Graphic Designers Piet Zwart & April Greiman

The purpose of this research is to examine the work of graphic designers Piet Zwart and April Greiman, the former a Dutch designer who died in 1977 and the latter an American who was born in 1948. The plan of the research will be to set forth each designer's background as well as an overview of the education, experience, and influences on each, and then to discuss the philosophy and style of design, and the use of type, photography, and color media, with a view toward showing the similarities and differences in the content and execution of their work.

It is possible to trace a direct line of generational influence from the European Zwart to his much younger American contemporary, Greiman, simply by looking at the work of each and pointing out similarities. However, that line would not be clear or supported by evidence, and the content of those similarities would not be explained. That is why it is important to look at how Zwart and Greiman evolved their styles, based on both their personal backgrounds and their professional influences.

With this in mind, let us explore how the professional career of Zwart, born in 1885 in an industrial region north of Amsterdam, Holland, developed. Although the fact that the region of Zaandijk is industrial is mentioned by a number of sources (Spencer, Pioneers, 1987, p. 117 and Liberated, p. 151; Purris, p. 61; Luidl, 1986, p. 33; Broos and Hefting, 1993, p. 67), the source who finds a significance in the kind of birthplace that Zwart

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an Futurists, who used machinery art motifs, Dadaists, and the emergence of the Bauhaus (Strauss, "Prelude," p. 5). Zwart participated in this "reconstruction" of typography, known as the "machine aesthetic" (Strauss, "Prelude," p. 5). As he developed after the war, he saw this reconstruction as being related to social reform and the environments in which people lived. Monguzzi quotes from Zwart's magazine articles in the late 1920s, along with commentary, in this regard: "Only the complete restructuring of the art school could turn its inefficiency into intensive, positive and culturally important work. It will have to open itself to the needs of our times and to all those who work creatively; its programs will have to include new departments and will have to eliminate others, which by now are insignificant factors in the general cultural process . . . " Zwart then pressed for the study of urban and regional development and continued by stating that teaching had to be radically changed (Monguzzi, p. 7). Greiman's philosophy of design does not appear to be so directly concerned with social engineering as Zwart's was. In fact, she resists declaring an aesthetic position in the same manner as Zwart: "I am not interested in the

Category: Arts - G