What is Graphic Design ?

William Addison Dwiggins

• The term ” Graphic Design” was first used by William Addison Dwiggins he was an American designer, calligrapher, and book designer.
• Dwiggins used the term graphic design to describe his professional activities. 
• The term “Graphic Design”  became widely used after World War 2.
• During 1938 Dwiggins Designed a book called Caledonia which is one of the most widely used books faces in America 

Pictogram

• A pictogram is a symbol that represents an object by illustration. The illustration represents a meaning, creating a visual language that is understood by all.

Some Examples:

Rebus

• Rebus is an image that represents sound.

• “Eye Bee M” poster Designed by Paul Rund, in 1981.
• Paul Rund used the rebus principle.
• This poster was designed for the presentation of  the Golden Circle awards.

• These Egyptian hieroglyphs illustrate the rebus principle.
• The words and syllabes are represented by pictures of objects and by symbols whose name are similar to word and syllabe to be communicated .
• The meaning of this hieroglyphs is bee, leaf, sea, and sun ( as rebus this could also mean belief and season)

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 14

Ideogram/Phonogram

A character or a symbol that represents a whole idea.

Graphic design has 3 roles:

1. To identify
2. To inform and instruct  ( Maps, diagrams, directional / warning signs)
3. Present and Promote

The use of posters 

• Advertising
• Announcements
• Propaganda
• Social social activism
• Environmental awareness
• Artistic.

The Art of posters 

• An expression of economic life
• Print was made up of letters and occasional woodblocks that  illustrated  in black black and white
• Lithography printing made it possible to have colour in posters.

Graphic design goes back to:

• Cave paintings 
• Petroglyphic figures 
• These were early forms of visual communication
  
  The above symbols are found carved and sometimes painted on rocks in the western United States, these petroglyphic  figures animals, and signs are similar to those found al over the world. Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 7
  
  
  
  Cave painting from Lacaux
  
  

• Cave painting from Lacaux 15,000-10,000 BCE. Random placement and shifting scale signify prehistoric people’s lack of structure and sequence in recording their experiences.
• This was not the beginning of art as we know it.
• It was the drawing of visual communications
• These early pictures were made for survival and for utilitarian and ritualistic purpose.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 6

• The clay tablet demonstrates how the Sumerian symbols for “star” which also mean “heaven” or “God”.
• “head” and “water evolved from early pictographs.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc.pg9

The Latin Alphabet

• The Latin Alphabet went to the Romans from Greece by way of ancient Etruscas, people whose civilization on on the Italian peninsula reached its height during the 6th century BCE.
• The Latin Alphabet contained 21 letters: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R ( which evolved a version of P), S, T, V, and X.

Following the Roma conquest of Greece during the 1st century BCE, The Greek letters Y, and Z were added to the end of the of the Latin alphabet because the Romans were appropriating Greek words containing these sounds.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg29

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  • The diagram above displays several evolutionary of western alphabets . The controversial theory linking early Cretan pictographs to alphabets is based on the similarities in their appearance.

  Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc
  
  

Chinese Calligraphy

• The Chinese Calligraphy is very similar to the Egyptian hieroglyphics and the  Mayan writing in Central America.
• The Chinese writing is pure visual language.
• It is not not alphabetical.
• Every symbol is composed of different shapes and lines within an imaginary square.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 30

• The top row of pictographs are chiaku-wen, or bone-and-shell script, attributed to the legendary Tsang Chieh.
• The lower row shows the same words from LI Ssu’s unified hsoao chuan, or small seal style.
• From the left: sun, moon, water, rain, wood, and dog.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 30

Orcal bone inscribed with bone bone-shell script, 1300 BCE 

• The 128 characters inscribed on the scapula concern a diviner’s predictions of calamities during the next ten day period.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc

• Legends says that Chinese was first written about 1800 BCE
• It was written by Tsang Chieh .
• Tsang Chieh was inspired to invent writing by contemplating the claw marks of birds and and footprints of animals.
• He continued to develop elementary pictographs of things in nature.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 30

The Invention of Paper

• Paper was invented by Ts’ai Lun who reported his invention to Emperor Ho in 105 EC.
• He was defined as the god of paper makers.
• In the early times  the Chinese people wrote on bamboo slats or wooden strips by using a bamboo pen and durable ink.
• His process of paper making almost unchanged until paper making was mechanized in the 19th century in England.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc

The Discovery of Printing

• Printing was a Chinese invention which was a major breakthrough in human history.
• The first form of printing was relief printing

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 39

• During the Han dynasty in 3rd century BC seals were done by carving calligraphic characters in flat surfaces of jade, silver, gold, or ivory.
• The user will ink the flat surfaces by pushing it into a pastel like red ink made from cinnabar and then pressed into a substitute to form an impression, as the ones done in the present day rubber stamp.

Philip B. meggs. and Alston W. Purvis.eds., 2012. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fifth Edition. Hoboken Canada: John Wiley & Sons,Inc pg 39