Page 70 - Studio International - September 1968

6. Temperance propaganda in the shape
of a wine pot
7. A watch label with spring shaped text

2. Bent lines. There are many examples of shaped 3. Bent letters. This type of shaping is calligraphic
poems in which the shape is made by bending the lines par excellence because it involved distortion of the
of the text. Pierre Albert-Birot and Apollinaire have letterform. It has only recently become possible to
written many examples of these. The setting of text do this mechanically with the advent of the Photo
with bent lines is an art which requires great Typositor. Bent letter shaping is the main form
sensitivity and skill on the part of the typographer of shaped writing in Islamic and Sino-Japanese
if he is to do the almost impossible and achieve calligraphy. Perhaps the best-known example of
the delicate effects and textures of a calligraphic shaping by letter bending is the Spratts series which
original4. Photo-litho makes it possible to avoid the we illustrate here.
problem by reproducing the original. Letter bending is an interesting compromise between
Bent lines are common in Chinese shaped writing diminished legibility and increased attention, one is
perhaps because the Chinese printer used woodblock to lead to the other. As Time magazine put it, 'While
printing till fairly recent times. Bent lines are the you're puzzling it out you're hooked'. This amounts to
main form of the decorative writing of the Hebrew an adman's booby-trap which could perhaps be justified
masoritic texts5. The latter have the peculiarity that by saying with Nietsche, 'With thunder and heavenly
the shape has little to do with the text which forms it. fireworks must one woo somnolent and indolent senses'.

8. The seven canons of Islam in the shape of a
Heavenly boat. Arabic calligraphy from Turkey