Page 75 - Studio International - September 1968

Gilt Edge

competition for

carpet designs

Its principle is that a persuasive statement should sound
like the truth. For instance, advertising men make the
mistake of thinking that a photograph is by definition
snakier() `truthful' and therefore more persuasive than a drawing,
and they too often think that two hundred words are ten
times more effective ( or less boring) than twenty. And
the designers who put the words and pictures together
have the mistaken belief that type is always and every-
where better than original lettering in which 'freedom'
is both practical and artistically justifiable.
In the theatre the best sort of acting is the kind that
compels the audience to forget the actor and believe in
the character. In the cinema, the cartoon is instantly
acceptable in its own terms. In both cases, the pro-
fessionalism and the technique which created the 'reality'
are concealed by the art. What advertising needs is less
of the trendy and tricky—of which compacted typesetting
is a trivial example—and more of the (apparently) direct
communication from maker to buyer. It ought to use
graphic art to the fullest; not, of course, in clumsy
pastiche of Beardsley and Mucha, but as a genuine
assault on the reader's imagination and emotion.
Advertisements might then become enjoyable—and
therefore memorable, which is what the advertising man
wants. Advertising is, after all, the great source of the
romantic in these anti-romantic times.

1 'Faces without bodies', James Sutton,
The Penrose Annual 1967.
2 Type Designs 1959.

8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 15, 14. A few examples of original
14
lettering done for a specific subject. The artist is
rightly free to use or ignore conventions of form
and arrangement; he is creating the letters, not
using ready-made ones.