Digital 1985- present

Like the "contemporary style, "digital" style is not a historical movement since it is happening right now. The term "digital" is a temporary lable which will proabably be replaced by historians after the movement ends. Computers are now designed to create very clean layouts, yet artists who use a computer as a creative tool have created work that looks messy ect. In the fine arts world, rebellion against clean, pure abstraction led to a renewed interest in messy decoration.

Keith Haring was a famous NYC grafitti artist whose iconic drawings worked their way into pop culture. From 1976 to 1978 he studied graphic design at the Ivy School of Professional Art, a commercial and fine art school in Pittsburgh. At age 19 Haring, who was openly gay moved to New York City, where he was inspired by grafitti art, and studied at the school of visual arts.

David Carson dared to run type across columns, made page numbers larger then headlines then overprinted and smashed the type. Like all other styles that suddenly "blow up" Carson was soon in great demand by mainstream advertisers who wanted to sell to they youth market, even microsoft saws the need to but the carson look.

Post modern 1975-1990

Postmodernisim was first coined to describe archetectural designs that distort the established code. Postmordernism was first to criticize the "glass box" structures of the swiss international period. The Sydney Opera House has now become one the most popular buildings in australia which definately took a huge step away from the geometry of the swiss international era.

Ettore Sottsass and a group of Italian designers and architects formed the "Memphis Group" as a reaction to the impersonal, slick, humourless design of modernism. The result of this was a vibrant ormental look which was conceived by the group as a fad. This is the picture to the left.

Wolfgang Weingarts influence as a teacher at Switzerlands Basel School of design had a major affect on the post modern era of graphic design. Weingart questioned the order and cleanliness of the swiss movement and his willingness to try the untried lead him to question the rules of typography and as a result opf this his work was joyful, full of energy and texture. Despite his daring ways, he didnt move away from the typical Siwss typeface helvetica.

contemporary 1975-present

In its day, the Victorian era was well known for being contemporary, although nowadays the contemporary look is clean and simple. Milton glaser is well known for his "I heart NY," his bob dylan poster and his DC comics. He is a well known designer for his comtemporary work.

Paul Rand is also known for being a american mondernist. He designed many posters and corporate identities, including the logos for IBM, UPS and ABC.

Although we have moved on from the old styled era's, every now and then you can pick up things from older styles such as the swiss international era, we still find the need for using grid layouts and simple but affective typography, we also still like to make things such as the ipod, simple but affective, in some of our advertisments, we use clean white backgrounds to achieve a professional image.

Psychedelia 1960-1975

The psychedelic sixties was born within the hippie subculture of the haight- ashbury distcrict in San Fransico. The name "pyschedelic" related to drugs that were popular with the youth culture during this time which is why poster artist tried their hardest to capture the feeling of tripping out in their work. Fashion was very flayboyant and colourful which this was inspired by rock musicians, clashing colours, extreme textures and long hair was very much "in." Designers used an optical vibrating affect of lines and textures which was also very popular during this time, curved lines were now back in fashion and fluro colours were taking over.

Andy Warhol was more known for being a pop artist, although sometimes he was commissioned to do graphic design. Andy Warhol become famous for a number of things, one being that he was well known with hollywood celebrities and for his work with them. Andy warhols most famous peice was of Marilyn Munroe, in this peice of work she is in very traditional psychedelia colours. i like his work because it was different but also very successful.

Victor Moscoso was actually a formally trained designer that worked in the psychedelic style. One of his favourite styles was to reduce a photograph to its most essential shapes by photocopying it over and over which converting all grays to a black or white. He also liked to take imagery which had nothing to do with what he was creating and using it for a graphic affect. Victor Moscoso work was also very out there but very successful in creating optical illusions which can be difficult.

swiss international 1945-1985

Swiss international was a major force in graphic design and still is today. The swiss's attitude towards design is to make everything socially useful, universal and very scientific. the visual resuly of this was extreme abstraction, always based on pure geometry.

Le Corbussier thought of his furniture as "equipment." Everything he designed was "a machine to sit on" and his furniture was always in rectangler forms and was very light-weight which made them very popular at the time.

italian born Massimo Vignelli was a New York based designer best known for creating the identity system for furniture manafacturer Knoll International. he was also known for the fisrt intergrated map of the New York city subway system which had a Helvetica type font like the rest of his work. Vignelli's map stirred alot of contraversy because it was abstracted so much that the people of New York complained about its usability.

i think the Swiss international era was probably the most unusal, yet the most simplified era that ever existed. it was the only era that overly used grids in their designs and everything was very thought out which makes it a very interesting era.

Late modern 1945-1970

The late modern era was dominated by american innovations. Americans developed a unique personal style and several superstars were born during this era. In the 40's and 50's Christian Dior was very popular in the fashion world because he combined simplicity with high fashion, this look continued later on when he designed the fashionable "rock and roll" skirts that was popular with the teenagers. The mini skirt represented both the dancing 60's with a relaxed attitude towards the body. Designer's work was always made with simplicity and 'easy to use' in mind.

Paul Rand was a very influential designer during this time. his work was very simple but very affective. He liked using a wide range of techniques when making his designs such as, collage, photograms and cut-outs. I like his work because you can see the the similarities between late modern and American Kitsch in his work, which gives is a interesting affect.

American Kitsch 1940-1960

'Kitsch' is a german word meaning "in bad taste" and is normally used to describe art that is vulgar and or overly sentimental. Designers in this era loved using feminine like curves in their work, whether it was architecture, cars, casino's, signs, curved type, toys, posters ect. Posters that were made during this era had very dramatic poses and their facial expressions were overly exaggerated.

James Dean represented a youth movement during this era. For the first time, the youth of america found news ways of dressing independant in a more adult like fashion. The now very famous "barbie doll" was invented in the 50's and is still very popular with young girls today, although the exaggerated curves of the 50's barbie doll no longer exists.

I think that American Kitsch was a very trendy era and that some designers still like to use dramatic poses and facial expressions today to draw attention to the work.