Arts 1939

Poster, color montage Museum of Modern Art project, 1941

. . . The “visual pun,” in which a double meaning is projected graphically, can be as informative as it is entertaining.

Magazine advertisement black and white, Talens & Sons 1942

Cover design red and black 1949

Folder, red, green, black Smith Kline & French 1946

Cover black and white, Direction 1941

Magazine cover red and green 1939

1. Printers’ Ink, December 28, 1945.

2. Roger Fry, Transformations, “Some Aspects of Chinese Art,” pp. 79–81.

Imagination and the Image

Frequently, trite ideas or unimaginative translation of those ideas is the result not of poor subject matter but of poor interpretation of a problem. In the absence of a fresh, visual solution, subject matter sometimes becomes the scapegoat. Such difficulties may arise if: a) the designer has interpreted a commonplace idea with a commonplace image; b) he has failed to resolve the problem of integrating form and content; or c) he has failed to interpret the problem as a two-dimensional organization in a given space. He has thus deprived his visual image of the potential to suggest, perhaps, more than the eye can see. And he has denied himself the opportunity of saying the commonplace in an uncommonplace way.

Roger Fry, commenting on the problem of integrating representational and plastic elements, states: “This may, perhaps, give us a hint as to the nature of such combinations of two arts, namely, that co-operation is most possible where neither of them are pushed to the fullest possibilities of expression, where in both a certain freedom is left to the imagination, where we are moved rather by suggestion than statement.”[1]

Visual statements such as illustrations which do not involve esthetic judgment and which are merely literal descriptions of reality can be neither intellectually stimulating nor visually distinctive. By the same token, the indiscriminate use of typefaces, geometric patterns, and “abstract” shapes (hand or computer generated) is self-defeating when they function merely as a vehicle for self-expression. The visual statement, on the other hand, which seeks to express the essence of an idea, and which is based on function, fantasy, and analytic judgment, is likely to be not only unique but meaningful and memorable as well.

In practice, when an advertisement is submitted for approval, it is prettied up with mat and cellophane and judged as an isolated fragment. Under such conditions, and in the absence of competition, the purely conventional type of illustration may seem quite effective. However, for an advertisement to hold its own in a competitive race, the designer must steer clear of visual clichés by some unexpected interpretation of the commonplace. He does this partly by simplifying, by abstracting, by symbolizing. If the resulting visual image is in any way ambiguous, it may be supplemented by one which is more clearly recognizable. In the examples which follow, the abstract, geometric forms (attention-arresting devices) tend to dominate, while the photographic images play a supporting role.

24-sheet poster 20th Century Fox 1950

Cover design blue, terra-cotta, black 1958

. . . There are, however, instances when recognizable images are of sufficient plastic expressiveness to make the addition of geometric or “abstract” shapes superfluous.

Brochure black and yellow, Autocar 1942

Advertisement tan and black, Jacqueline Cochran 1944

Magazine cover full color, Curtis Publishing Company 1956

Newspaper advertisement black and white, Ohrbach’s 1946

Magazine cover pink and olive green 1943

Magazine advertisement full color, Westinghouse 1963

Magazine cover black and green, Apparel Arts 1939

Book jacket Wittenborn & Schultz 1946

The virtue of the symbol, its ready availability, may, in the long run, prove to be disadvantageous if it is used indiscriminately. It should therefore be used in a manner that will not diminish its effectiveness.

What we commonly understand as “originality” depends on the successful integration of the symbol as a visual entity with all other elements, pointed to a particular problem, performing a specific function consistent with its form. Its use at the proper time and place is essential and its misuse will inevitably result in banality or mere affectation. The designer’s capacity to contribute to the effectiveness of the basic meaning of the symbol, by interpretation, addition, subtraction, juxtaposition, alteration, adjustment, association, intensification, and clarification, is parallel to those qualities which we call “original.”

The Coronet Brandy advertisements are based on a common object—the brandy snifter—in animated form. The dot pattern of the soda bottle was designed to suggest effervescence; the dotted background, in turn, is a visual extension of the bottle; the waiter is a variation of the snifter glass; the oval tray individualizes for Coronet the silver tray we used to see in liquor advertisements.

Magazine advertisement full color, Brandy Distillers 1943

1. Roger Fry Transformations, “Some Questions in Esthetics,” p. 24.

Reader Participation

It is a truism that the fundamental problem of the advertiser and publisher is to get the message into the reader’s mind. Commonplace images and unimaginative visualization afford the spectator little reason for becoming engrossed in an advertiser’s product. Radio and TV advertisers, who use media by which it is possible for studio and home spectators to take part in the proceedings, have discovered the value of audience participation. Producers of print advertising, on the other hand, must devise methods of engaging the eye and attention of the reader in a manner consistent with the printed form. Picture puzzles, cryptograms, quizzes, memory tests, and teaser devices have been employed to this end from time to time.

Contemporary advertising techniques, resulting from experiments and discoveries in the fields of psychology, art, and science, suggest many possibilities. Among the great contributions to visual thought is the invention of collage. Collage and montage permit the showing of seemingly unrelated objects or ideas as a single picture; they enable the designer to indicate simultaneous events or scenes which by more conventional methods would result in a series of isolated pictures. Compactness of the complex message in a single picture more readily enables the spectator to focus his attention on the advertiser’s message.

