In redesigning the cover for Stephen J. Eskilson’s graphic design history book my main objective is to make an amalgam of the history through visual representation and text. The original cover makes no indication of the various design styles discussed, so my intention is to expose these styles before the book is ever opened. As a foundation I use ITC Fenice as a typeface to express the classical use of serifs in books, similar to high- quality books during the Arts & Crafts movement. The typeface works well in both printed and digital readability, so it is flexible to use in designing the cover. I also emphasize the use of grids, a common practice found in the International Typographic Style, in arranging the text on the covers, spine, and flaps. In displaying the graphic design movements on the cover, I line the text up with the baseline grid to make the layout more apparent. The use of triangles on the cover I believe is a simple way to covey the field of design, similar to how the triangle ruler emoji is meant to represent graphic design or architecture.

With the visuals on the cover, my basis for their use comes from Suprematism, which focuses on geometric shapes and the “pure art” in abstract shapes. The Suprematist movement occurs during a pivotal moment in graphic design history, and I believe it links past and present designs. Nature-esque styles from Art Noveau and experimental styles found in Dada (~late 1800’s and WWI) represent the past, while American Modernism and the Swiss Style (~1940’s) are tied closer to the present. Suprematism occurs at a moment between these two eras, when design undergoes a transformation in concept and purpose with parallel art movement Constructivism. The use of photomontages in Constructivism for a social purpose (Communism) became an inspiration for many designers for design today. However, I want to respect the place Suprematism has in its simple, yet complex representation of shapes which evolves to the power corporate designs have to the eye (an outline of an apple, or a black circle with the letters, ‘abc’). So on the book cover I copy suprematist art to incorporate popular graphic design, and build a contrast (ex. Paul Rand’s Advertising Typographers Association, 1965 to Alphonse Mucha Monaco Monte Carlo 1897) to illustrate the ideas explored throughout design history.

Illustration Sources:

Back Cover & Flap: Paul Rand Advertising Typographers Association (1965), Alphonse Mucha, Monaco Monte Carlo (1897), Job Cigarette Papers Advertising (1898), El Lissitzky, Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge (1920), Proun 99 (1924), Lester Beall, Rural Electrification Administration (1937)

Front Cover: Herbert Matter, Engelberg Trübsee (1936), Kazmir Malevich, Mystic Suprematism (1922), Suprematist Composition (with Eight Red Rectangles) (1915), Margaret MacDonald, Frances MacDonald, J. Herbert Nair, The Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts (1896)

Book Jacket