Books

  • Hunt & Gather
    Discovering New Art

    January 28, 2010

    Hunt & Gather showcases a contemporary view of international art featured in galleries and media across the globe. This striking collection of surrealism, pop art, illustration, collage, graphic design and mixed media represents many of today’s most boundary-pushing artists. Aspects of this collection are dark, at times macabre, but these images are complemented by arrestingly [...]

     

  • Toy Instruments
    Design, Nostalgia, Music

    January 25, 2010

    Toy Instruments comprises an eye-popping collection of musical toys made between the 1950s and 1990s. Created to excite children about learning how to play an instrument, it turns out that adults also had fun with these products. Just ask David Bowie; he used the Stylophone in his song “Space Oddity.”
    Culled from the author’s personal collection, [...]

     

  • ABCing
    Seeing the Alphabet Differently

    January 6, 2010

    From abstract to zeitgeist, ABCing: Seeing the Alphabet Differently spurs alternative approaches to seeing and understanding letterforms, and the world. Colleen Ellis has dismantled the Latin alphabet, shifting the focus from the subject—the letter—to the surrounding space, introducing new ways of visualizing, thinking and talking about art and design. Each illustration is created using only [...]

     

  • Textura
    Valencia Street Art

    November 10, 2009

    Valencia is Spain’s third largest city and is a hotbed of vibrant street art. Photographer Luz A. Martín, a native of Valencia, has been wandering the streets of her hometown capturing the artwork that brings the walls, alleyways and buildings to life. Utilizing rain gutters, window frames, doorframes and other such urban surfaces the city’s [...]

     

  • Drawing Autism

    October 26, 2009

    Over the last decade autism has become an international topic of conversation. Knowing no racial, ethnic or social barriers, today autism is diagnosed in 1 in every 150 children.
    Drawing Autism celebrates the artistry and self-expression found in the drawings, paintings and collages created by individuals diagnosed with autism. The work of over 50 international contributors [...]

     

  • FACE FOOD RECIPES

    October 20, 2009

    Two years ago, Face Food brought the curious, cute and infectiously popular phenomenon of charaben, or character bento boxes, into homes across the globe. Face Food Recipes builds upon the success of Face Food with a new collection of charaben that also includes informative how-to guides for making lunches that look like your favorite animated [...]

     

  • Instructions for the Apocalypse

    September 29, 2009

    Instructions for the Apocalypse fuses a collection of found photographs with the fictional account of one man’s descent into madness. Leaving “instructions” about living through an inevitable apocalypse for his estranged daughter Gareth Gray’s gloss of the last 200 years dissects the industrial military complex, technology and religion with a voice as original as the [...]

     

  • EdgyCute
    From Neo-Pop to Low Brow and Back Again

    September 28, 2009

    Doe-eyed girls in pink dresses, animated desserts, bubbly cartoon characters – at first blush these qualities seem to define the work contained in EdgyCute. But a closer look reveals the dead rat on a plate, lurking skeletons, the crying birdhouse; there is nothing sugary-sweet about those cupcakes and Pinocchio will use that revolver he’s holding.
    Harry [...]

     

  • The Noir A-Z

    September 9, 2009

    Photographer Julian Hibbard offers an abecedary unlike any other, pairing a word with one of his photographs for all twenty-six letters in the alphabet. The resulting book evokes a shadowy, sexy and voyeuristic noir aesthetic.
    Hibbard’s ability to infuse his frames with palpable emotion draws viewers back to his work, over and over again, as they [...]

     

  • Glitch
    Designing Imperfection

    September 2, 2009

    A “glitch” usually fixes itself in the amount of time it takes for it to be noticed in the first place, whether as a scrambled cable television delay, a page-loading error on an internet browser or a jumble of pixels on an ATM interface.
    Glitch: Designing Imperfection consists of over 200 glitch images grabbed, composed and [...]

