Max Bill
Subtitle: Typografie, Reklame, Buchgestaltung = Max Bill : typography, advertising, book design
By: mit Textbeiträgen von Gerd Fleischmann, Hans Rudolph Bosshard, Christoph Bignens.
Contributors: Fleischmann, Gerd.; Bosshard, Hans Rudolph, 1929-; Bignens, Christoph.
Publisher: Niggli
Published: 1999
Place of publication: Zürich
Language: ger; eng
Number of pages: 304
Subjects: Bill, Max, 1908- -- Criticism and interpretation; Commercial art -- Switzerland -- History -- 20th century
Other titles: Max Bill :
Description: The book at hand offers a comprehensive view into an area of work from Max Bill that has so far received little attention: typography, advertising and book design. One discovers Max Bill as the tireless creator of highly individual types and commercial logos as well as a designer with a sense of visual humor – not exactly a common aspect of constructive design in this country. Bill pursued two opposing principles and accordingly left behind two lines in his work: a graphic one and a sculptural one. Taking Herbert Bayer’s universal type as a point of departure, Bill developed two lettering schemes for the Neubühl housing development and the firm “wohnbedarf”, which departed from all then-known forms. The reason for the stretched “o” in “wohnbedarf” may well have been grounded on how one perceives the text from the side; yet, behind this understanding lie formal ideas and the reductionist concept of the Bauhaus.
Notes: German and English.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 294-299) and index.