Author: ftnbooks

Bookseller, with an expertise in art books for over 35 years.
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Paul Schuitema (1897-1973) and dutch design.

Just a screenshot from my computer when i searched for some information on Paul Schuitema and instantly you see the importance of Schuitema for dutch design.

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Here it is the ultimate combination between a spectacular lay out, great typography and photo montage resulting in a highly recognizable style….this is Paul Schuitema. Schuitema a contemporary of Piet Zwart, was not as well known as Piet Zwart , but both did their ground breaking work in the Interbellum and can be considered as extremely important for graphic design. Schuitema differs from Piet Zwart.

Where Piet Zwart excels in Typography and lay-out, the photo montage is the part in which Schuitema excels. Both are important, not only because they are essential in the development of dutch design, but more and more they are recognized as being important for graphic design all over the world in general and their influence can be found everywhere. This imporance is underlined by orderes on these 2 artists from all over the world.

The Gemeentemuseum has both artists in its collection and because of the former curator Flip Bool , these collections are possibly the most important in the world.

When you come to the Netherland check the exhibitions at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag, maybe you are lucky and there is a special exhibition on one of them. If not know that www.ftn-books.com has some nice books available on both these graphic designers.

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Willem Hussem and Carel Visser … an (unusual) cooperation

Thursday is bookmarket day and sometimes you are lucky and you encounter a rare publication. Last Thursday there was one. I found an extremely nice publication published by Stedelijk Museum Het Prinsenhof in Delft on the occasion of a WillMe Hussem Carel Visser exhibition. My guess it must have been in 1967 because an inlay with actual prices of the works in the exhibition s included with the mention that the works are from 1966-1967.

Willem Hussem died in 1974 and the works that are included were probably from his best years. Carel Visser started at that time his career and stayed true to iron, the material he kept using for all the decades to come. Both these artists became famous in their own way. The Delft catalogue has a simple layout, where the first  part is used to cite some of the Haiku’s Willem Hussem used to write in those years. The second part is for Carel Visser’s works. I tried to find another copy on the internet, but could not find one. Conclusion www.ftn-books.com is probably the only internet store that has this rare title available

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Erwin Olaf donates 500 “key” works to the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam

This morning you could read in the Volkskrant that Erwin Olaf donated 500 of his key works to the Rijksmuseum. Why the Rijksmuseum….because the last 5 year a bond between these 2 major forces in the art world grew now resulting in the extremely generous and large gift of the 500 most important works from Erwin Olaf’s career.

At the same time as this gift was announced, it was announced that the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag and the Fotomuseum will both open an Erwin Olaf exhibition in February 2019. Please check  both their sites in half a year when the details will be known for both these exhibitions. If you can not wait until February…… Check Erwin Olaf’s site and visit http://www.ftn-books.com for his publications.

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Hyperrealism Sculpture at the KUNSTHAL Rotterdam

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The day we visited the Rajlich exhibition some months ago we also went to the Kunsthal. A totally different museum than the Boijmans van Beuningen. The exhibitions in there need to have a great appeal to many and that must be the reason that this hyper realistic sculptures were exhibited over there. Far too many people crowded the exhibition space to have a good look at the sculptures. For me this was not a group of visitors that wanted to see some great art, but far more they wanted to be amazed by the technique and craftsmanship…. because these were really hyperrealistic sculptures. Personally i did not like it very much, with some exceptions.

The baby by Mueck was fascinating and the sculpture by Allen Jones / girl in the Chiquita banana was a first for me, but for me personally the most amazing one was by a dutch sculptor Margriet van Breevoort.

Every detail in the self portrait of het body was perfect. Not near perfect, but really 100% perfect and one could not tell the difference between reality and the sculpture. Is it art?…i do not think so, but fascinating it is. www.ftn-books.com has some publications on hyperrealistic sculpture available.

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here is the text the Kunsthal has published:

Following the success of the 2017 exhibition ‘Hyperrealism. 50 years of painting’, the Kunsthal Rotterdam crosses over to the third dimension with the exhibition ‘Hyperrealism Sculpture’. This exhibition will show a unique selection of three-dimensional works by all important hyperrealist sculptors of the past 50 years. From the early American pioneers, including George Segal, Duane Hanson and John DeAndrea, to the rise of the international movement, represented by Juan Muñoz (Spain), Maurizio Cattelan (Italy), Berlinde de Bruyckere (Belgium) and Ron Mueck, Sam Jinks and Patricia Piccinini (Australia).

With 35 artworks by 28 artists, the Kunsthal will present – for the first time in the Netherlands – an overview of the worldwide developments in hyperrealist sculpture over the past fifty years. In the 1960s and 1970s a number of sculptors, each from their own perspective, became interested in a type of figurative art based on representations of the human figure that were as vivid and lifelike as possible. Standing face to face with these works provokes a reaction from the visitors, raising questions about the extent to which human beings can be manipulated and about identity in general. How do we see ourselves and others? – An interesting topic in the light of the current selfie culture on social media.