     

  • Negative Space

    August 20, 2009

    An artist using “negative space” relies on the space that surrounds the subject to provide shape and meaning. Of course, the term also refers to any topic that conjures feelings of unease and discomfort. Furthering the partnership begun with the publication of Guess Who? internationally acclaimed illustrator Noma Bar has compiled his newest collection [...]

     

  • Crazy Wacky Theme Restaurants: Tokyo

    August 13, 2009

    Even if you’ve been to Tokyo, you’ve never done a restaurant tour like the one endeavored by La Carmina in Crazy, Wacky Theme Restaurants: Tokyo. Traditional dishes like sushi, rice balls and curry get tricked out thanks to theme restaurants inspired by everything from religions to animals. Waitresses dressed as maids slap you when you [...]

     

  • Everyman’s Joyce

    August 4, 2009

    “Pablo Picasso dismissed James Joyce as an obscure writer that all the world can understand.”
    Through the power of illustration the Everyman’s Series illuminates complex bodies of work by some of the 20th century’s most vital thinkers. Picasso’s assessment of James Joyce as a writer that “all the world can understand” speaks to how a perspective that [...]

     

  • DIY ALBUM ART
    Paper Bags & Office Supplies

    June 30, 2009

    In the early 1990s a renewed spirit of co-operation and do-it-yourself initiative took hold of the North American punk and hardcore scenes. The new DIY approach didn’t stop at booking your own tours and self-releasing records, now it involved putting together the very packaging for those records. Hand-gluing sleeves, silk-screening manila envelopes and raiding thrift [...]

     

  • Truckers

    June 2, 2009

    The objects that fill our lives are delivered on the trailers that truck drivers haul to and from farms, refineries, factories, docks, airports, warehouses and retail outlets. Without truckers the world’s consumer cultures would collapse. As integral parts of the global economy, truckers are too often taken for granted.
    Drawing on her many years experience writing [...]

     

  • Talking About Arabic

    May 18, 2009

    In Talking About Arabic Mourad Boutros, author of Arabic for Designers, enlists his professional peers to examine the global context for contemporary Arabic design and typography. The thematic thread that runs through every article, case study and illustration is how technological advances have furthered, and changed, the use of Arabic throughout the world, whether it [...]

     

  • Pioneers of Spanish Graphic Design

    April 9, 2009

    Spain: a country that calls so many famed artists – Picasso, Dali, Goya, Miro, to name only four – its own. Yet, the reputation of its graphic designers has never been fully recognized by the international design community, until now. Pioneers of Spanish Graphic Design establishes, once and for all, the legacy of 15 groundbreaking [...]

     

  • Typography Monographs Vol. 2
    Size-specific Adjustments to Type Designs: An Investigation of the Principles Guiding the Design of Optical Sizes

    April 8, 2009

    Type designs in history have had significantly different designs in smaller point sizes than that of the larger sizes – a feature which has hardly been carried over to digital type as it is used today, where all sizes can be scaled from a single master. Why were the various point sizes so different in [...]

     

  • Notations 21

    March 25, 2009

    Drawing inspiration from John Cage’s, Notations, Notations 21 features illustrated musical scores from more than 100 international composers, all of whom are making amazing breakthroughs in the art of notation. These spectacularly beautiful and fascinatingly creative visual pieces not only make for exciting music, but inspiring visual art as well. The scores are accompanied by [...]

     

  • In China, My Name Is …

    February 10, 2009

    Name giving is one of the pillars of Chinese culture. Related to astrology and the “five elements,” names connect people to their destinies. While tradition still plays a major role all over China, foreign influences linked to the nation’s economic boom have ushered in a great deal of change. What then can be found in [...]

     

  • Chicken: Low Art, High Calorie

    January 22, 2009

    Throughout the world major fast-food chains are easily recognizable, synonymous, for better or worse, with an American way of life. Far more interesting, however, are the generic fast-food establishments that serve menus that are more or less the same, but not as slicked with corporate marketing.
    A sub-genre of such eateries, found across the United Kingdom [...]

