Rumania had a vibrant graphic design industry – and produced some superb designers and illustrators too (think Saul Steinberg). But one of the only ways we in the West could know about it is through the group Graphic Front, which archives and publishes books on design before computers. The images here are from Graphics Without Computers: 40 Years of Modest Achievements, a delightful volume of everyday marks, icons and packages.
Graphic Front was launched in 2010 to rediscover Romanian utilitarian graphics created between 1940 and 1989. What stands out is the high quality of the visual materials produced before the advent of computers, as opposed to the graphic output of recent years.
The GF Visual Archive contains five categories: printed matter, signage, logos, illustration and photography. GF’s aim is to build an archive of graphic images and objects primarily from the period 1950-70, though not exclusively, but without the intention of performing a comprehensive study.The GF MEDIA+ is dedicated to GF news. The articles are written by people in Romania and abroad who are specialists in a wide range of cultural areas, and grouped together into different categories. An average of 1-2 articles are posted every week and announced via the GF newsletter.
Additional Resource
Selfies, the new book by Haje Jan Kamps,l ooks at the culture of social networking and its influence on the self portrait while covering practical matters, such as how to take better photos of yourself.