from this Workshop, dated 1905, which I set beside the books of Behrens
and the Jugendstil typography of Holland as forerunners of our modern
typography. It is a small publicity booklet of black card, in the format of a
cigarette packet, with a white shield bearing the firm's well-known symbol.
Inside. we find. as type, the capitals of the "constructive" so-called Elzevir;
a simple border: a double row of quite small black squares; reversed initials
on solid, undecorated black squares. In addition there are photographic
halftones the width of the type area, made from splendid photographs.
Although, as we can see. typography is here still being used in an orna
mental way, we can give this booklet great credit for its deliberate avoid
ance of "period" typography, and its use of simple geometric shapes. pho
tography, and strong contrasts of black and white.
For the same reason I would like to mention the much later type designs
and typography of C. 0. Czeschka. who also came from the Vienna Work
shop. The type named after him. which appeared in about 1912, is the only
attempt, among all the artist-designed decorative typefaces of the pre-and
postwar periods. to produce a design not from a historical prototype but
from the imagination. It is a sanserif, whose rounded terminals appear to
form small spirals. The accompanying ornaments, like the types themselves,
in their geometric accuracy anticipate our own ways of thinking. Czeschka
made no use of photography.
It is to a "non-technician," the Italian poet F. T. Marinetti. the founder of
Futurism. that the credit must be given for providing the curtain-raiser for
the change-over from ornamental to functional typography.
In his book of poems Les mots en liberte futuristes. Milan 1 919. he pub
lished the following manifesto:
TYPOGRAPHIC REVOLUTION
AND FREE-EXPRESSION ORTHOGRAPHY
Typographic Revolution
I am starting a typographic revolution. directed above all against the
idiotic, sick-making conception of the old-fashioned• Poetry Book,
with its hand-made paper. its sixteenth-century style. decorated with
galleons. Minervas. Apollos. great initials. flourishes. and mythologi
cal vegetables. with clasps, mottoes. and Roman numerals. The book
must be the futuristic expression of our futuristic thought. Better: my
revolution is against among other things the so-called typographic
harmony of the page, which is in complete opposition to the flow of
- =earlier (opposite of futunstic)