     

  • Protest Graffiti Mexico: Oaxaca

    On October 27, 2006, when Mexican police opened fire on a crowd of protesters in the city of Oaxaca, killing three people, including American journalist Brad Roland Will, the world became aware of a social conflict that at its core was about the right to an education. Since 1981, teachers in the Mexican state have [...]

     

  • New Skateboard Graphics

    January 21, 2009

    In the 1980s skateboarding gained notoriety, growing from a Southern California hobby born out of surfing to a nationwide trend, which developed into a visual style. While the bottoms of skateboards have always been adorned with graphics, back then only a handful of skateboard manufacturers existed. Today, vast amounts of visuals are created for skateboards, [...]

     

  • Going Postal

    Postal stickers have long been a preferred substrate used by street artists to get up. Of course, because stickers from the US Postal Service, UPS, DHL and FedEx are so readily available, most of these stickers get lost in the fray, especially if you don’t know what you’re looking for.
    That’s where graffiti photography legend Martha [...]

     

  • Bay Area Graffiti

    Fabled as a region that embraces freedom of expression in all of its guises, the San Francisco Bay Area has long been a world-renowned cultural hotbed. Bay Area Graffiti is the first comprehensive retrospective of the area’s vibrant contemporary street-art scene. Documented by the distinctive photographic eye of Steve Rotman, his images showcase the innovative [...]

     

  • Urban Iran

    Urban Iran is a depiction of everyday life apart from international and diplomatic policies, giving voice to people living and working in Iran today while probing the complexities of contemporary Iran. Described and revealed by photographers, writers and visual artists, from street art to heavy metal bands and book publishing, Urban Iran documents how the [...]

     

  • Decay

    Decay can possess the drama of a landslide or the intimacy of cracked skin. In Decay, photographers Nathan Troi Anderson and J.K. Putnam share how decay looks to them through their lenses. Shot in color and black & white, with their cameras trained on a wide array of subjects, decay begins to take shape, framed [...]

     

  • Shapes for sounds

    Shapes for sounds examines one of humankind’s fundamental creations: alphabets. In a culture that is overrun by the image, it is easy to forget that alphabets are the origin of gleaning understanding through images.
    Typographer, graphic designer and teacher Timothy Donaldson has compiled a history of the Latin alphabet, consolidating his research into 26 informative and [...]

     

  • The Inner Life of Martin Frost

    Paul Auster’s novel The Book of Illusions explores the implications of stories within stories, especially as films. Battling with personal crises, Auster’s protagonist David Zimmer falls into the work of the fictional silent film star Hector Mann. The Inner Life of Martin Frost is a long-lost Mann film. It is also this book, which through [...]

     

  • Graffiti Japan

    Japan has long been a breeding ground for innovative approaches to Western traditions, like movies and baseball. But, the fanatical embrace with which Japanese artists have welcomed graffiti has made for a form of graffiti wholly apart from its Western origins. Photographed by Remo Camerota, Graffiti Japan captures the culturally unique aspects of Japanese street [...]

     

  • Urban Guerrilla Protest

    July 1, 2008

    Urban Guerrilla Protest showcases the ways and means of individual, subversive protest actions. Featuring over 90 artists and initiatives from around the world, the book provides insights into the resources that are being used to place activist messages in the heart of the everyday, documenting the rise of the media-guerrilla during the decade spanning 1995-2005. [...]

     

  • Arabic Tattoos

    June 3, 2008

    It’s no secret that tattoos have become a commonly accepted and popular form of self-expression; people young and old wear sleeves of ink, or little designs that peek out from the top of a waistband or the collar of a shirt. Over the past few years, however, a sub-genre of tattoos has emerged: Arabic tattoos.
    Although [...]