HUMAN REPLICAS

In five different themes, the exhibition will show how our perspective on the human body is subject to constant change. ‘Doppelgangers’ zooms in on artists such as Duane Hanson and John DeAndrea who, in the 1960s, set the trend by making life-sized sculptures. To make the sculptures even more lifelike, they used extremely laborious, complex procedures and innovative materials to meticulously replicate the structure of the human skin, and combined the works with objects from reality. Also shown are the hyperrealist nudes of the American artist Paul McCarthy and works by the French artist Daniel Firman, who, by contrast, fully dresses his figures and systematically conceals their facial features and limbs.

DIMENSIONS

From the 1990s a number of artists, including Ron Mueck, Marc Sijan and Sam Jinks, started to drastically enlarge or reduce the dimension of their figures. Ron Mueck uses this method to focus on the transitional stages of life, such as birth, old age and death. By depicting the human body in an alienating way, he makes these themes even more profound.
A spectacular example of this is the five meter long work ‘A Girl’ from 2006 (from the collection of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art), representing a new-born baby.

DEFORMED REALITIES

The theme ‘deformations’ zooms in on artists such as Evan Penny and Patricia Piccinini who observe the body from distorted perspectives,  Tony Matelli who, with his floating figure, seems to completely discard the laws of nature, and Berlinde de Bruyckere who explores themes like death and human existence with her sculptures of contorted bodies.

BODY PARTS

The theme ‘body parts’ shows the works of artists who, since the 1990s, have focused their attention on specific parts of the body. Maurizio Cattelan’s disconnected arms and Robert Gober’s apparently cleanly severed lower part of a hairy leg projecting from the wall, as well as the life-sized heads by John Davies and the almost surrealist human parts by Peter Land, all convey disturbing messages, occasionally with a touch of humour.

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Herb Lubalin (1918-1981)… a 1965 series at FTN-books.

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A blog on Herb Lubalin, because www.ftn-books.com has the rare opportunity to have for sale SIX original 1965 posters by Herb Lubalin.

 

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Herb Lubalin was a celebrated twentieth century American graphic designer. He is recognized for his collaboration with Ralph Ginzburg on three of Ginzburg’s magazines. The magazines showcased his artistic skills as he brought out the creative visual beauty of these publications. ITC Avant Garde typeface is one of his creations and it is mostly known for being a revision of art-deco.

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On March 17, 1918, Herbert F. Lubalin was born in New York, United States. At the age of seventeen, he was enrolled in a privately funded college located in the East Village, Cooper Union. An array of possibilities offered by the field of typography as a communicative implement fascinated him. Lubalin learned about the fundamentals of typography and was awestruck by the impact a typeface can have if traded with another and how it affects the whole text’s interpretation. Upon receiving his graduation degree in 1939, he had a rough time searching a suitable job. He was able to get a job at a display firm, though he got sacked after requesting a two dollar raise on his weekly salary.

Soon after, Lubalin found work at Reiss Advertising and eventually he was landed a job at Sudler & Hennessey. At S & H he became a practitioner of a wide range of skills. In fact, it was he who attracted talent from multidiscipline, such as design, typography and photography, to the firm. While working there he made associates with George Lois, John Pistilli and Art Kane. He stayed with Sudler & Hennessey for two long decades before he decided to establish his own design firm, Herb Lubalin, Inc in 1964. With the foundation of his private studio he enjoyed the liberty of taking on a variety of art projects. He excelled in a number of projects including poster designing, magazine designing and packaging and identity solutions. Lubalin’s talent was best manifested when he designed Ralph Ginzburg’s succession of magazines; Eros, Fact and Avant Garde.

Ginzburg first launched Eros which was dedicated to beauty and emerging sense of sexuality in the burgeoning counterculture. It had a large format, similar to a regular book rather than a quarterly magazine, with no advertisement. Lubalin’s editorial design for the magazine is considered one of the brilliant of its kind. However, following an obscenity case filed by the US Postal Service against the magazine it immediately folded. In response to the treatment Eros received, Ginzburg and Lubalin launched a second magazine, Fact. The managing editor of Fact Warren Boroson defined it as having spiced up issues instead of sugar-coated pieces like in Reader’s Digest. Lubalin applied an elegant design to the magazine with minimalist palette, based on dynamic serifed typography and exquisite illustrations. Notwithstanding the fact that the magazine received great reviews, it followed the lead of its predecessor and folded. It was a consequence of their publication of an article on the Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater, titled “The Unconscious of a Conservative: A special Issue on the Mind of Barry Goldwater” . Goldwater sued the magazine repeatedly and put it out of business eventually.

However, Lubalin and Ginzburg stayed undeterred by demise of one magazine as they released another one by the name Avant Garde. Lubalin created ITC Avant Garde typeface for the magazine. During the last ten years of his life, Herb Lubalin supervised various projects. His most distinguished works include his typographic journal U&lc and the foundation of International Typographic Corporation.

http://www.ftn-books has also one of the most important Avant Garde magazines for sale.

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