Contemporary as it may seem, the concept of simultaneity takes us back to ancient China. The Chinese, aware of the need for a means of expressing in one picture simultaneous actions or multiple events, devised a form of oblique projection. They also devised a means of showing one object behind, above, or below another, by free disposition of elements in a composition, completely disregarding the illusions of visual perspective. This was essentially a method of formalizing or “neutralizing” the object. It was a transformation resulting in formal arrangements rather than conventional illustration. In one sense montage and collage are integrated visual arrangements in space, and in another sense, absorbing visual tests which the spectator may perceive and decipher for himself. He may thus participate directly in the creative process.

Magazine advertisement full color 1946

Poster full color, Apparel Arts 1940

Magazine advertisement full color, Olivetti 1953

Magazine advertisement full color, Container Corporation 1954

Magazine advertisement full color, montage 1964

Magazine cover red and black 1939

Cover design full color, IBM 1964

The idea of the photogram or cameraless photography goes back as far as the 18th century. In our time the pioneers of photography without the use of a camera were Man Ray in France, Lissitzky in Russia, and Moholy-Nagy in Germany. One of the first to apply this technique in advertising art was the constructivist, El Lissitzky, who, in 1924, designed a poster for Pelikan inks. Picasso, at a later date, also made use of the photogram. In advertising, the photogram has yet to be fully exploited.

Although the effectiveness of the photogram depends chiefly on straightforward mechanical methods (light on sensitized paper), it offers the designer ample opportunity for esthetic, manual control. In a sense, it is not a picture of the object, but the object itself; and, as in stroboscopic photography, it makes picturization of continuous movement possible. Although some of its effects may be approximated with pen, brush, or scissors, the quality inherent in the subtle light modulations can be achieved only by means of the photogram. The following illustrations will help to point out the qualitative differences between the photogram and other techniques.

Package design photogram and color 1952

Book jacket photogram 1943

Book jacket blue and black, Wittenborn & Schultz 1951

Title page photomontage, Esquire 1938

Title page black and yellow, Esquire 1939

Book jacket black, red, green, and brown 1946

Poster red and black 1966

The emotional force generated by the repetition of words or pictures and the visual possibilities (as a means of creating texture, movement, rhythm, indicating equivalences for time and space) should not be minimized.

The following are but a few instances of our everyday experiences in which the magical, almost hypnotic, effects of repetition operate: the exciting spectacle of marching soldiers, in the same dress, same step, and same attitude; the fascination of neatly arranged flower beds of like color, structure, and texture; the impressive sight of crowds at football games, theatres, public demonstrations; the satisfaction we derive from the geometric patterns created by ballet dancers and chorus girls with identical costumes and movements; the feeling of order evoked by rows of methodically placed packages on the grocer’s shelf; the comforting effect of the regularity of repeat patterns in textiles and wallpapers; the excitement we experience at the sight of plane formations or birds in flight.

Package design cerise and black, IBM 1956

Jacket and binding pink, green, and gold 1945

Announcement black and white 1941

Magazine cover full color, PM 1938

Brochure cover full color, U.S. Navy 1959

Magazine advertisement black and tan, Disney 1946

Illustration SKF Laboratories 1946

Wall covering gray and black, IBM 1957

Advertisement illustration, Westinghouse 1968

Trademark TV billboard, Westinghouse 1961

Newspaper advertisement Frank H. Lee Co. 1947

Newspaper advertisement black and white 1954

Yesterday and Today

Disputes arising between the two schools of typographic thought, the traditional on the one hand and the modern on the other, are, it seems to me, the fruits of misplaced emphasis. I believe the real difference lies in the way “space” is interpreted: that is, the way in which an image is placed on a sheet of paper. Such incidental questions as the use of sans-serif typefaces, lowercase letters, ragged settings, primary colors, etc., are at best variables, which merely tend to sidetrack the real issue.

Book cover red and yellow, Wittenborn & Schultz 1944

“But great original artists,” says John Dewey, “take a tradition into themselves. They have not shunned but digested it. Then the very conflict set up between it and what is new in themselves and in their environment creates the tension that demands a new mode of expression.” Understanding modern and traditional in this light, the designer is able to bring into a new and logical relationship traditional graphic forms and ideas together with “new” concepts based on a present-day point of view. This union of two supposedly divergent forces provides conditions which lead to fresh visual experiences.

In advertising one is often faced with the problem of conveying a quality of age. In the example which follows, traditional “ornaments” combine with geometric forms to establish new relationships. This transition from old to new may be accomplished by arranging these familiar devices in some surprising manner:

Label designs full color, Schenley 1942

Typographic Form and Expression

One of the objectives of the designer who deals with type matter concerns readability. Unfortunately, however, this function is often overemphasized at the expense of style, individuality, and the very effectiveness of the printed piece itself.