     

  • Celebrity Vinyl

    June 2, 2008

    Celebrity Vinyl is a laugh-riot reminder of what happens when famous people decide to (unsuccessfully) give singing a try. The number of celebrities, and pseudo-celebrities, that have indulged such hubris boggles the mind: Burt Reynolds, Shaquille O’Neal, John Travolta, Eddie Murphy, Leonard Nimoy, Alyssa Milano – the list goes on and on, as do the [...]

     

  • Translating Hollywood

    May 2, 2008

    A fresh perspective on the art of movie posters!
    Culled from the collection of movie-poster aficionado Sam Sarowitz’s Posteritati Gallery, Translating Hollywood examines how the posters used to sell the same film in different countries speak volumes for how cultural tendencies are reflected in graphic design and how the differences are about much more than [...]

     

  • Traveler’s Advisory

    May 1, 2008

    Written by Jessica Lehrer, Rick Lightstone and Alice Murray, Traveler’s Advisory proves that laughter is indeed a universal language, and the tidbits of advice they dispense will resonate with anyone who has ever missed a bus, received a completely different meal than the one ordered at a restaurant, attempted to get medical attention without knowing [...]

     

  • Face Food: The Visual Creativity of Japanese Bento Boxes

    March 1, 2008

    Dating back several hundred years, the Japanese bento box is as integral a part of the country’s culinary identity as sushi. Today, a contemporary version of the bento box exists, inspired by the rampant popularity of movies, television shows and manga. These charaben, made by parents (mostly mothers) eager to bring attention to their children’s [...]

     

  • Type, Trends and Fashion: A Study of the Late Twentieth Century Proliferation of Typefaces

    February 5, 2008

    Changes in technology and stylistic developments in the design, use and reproduction of typeface designs were exponential in the last two decades of the twentieth century. This was due in no small part to the availability of the desktop computer and associated software.
    Anthony Cahalan investigates this late twentieth century proliferation of Western typefaces by analyzing [...]

     

  • PEEL: The Art of the Sticker

    February 3, 2008

    Dave and Holly Combs traveled to New York City from Indianapolis, Indiana, to assist with Sept. 11 recovery efforts. While exploring Manhattan during their off hours, they were inspired by the wealth of stickers they saw all over the city. These stickers made such an impact that the Combses started PEEL, the first street-art magazine [...]

     

  • Imposters

    February 1, 2008

    Millions of people trekking from the near and far ends of the world to Los Angeles every year head straight to the heart of Hollywood, with vain hopes for a close encounter of the celebrity kind. Despite the billion-dollar facelift of the Entertainment District in the mid-1990s, these star-hungry tourists must forfeit their visions of [...]

     

  • Tart Cards – Special Limited Edition

    January 5, 2008

    MBP is pleased to announce that the Tart Cards Special has been purchased by the Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture at Duke University (Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library).
    Edition size: 60 copies
    This book is innovatively bound in black and pink satin over boards. The spine is laced with bodice-like black ribbons. [...]

     

  • Illustrations from the Inside: The Beat Within

    January 1, 2008

    The Beat Within is a decade-old, nationwide writing program for incarcerated youth. “Words not Weapons” is the organization’s credo, inspiring these young adults – males and females of all ethnicities – to learn that words and images are more effective than violence. Illustrations from the Inside features the pencil drawings created by these youth as [...]

     

  • Xiu Xiu: The Polaroid Project: The Book

    November 2, 2007

    David Horvitz, road manager for indie rock band Xiu Xiu, devised the idea to document the band’s tours by encouraging fans to bring Polaroid film to shows. Photographs of life on the road – from towering truck-stop beacons reaching out into huge blue sky to motel-room antics – were shot and returned to the fans, [...]

     

  • Guess Who? The Many Faces of Noma Bar

    November 1, 2007

    It requires skilled eyes and hands for artists to render subjects by translating their personalities, physical traits and careers into a few well-executed lines. Having worked for such publications as The New York Times, Esquire, The Guardian and Time Out London, Noma Bar is one artist capable of such visual feats. From famous celebrities like [...]

