Revolution of Jan Tschichold’s New Typography
A Review of Literature
Tan Jun Kai
Forum for Critical Inquiry, Year 3
AY 2014 / 2015
The Glasgow School of Art Singapore
Nadia Wagner
Word count: 1000
Revolution of Jan Tschichold’s New Typography:
A Review of Literature
By Tan Jun Kai
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to analyze the development stages in Jan Tschichold’s understanding towards the New Typography throughout his life and comparison of what is considered an old typography and his ideas behind The New Typography. Although his ideology on New Typography had changed overtime, he had the same passion for detail and to point out faults including his younger self. His devotion to a better typography eventually self contradicts his…show more content… With the increase in quantity, the “form” has to change. It simply means that we no longer read quietly line-by-line but glance quickly. We only pay attention to content that we are interested in. The old typography in this case (its “form”) was more fitted towards the needs of its readers. For this reason the old typography concerned itself less with function, but more towards to beauty. Both nature and technology showed us that “form” is not independent, but grows out of function. Technology by its very nature can never be an end in itself, only a means to an end, and can therefore be a part of man’s spiritual life only indirectly, while the remaining fields of human creativity rise above the purely functional of technical forms. Like what we have seen in modern architecture itself, in particular to Le Corbusier’s design. Le Corbusier discards the ornamental facade and “decorated” furniture and develops its forms from the function of the building. This is applicable to typography too. The New Typography should be free from superficial and abstract shapes. We cannot allow ourselves to imitate the typography of previous centuries. Our generation with its very different desire and new technology must therefore dictate new visual forms. The essence of the New Typography is clarity. In old typography, the principle was to arrange everything on a central axis (to achieve symmetry). As there…show more content… On the contrary, the New Typography uses colors functionally. For example, white has the effect of reflecting light. Red seems closer to the reader than any other color. Black on the other hand is the densest color and seems to return the furthest.
Type
Any typefaces with ornament would not qualify for New Typography (the essence for New Typography is clarity). One thing to note is that not all san serif types are applicable to New Typography. Tschichold explains that the essential characteristics of this type have not fully worked out: the lower-case letters especially are still too like their “humanistic” counterparts. The New Typography would therefore favor the old anonymous san serifs to typefaces such as Kabel. The particular typeface that justifies clarity was none other than Paul Renner’s Futura. Even till today, Paul Renner’s Futura still embodies the essence of the New Typography. Futura, the pure geometric typeface, which was intentionally designed to avoid any decorative and without any unnecessary