Print Culture and Distribution part 1:

Age of print began in 1450 with :Gutenburg press.

1760-1840/ 1780-1832:

Industrial revolution causes production to speed up and become more mechanised causing a shift in labour and cities grow which resulted in the need for more products at quicker rate as industry was rapidly expanding. Consequently this caused a clear segregation in class as factory owners and businessmen lived at top of city and the working class lived in poverty at the bottom. this caused a community to form among the working class who created new forms of popular entertainment which also involves the working class to begin to question social norms such as questioning social divides and demanding the right to vote causing the politicisation of the working class. Consequently this was aided by mass image culture and John Martin who bypassed traditional methods and charged people an entrance fee to see his work instead of selling it. He then made cheap engravings to sell to makes more money which gave people the ability to be an artist without state funding or by being royalty/high class giving power to the working class. Mass image culture further aided the working class as it made art available to masses,as it was no longer just kept in galleries due to developments in the industrial revolution as artist should now reproduce their work. 

Culture vs popular culture

Matthew Arnold ‘Culture & Anarchy' 

Culture is he best that has been thought and said in the world and is the study of perfection therefore working class aren't cultured and refers to working class as Anarchy. Working class culture in general is not culture properly but has political function to keep working class in their place. 

Leavisism- F.R Leavis 7 Q.D Leavis:

Culture has always been in minority keeping’- believe there needs to be an educated few to maintain culture, as only a few can truly understand culture. Popular culture creates an addiction that doesn't refresh attitude to life whereas ‘art’  makes you question world. 

However due to the industrial revolution the Schools of design start to emerge which start to work towards new disciplines such as printing. Government school of design where created to create workers with skills for industrial capitalism and focused on getting people into industry. First government school of design was Summerset House and they started to move across the country. However there are only a few left today Leeds College of Art being one. Culture of art and culture of design created out of political divide between elite and working class as neither understood each others methods. This is because the elite saw art with an Aura as they believe it to be something thats  eternal and  perusing  something greater then ones self. However the industrial revolution sought to take the aura out of art by removing it from galleries something which was tighten by the age of digital print which saw the recycling of image  which further threatens the aura status of art as becomes less exclusive which can be seen in the many reproduction sand digital edits of the Mona Lisa which saw the idea of making art by using new technology to try to fight back against systems of power not just for reproduction and profit.

The introduction of new technology saw a new breed of artist show man appear in form of  Eidophusikon  who open an exhibition in lester square and charged entrance fee. The exhibition featured a set that the audience looked through as if they where looking at a painting, with moving pieces became first use of immersive sensory experience in an exhibition setting and was the first moving image within art. The use of moving image within art expanded by the use of the Panorama in London which was the use of new technology that allowed artist to create photographic mapping/panoramas which where viewed in a circular galleries above ground to create submissive experience. This lead newspapers to begin to use images within publication as people often bought the Illustrated London News 1840 for the photography and illustrations within publications causing no need to buy art, go to galleries as can gain art from newspapers which lead to the belief that anyone can be visual communicator if have access to technology. This was developed further through the use of photography as with the invention of photography there became no need for portrait paintings as photographs where cheaper and more accurate. therefore giving further power to the working class as anyone could have a portrait no longer just for the rich. 

Print Capitalism 1842:

Own culture, makes own rules and creates own markets centred around images made for purpose of profit, markets overtake traditional art distribution methods such as galleries causing culture to be replaced by popular culture as are art became generally cheap and affordable which the elitist hated as they though it to be mindless and cheap.

History of Type: Distribution and Production

Typography is a method of communication - Shelley Gruendler

Typography is a language which has developed from oral communication to visual communication in the form of type. 

1919:

Bauhaus allowed for the combination of making an idea physical and industrialising craft. This allowed new connection between new technology to be made resulting in different discipline coming together to create new ideas, trends on of which was form follow function which is still popular today. Form follows function meant that what an object  was supposed to do drove what the design resulting in a minimal approach to design. This lead to the development of promotion as the industrial aged had its own visual language and commerce started to drive design. This is interesting as it links back to the first written words which where driven by trade. Consequently showing that nothing has gone away instead we've added to and reinvented ideas, principles and practises.

1957: Modernism

Helvetica was created by Eduard Hoffman and Max Miedinger and quickly became the typeface of the Swiss Style movement due to its simplistic and neutral nature which allowed Helvetica to be interpreted in many ways which lead to its use across promotional material for mass communication. Helvetica quickly became the benchmark for modern type. 25 years after Helvetica was released Microsoft released Arial a slight variation of Helvetica. This indicated the development of type as there where now type designers who focused on finding a better way to communicate an idea. However type design was still very mechanical and focused on hand drawn type.

1990:

First Mac was now available for less than $1000 which shifted typography and the way its produced as designers now had access to computers which saw the introduction of the digital age within type design. Consequently this democratised type and design as it allowed individuals to create typefaces as the computer became a design tool. As a result type became the forefront of visual culture as it became something everyone could use. Typography was no longer a specialist practise. 

By making itself evident, typography can illuminate the construction and identity of page screen place or produce - Ellen Lupton

1990:

Tim Berners-Lee created the world wide web and gave it away for free which created a way of communicating without paper allowing for the democratisation of design and distribution. Consequently in 1995 internet explorer was released which laid the foundations fro template based layout however this also restricted design due to the use of certain templates and only 8 fonts. The creation of these templates however shaped the way we design online as people realised we read and communicate differently online causing people to stop speaking and start typing, highlighting the move from spoken to written word. This development of language has gone even further as we move from written word back to using symbols though the use of emojis which have become there own visual language. 

Postmodernism: 

1997: 

Jamie Ried created the visual culture that surrounded punk by not conforming to modernism, getting rid of the grid. His destructive approach to modernism has become embedded into a language style that can be reused in contemporary design to reference a point of defiance/rebellion. 

1979: 

Barbra Kruger started to look at a modernist view to communication in the style of form follows function as type moved across into the gallery system. She explored the relationship between feminism and commerce using type to communicate her message. 

1992:

David Carson had a modernist approach to redefining typography that representing surf, music culture in America by undermining the grid and how that reflects subculture within music scene in America. His ideas our based on heritage dating back to Bauhaus showing different ways about thinking about type and design resulting in aesthetic evolution. 

Typography now works across a range of disciplines and products as there is no longer one single approach to design. Design is driven by what we can do and how we choose to distribute this which begins to shape our individual practise which shapes the visual culture everyone engages with as well as how they interpret the world.