By carefully arranging type areas, spacing, size, and “color,” the typographer is able to impart to the printed page a quality which helps to dramatize the contents. He is able to translate type matter into tactile patterns. By concentrating the type area and emphasizing the margin (white space), he can reinforce, by contrast, the textural quality of the type. The resulting effect on the reader may be properly compared to the sensation produced by physical contact with metal type.

Book jacket and binding tan and black, Alfred Knopf 1945

Broadside full color, Westvaco 1968

Children’s book I Know a Lot of Things, Harcourt Brace 1956

. . . In ordering his space and in distributing his typographic material and symbols, he is able to predetermine, to a certain point, the eye movements of the spectator.

. . . With asymmetric balance, he is able to achieve greater reader interest. Bilateral symmetry offers the spectator too simple and too obvious a statement. It offers him little or no intellectual pleasure, no challenge. For the pleasure derived from observing asymmetric arrangements lies partly in overcoming resistances which, consciously or not, the spectator has in his own mind, thus acquiring some sort of esthetic satisfaction. (For a more comprehensive discussion along these lines, see Roger Fry’s essay on “Sensibility.”[1])

Newspaper advertisement black and white, Ohrbach’s 1946

A typeface which sometimes is described as having character often is merely bizarre, eccentric, nostalgic, or simply buckeye.

To distort the letters of the alphabet in “the style of” Chinese calligraphy (sometimes referred to as chop suey lettering), because the subject happens to deal with the Orient is to create the typographic equivalent of a corny illustration. To mimic a woodcut style of type to “go with” a woodcut; to use bold type to “harmonize with” heavy machinery, etc., is cliché-thinking. The designer is unaware of the exciting possibilities inherent in the contrast of picture and type matter. Thus, instead of combining a woodcut with a “woodcut style” of type (Neuland), a happier choice would be a more classical design (Caslon, Bodoni, or Helvetica) to achieve the element of surprise and to accentuate by contrast the form and character of both text and picture.

Logotype Cresta Blanca Wine Co. 1942

In this logotype for Cresta Blanca wine (a product which ordinarily might suggest a more conventional type style, Didot or Spencerian, to evoke a sense of gentility and pedigree), simple, bold, sans-serif letters are combined with delicate line drawings. This contrast revitalizes — gives new meaning to — familiar images:

Newspaper advertisement Seeman Brothers 1944

By contrasting type and pictorial matter, the designer is able to create new combinations and elicit new meanings. For instance, in the Air-Wick newspaper advertisement, the old and the new are brought into harmony. This effect is achieved by contrasting two apparently unrelated subjects — 19th-century wood engravings and 20th-century typewriter type. The surrounding white space helps to separate the advertisement from its competitors, creates an illusion of greater size per square inch, and produces a sense of cleanliness and freshness.

. . . The isolated letter affords a means of visual expression which other kinds of imagery cannot quite duplicate. Letters in the forms of trademarks, seals, and monograms — on business forms, identification tags, athletic jerseys, or even handkerchiefs — possess some magical quality. They serve not only as status symbols but have the virtue of brevity as well.

Magazine cover black and white, Direction 1945

Magazine cover black and red, Direction 1941

Poster, full color Advertising Typographers Association 1965

Building sign aluminum 1957

Magazine cover black and pink, AD Magazine 1941

Alphabet design Westinghouse 1961

Bulb packages blue and white, Westinghouse 1968

Trademark United Parcel Service 1961

Folder full color, SKF Laboratories 1945

. . . The numeral as a means of expression possesses many of the same qualities as the letter. It can also be the visual equivalent of time, space, position, and quantity; and it can help to impart to a printed piece a sense of rhythm and immediacy.

Poster, tan on white N.Y. Art Directors Club 1963

Magazine cover Direction 1940

. . . Punctuation marks, as emotive, plastic symbols, have served the artist as a means of expression in painting as well as in the applied arts.

Booklet red, black, and green, U.S. Government 1943

Where the basic appeals of visual communication can be interpreted most graphically by abandoning the literal approach, it is the artist’s business to do so. If he translates them into a visual message which is not only arresting and persuasive, but imaginative, dramatic, and entertaining as well, he has fulfilled his obligation to his audience; and perhaps he has also fulfilled his obligation to more personal standards.

Even if it is true that the average man seems most comfortable with the commonplace and familiar, it is equally true that catering to bad taste, which we so readily attribute to the average reader, merely perpetuates that mediocrity and denies the reader one of the most easily accessible means for esthetic development and eventual enjoyment.

Book jacket black and pink, Alfred Knopf 1945

1. Roger Fry, Last Lectures.

Paul Rand (1914–1996) was known to his admirers as the “Picasso of Graphic Design,” and is recognized as one of the most influential designers in the history of print. His legendary career spans graphic design’s formative years, and his progression through different roles and spheres of influence constitutes a roadmap for contemporary graphic design professionals—from launching his career in media promotion and cover design at Esquire, to art direction on groundbreaking ad campaigns, to designing some of the most enduring corporate logos of the twentieth century, including those for IBM and ABC. He was named one of the ten best art directors in history by the Museum of Modern Art, and his numerous accolades include awards from the AIGA, the New York Art Directors Club, and the Type Directors Club.