     

  • Products for a Happy Life

    October 3, 2007

    Products for a Happy Life seeks to “un-take” for granted some of the most elegant and most functional household goods: a hefty pair of scissors, a hammer with a hickory handle, a cotton T-shirt. With imagery and descriptive text inspired by early 20th century American mail-order catalogues like Sears and Roebuck, this book evokes a [...]

     

  • A Field Guide to the North American Family

    October 1, 2007

    For years, the Hungates and the Harrisons have coexisted peacefully in the suburbs of New York. But when the patriarch of one family dies, the survivors face a stark imperative: adapt or face extinction.
    In sixty-three entries and an accompanying website, A Field Guide to the North American Family offers a collaborative portrait of two fictional [...]

     

  • Everyman’s McLuhan

    August 1, 2007

    Anyone who has ever considered technology and its relation to humanity has most likely heard the name Marshall McLuhan. A careful student of media, a prolific lecturer and author, and the coiner of such phrases as “global village” and “the medium is the message,” McLuhan’s career merits a freshly creative and accessible examination as technology [...]

     

  • Los Angeles Graffiti

    July 1, 2007

    Graffiti makes us think of cities. Urban denizens are used to seeing ink and paint scrawled and plastered on trains, buses and alleyways, and in heavily trafficked city centers, where structures of steel and glass tower. With its lack of a central point, of all major American cities, the sprawling megalopolis of Los Angeles does [...]

     

  • While You’re Reading

    June 1, 2007

    This book is about everything that happens while you’re reading – in front of your eyes and inside your head – and about what type designers, typographers and graphic designers bring to a page to make reading happen.
    Renowned type designer Gerard Unger distills decades of design experience into a playful, accessible text that reflects the [...]

     

  • The Serif Fairy

    May 1, 2007

    The Serif Fairy has lost her wing, keeping her from performing magic. This book follows her through an airy, immaculately designed typographic landscape as she hunts for the wing. Along the way, she makes friends and has adventures as she wanders through the Garamond Forest, visits Futura Town and eventually ends her quest at Shelley [...]

     

  • Made with FontFont: Type for Independent Minds

    March 1, 2007

    Founded in 1990 by Erik Spiekermann and Neville Brody, FontFont produces innovative and influential fonts by designers, for designers. Made with FontFont is an anthology of type specimens and essays closely and creatively examining how FontFont operates, to elucidate how this relative newcomer on the type design scene has made such an impression on the [...]

     

  • dot-font: Talking About Fonts

    February 5, 2007

    Mark Batty Publisher proudly commences the dot-font series, about design in the world around us, with two titles: dot-font: Talking About Design and dot-font: Talking About Fonts. Both books offer a selection of direct, opinionated, authoritative, often witty essays selected from the “dot-font” column that John Berry has written since 2000 for the website for [...]

     

  • dot-font: Talking About Design

    Mark Batty Publisher proudly commences the dot-font series, about design in the world around us, with two titles: dot-font: Talking About Design and dot-font: Talking About Fonts. Both books offer a selection of direct, opinionated, authoritative, often witty essays selected from the “dot-font” column that John Berry has written since 2000 for the website for [...]

     

  • Madonna of the Toast

    February 3, 2007

    All over the world people cherish different beliefs. Regardless if these beliefs are rooted in religion or popular culture, a true believer cannot be swayed. So, when Mother Teresa surfaces on a cinnamon bun, the manifestation turns into an event that attracts global attention. Madonna of the Toast documents what happens when religious and secular [...]

     

  • The Book of Independence

    February 1, 2007

    Mark Batty Publisher is pleased to be the exclusive North American distributor of The Book Of Independence, winner of the Best of Show at the International Design Awards. Produced by the Scheufelen paper company in Germany, this stunning book serves as an excellent source guide for designers. Part daily planner, part design manifesto that implores [...]

