Assignment 11

Two of my favorite designers of the New York School era are Henry Wolf and Herb Lubalin. Both of them were masters of their own style, Wolf excelling in fashion photography and design and Lubalin with his masterful use of type so that the words became the subject. Henry Wolf was an Austrian born designer and photographer that came over to the U.S. after the end of the war. He influenced American magazine design during the 1950s and 60s with his bold layouts, elegant typography and his enchanting and eye-catching photography. He was the art director during his time at Esquire, Harper’s Bazaar, and Show magazines, bringing his impeccable taste and eye for fashion and design to each of the magazines. He transformed the fashion world through design, fulfilling the need of beauty and nostalgia to a public that was recuperating from the war. One of his covers that stood out to me the most was the Harper’s Bazaar cover in 1959. The model has a peacock feather laying over her one eye, the make-up on the other eye imitates the colors and design of the feather. That is not the only thing, just as the peacock feather is off center of her face, she is off centered on the magazine cover. This creates an asymmetrical balance and allows the eye to flow from the writing on the left, to her eye on the right and then to the peacock feather covering her other eye. He even changed the font color of Bazaar so that it coordinated with the colors of the photographic image. As his skills progressed he eventually opened his own studio in 1971 where he taught magazine design and photography classes.

Herb Lubalin was a typographer and designer. He is most known for his creation of the font Avant Garde. He used this font in many of his designs, naming most of his works after the name of the typeface. Lubalin gained so much fame from his art as it began to show signs of the beginning stages of the pop art movement that was soon to come. His best known designs were created with just font alone, this style taking off in the 70s as advertising budgets were beginning to be cut due to the economy of the time. He made words into art, giving them movement and whythym, exploring with color, contrast and layering. Lubalin was even one of the people behind the culture-shocking magazines Avant-Garde, Eros and Fact, he spent his time with these publications making them a visual beauty. His success in just about everything he did had to do with his consistent breaking of boundaries on both a visual and social level. The biggest gift by far that Lubalin gave to the graphic design community was the font Avant Garde, his bigger success, it is used in brand names and album covers today.