     

  • Mexican Blackletter

    December 3, 2006

    Blackletter, known also as Gothic miniscule, originated in Europe near the end of the 12th century. Transported from Europe to the New World, blackletter was subtly reshaped by indigenous influences. No better is this illustrated than in Mexico.
    The blackletter that adorns countless small stores, shops and service providers throughout the country has a wholly Mexican [...]

     

  • Shadows of Time

    December 1, 2006

    “Ads are the cave art of the twentieth century.” Marshall McLuhan made many such comments regarding the nature and social relevance of advertising. In Shadows Of Time, Nathan Troi Anderson juxtaposes incredibly nuanced black and white photographic images of cave art from the southwestern United States and Asia against recognizable contemporary advertising that demonstrates how [...]

     

  • New Orleans Bicycles

    New Orleans will forever exist in a post-Hurricane Katrina context. New Orleans Bicycles features over 100 colorful and detailed photographs taken eighteen months prior to the disaster, showcasing the beauty and allure of the city’s category-defiant population. Though some of the bikes look as if they would crumble under the weight of a rider, and [...]

     

  • Bathroom Graffiti

    September 10, 2006

    If you’ve ever used a public restroom, chances are you’ve read some bathroom graffiti, or at least noticed it. Often bawdy, funny and smart, sometimes illegible, it is a ubiquitous means of expression found across the United States and all over the world. Do the private, intimate moments in the bathroom provide people the opportunity [...]

     

  • CBGB: Decades of Graffiti

    September 1, 2006

    CBGB, the music club that helped define New York City’s “punk” scene by introducing the world to such bands as the Talking Heads and Ramones, is little more than a bar, a stage and two bathrooms. Since the club opened in 1973, very little has changed about the physical space, with one exception: the graffiti. [...]

     

  • Faces of the Living Dead

    June 7, 2006

    Faces of the Living Dead offers an examination of paranormal photography’s popularity during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Extensively illustrated throughout with previously unpublished black & white, as well as duotone, photographs from the British Library’s archives, Faces of the Living Dead offers a beautifully focused study of this movement. The fraudulent nature [...]

     

  • Talk Back: The Bubble Project

    June 5, 2006

    No one is free from advertising. Whether on television or radio, plastered along streets and highways, or screaming off trains and buses, ads for everything from films to hair gels vie for the attention of consumers. Of course, ads have long been a cultural presence, though in our shrinking world of mega-corporations, they have infiltrated [...]

     

  • Green Design

    June 1, 2006

    Green Design colorfully documents the rising trend to create and market new and innovative products that help consumers downsize and upgrade their lives. Through a carefully chosen selection of green toys, objects, fabrics, paper and alternative energy sources, the photographs and articles in Green Design illustrate what happens when green-minded lifestyles meet well-designed, high quality [...]

     

  • The Wood Engravings of Agnes Miller Parker

    May 1, 2006

    Agnes Miller Parker (1895-1980) was primarily an illustrator who achieved a prolific output of wood engravings. This beautiful book is the most comprehensive compilation of her work to date and contains more than 900 examples of her wood engravings and linocuts, cut between 1926 and 1969. She studied art at the Glasgow School of Art [...]

     

  • Arabic for Designers

    March 1, 2006

    With more than 200 examples of the best in contemporary Arabic typography and graphic design, this book is an illustrated primer on how to work with Arabic and understand and respect its cultural nuances. For an array of reasons, the worlds of business and communications rely more and more on the cross-hybridization of Latin and [...]

     

  • New Visual Culture of Modern Iran

    February 1, 2006

    Reza Abedini’s presentation about contemporary Persian typography at the AGI conference in Helsinki in 2003, made clear to those in attendance that the subject merited a book. Iran underwent many changes in the wake of the 1979 Revolution. The sources of creative influence in Iran expanded as a result of the uprising, and the passing [...]

     

  • Playing Cards

    October 5, 2005

    Playing cards are ephemerel; they are used, become worn and then just get thrown away. Good quality examples of playing cards featuring the graphics of the past are hard to find in sufficient volume and variety to make an interesting collection. The 300 cards collected here were printed during the 1930s and 1940s. The subjects [...]

     

  • Stencil Graffiti Capital: Melbourne

    October 1, 2005

    An edgy, lavish visual survey, Stencil Graffiti Capital: Melbourne shows the best work of the best stencil artists working in Melbourne, Australia. Through intimate interviews, dynamic layouts and a riot of examples the street artists are shown in the context of world street art culture. Melbourne’s walls are both canvases and meeting places for ideas, [...]

     

  • Paris Underground

    July 1, 2005

    “Fancying myself something of a connoisseur of the historical, I scoffed at the lineups of tourists assembled for the daily tours of the catacombs, finding that kitschy and lame. Ah, the arrogance of youth. After reading Paris Underground, I now very much regret not paying more attention to what is clearly a huge and fascinating [...]

     

  • Warning!

    June 1, 2005

    WARNING LABELS HAVE BECOME UBIQUITOUS, from take-out coffee cups to heavy machinery. People are constantly cautioned against potential injury or death by wordless pictures. Unnoticed, often unheeded, warning labels contain a special graphic language. Designed to ensure clarity of a message, the visual simplicity of warning labels provides for clear meaning, though frequently awkward and [...]

     

  • Paper War

    May 5, 2005

    Propaganda is a weapon. It is graphic design’s most sinister manifestation, made to change perceptions, destroy morale and help dominate culture. Paper War offers a rare opportunity to understand the dynamics of propaganda in the timeless tale of the flexible and immediate use of information in one battle, on a single day – Cassino, Italy, [...]

     

  • George W. Jones: Printer Laureate

    March 10, 2005

    THIS BOOK PROVIDES the first extensive review of the life and work of George W. Jones (1860-1942) and fills an important gap in the literature of graphic design and printing history. He was one of the most respected and celebrated fine printers of his generation, producing books for notable publishers such as the Limited Editions [...]

     

  • U&lc

    February 5, 2005

    “The relevance of U&lc to designers and students today cannot be underestimated. U&lc showed how typography could be used as an art form to facilitate communication and convey ideas. Lubalin and his predessesors often did it by hand or with photo-lettering, whereas today we can use Illustrator and Photoshop. But the goal is the same, [...]

     

  • Pentothal Postcards

    FROM 1954 TO 1968 a series of postcards from faraway and exotic places arrived in the mail for doctors, nurses, hospitals and public health officials worldwide. Not unlike greetings from a well-traveled friend, these postcards were entertaining and inscribed with a personal message. But their purpose was more than to say “wish you were here;” [...]

     

  • This is Not an Atlas.

    November 5, 2004

    “This is Not an Atlas shines a flashlight on some of the world’s murkiest signage and branding. (Could any storefront sign effectively represent Kebab World?) But its spare layout, set in a minimalist Gill Sans, provides a deadpan tonic for the puffery of, say, Denture World – a gaudy, miserable shotgun storefront in Reading, England [...]

     

  • MATCHIBAKO

    November 1, 2004

    MATCHIBAKO: Japanese Matchbox Art of the 20s and 30s depicts Japan’s swift transformation into an industrial empire in the early 20th century, as illustrated in the infinitesimal advertisements on matchboxes from the period. In an uncertain society and its changing leisure market, matches joined cigarettes in Western-style hotels and cafes, and in sushi bars next [...]

     

  • Afrikan Alphabets

    May 1, 2004

    Read Steve Heller’s review of Afrikan Alphabets for Eye Magazine, and Clarence V. Reynolds’s review for Black Issues Book Review.
    Read an article by author Saki Mafundikwa about his graphic design school ZIVA in Zimbabwe, and his thinking behind Afrikan Alphabets for U&lc Online.
    AFRIKAN ALPHABETS have a long history and fantastic variety, and some continue to [...]

     

  • Contemporary Newspaper Design

    April 1, 2004

    THERE HAS NOT BEEN A BOOK of this scope about graphic design and graphic design issues, as they apply to today’s newspapers, for over a decade. Through in-depth, highly visual essays on the graphic evolution of some of the world? most famous newspapers, this carefully compiled survey examines how both technology and design have radically [...]

     

  • 1×1

    March 1, 2004

    1×1 refers to the creation of images using pixels – picture elements – the smallest-sized element that shows up on a computer screen. With the growth of the Internet and computer game design, pixel art has become increasingly mainstream and is now used widely in print media and advertising.
    This book is an arresting, colorful, and [...]

     

  • Surprise Me

    September 1, 2003

    SURPRISE ME is a comprehensive and inspirational guide to editorial design packed with contemporary examples of sophisticated and effective solutions for virtually any design challenge. Moser’s thorough understanding of the process, combined with intriguing juxtapositions of layouts, no-nonsense comments, and original insight, make for an entertaining and useful book.
    Chapters range from Grid Systems and Formats [...]

     

  • Type & Typography Special Edition

    June 1, 2003

    The Special Edition of Matrix, the respected and renowned journal produced annually for over 20 years by John and Rose Randle at The Whittington Press, will contain a selection of printed ephemera assembled over the years. It is a limited edition of 60 copies. Items are all letterpress and wood-engraving, culled from the 20-year history [...]

     

  • Tart Cards

    Read Alice Twemlow’s review of Tart Cards for Eye Magazine, and Cara Bruce’s review of Tart Cards for Eros Guide London.
    IN LONDON, more money is spent on sex than going to the cinema. Tart cards are the means by which providers of sexual services advertise, and they have become as ubiquitous a symbol of that [...]

     

  • Type & Typography

    May 1, 2003

    THIS BEAUTIFULLY designed book contains a rich collection of articles on typography and the printing arts from metal to digital type. Drawing on the archives of Matrix, the thirty-six carefully selected articles cover an eclectic and fascinating breadth of topics, ranging from the earliest type design techniques to the latest in typeface and design developments.
    The [...]

     

  • The Art of Dove Bradshaw

    March 1, 2003

    DOVE BRADSHAW has been a major proponent in the development of the artistic concept of indeterminacy. This monograph is the first extensive critical analysis of her work.
    Her method has been to combine unstable materials with traditional ones, setting off a metamorphic process. The unstable materials are susceptible to weather and indoor atmosphere; their interaction takes [...]

     

  • The Spiral Press [1926-1971]

    September 3, 2002

    JOSEPH BLUMENTHAL, founder of the Spiral Press, designed and printed for Robert Frost, W. H. Auden, Pablo Neruda, William Carlos Williams, Robinson Jeffers and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This activity underscores the significance of the Press to American letters and cultural history. Institutions counted among the Press? clients include The Metropolitan Museum, The Museum of Modern [...]

     

  • The Well-Made Book

    September 1, 2002

    Available in the Regular Edition only – the Special Edition has sold out, sorry!
    Click here to connect to an interview with William Peterson on Reservocation.com, in which he discusses his book, his work, and the design and typography of The Well-Made Book.
    DANIEL BERKELEY UPDIKE (1860-1941) has been described as ?he most distinguished American printer.?He [...]

     

  • Gudrun Zapf von Hesse Special Edition

    January 1, 2002

    This book is the first major retrospective publication illustrating the work of Gudrun Zapf von Hesse?n important German lettering artist, type designer and bookbinder. This 224-page limited editon of 80 copies features 150 color plates, with a beautiful hand binding and slipcase, together with six letterpress sheets designed by the artist. It is a visual [...]

     

  • Gudrun Zapf von Hesse

    This is the regular edition of the book; please also see the special edition.
    THIS BOOK IS the first major retrospective publication illustrating the work of Gudrun Zapf von Hesse – the important German lettering artist, type designer and bookbinder, and wife of Hermann Zapf. This 224-page book features 150 color plates and is a visual [...]