History of Graphic Design - Study Guide Flashcards

Vocabulary flashcards covering key historical figures, movements, publications, and innovations from Chapters 7 through 12 of Meggs' History of Graphic Design.

Renaissance

Meaning "Revival" or "rebirth," this term references the period marking the transition from the medieval to the modern world, placing emphasis on science, medicine, and art (the humanities).

Venice

A major center of commerce and trade that served as the epicenter of Renaissance graphic design.

Italian renaissance book design

was innovative. Illustrators, designers, and printers included page

numbers, title pages, floral decoration, woodblock and cast metal ornaments, Roman and italic type, and

an innovative approach to the layout of illustrations with ty

Nicholas Jenson

A Frenchman who worked at the Royal Mint at Tours, founded the Second Press in Venice, and is credited as the "father of the Roman typeface." His designs inspired Cen-Tor and Adobe Jenson.

Aldus Manutius

Founder of the Aldine Press and a humanist scholar who published works of Greek and Roman thinkers, invented italic type, and produced the first pocketbook (Virgil's Opera).

Italic Type

A typeface style invented by Aldus Manutius that made it possible to fit more words on a page, thereby using less paper.

Claude Garamond

The first type designer and punch cutter to establish an independent type foundry selling cast type directly to printers; played a major role in eliminating Gothic styles from typography.

Calendarium

A scientific book produced by Erhard Ratdolt featuring 60 diagrams explaining solar and lunar eclipses, representing the first example of tipped-in artwork in a book.

French renaissance designs

Printers often used headpieces, tailpieces, and fleurons (decorative

elements cast like type, “printer’s flowers”

Pierre Simon Fournier le Juene

Typographer credited with the standardization of type measurement and the initiation of type families (one typeface containing various weights, widths, and complementary versions).

Louis Simmoneau

in 1695, created copperplate prints of master alphabets, intending to establish new

typographic standards for the French Royal printing office.

Romain du Roi

A typeface created around 1695 based on mathematical construction; considered the first transitional Roman typeface with increased stroke contrast and a geometric quality.

William Caslon

English typefounder who cut Caslon Old Style in 1722, leading to the famous printer's phrase: "When in doubt, use Caslon."

William Playfair

Scottish author and scientist who converted statistical data into symbolic graphs, introducing the first line chart (fever chart) and pie chart.

Francois Ambroise Didot

Creator of a typographic measurement system (the point system) where $72\text{ points} = 1''$.

William Blake

Artist, poet, and printer known for his romanticism style, which contrasted with the prevalent neoclassical style of his era.

The Industrial Revolution expanded the roll of graphic design.

• Reading material increased due to the spread of public education and literacy.

• Factory output increased, and designers were needed to help market goods.

• Industry perceived that advertising was necessary to sell goods, as their competitors were also doing.

• Production of printed materials increased due to advances in technology, which lowered per-unit

costs.

Fat-face type

A category of roman face introduced by Robert Thorne in 1803 whose contrast and weight are increased by expanding the thickness of heavy strokes.

Antique type (Egyptian)

A bold typestyle featuring a machine-like feeling, slab-like rectangular serifs, even weight throughout the letters, and short ascenders and descenders.

Sans-serif type

A category of type design without serifs, invented by William Caslon IV in 1816 and named "sans-serif" by Vincent Figgins in 1832.

Vincent Figgins

Type designer responsible for giving "sans-serif" its name in 1832 and producing one of the first three-dimensional or perspective fonts.

Joseph Niepce

French inventor and lithographer credited with producing the first photographic image in 1826.

Daguerreotype

A photographic process invented by Louis Jacques Daguerre that produced detailed, one-of-a-kind images.

Calotype

A photography technique developed by William Henry Fox Talbot (from Greek Kalos Typos) allowing photos to be reproduced from negatives in unlimited numbers, enlarged, or reduced.

The Pencil of Nature

A work by William Henry Fox Talbot published in 1844, recognized as the first book illustrated entirely with mounted photographs.

Halftone Screen

An invention by Stephen H. Horgan that breaks continuous-tone photographic images into dots of varying sizes to allow full tonal range printing.

Julia Margaret Cameron

Victorian portrait photographer known for revealing the inner being of her subjects and capturing sensitive portraits of contemporary celebrities.

Matthew Brady

American Civil War photographer credited as "The father of modern photojournalism."

Eadweard Muybridge

Photographer who recorded split-second motion sequences (such as horse motion studies) that laid the foundation for motion pictures and graphics.

Randolph Caldecott

Children's book illustrator whose humorous drawing style served as a prototype for children's literature and later animated films.

Thomas Nast

Political cartoonist for Harper's Weekly who created iconic graphic symbols including Santa Claus, Uncle Sam, the Democratic donkey, and the Republican elephant.

Chromolithography

A color printing process using stone or zinc plates that allowed full integration of type and lifelike images, as well as printing on product packaging.

William Morris

Leader of the English Arts and Crafts movement and founder of the Kelmscott Press, who designed the Golden, Troy, and Chaucer typefaces.

Century Guild

A group formed in 1882 by Arthur H. Mackmurdo and Selwyn Image with the goal of elevating design arts to the status of painting and sculpture.

The Century Guild Hobby Horse

The first 1880s periodical to introduce the British Arts and Crafts viewpoint and treat printing as a serious design form.

William Addison Dwiggins

American designer who coined the term "graphic designer" in the 1920s.

Art Nouveau

An international style influenced by Japanese decorative designs, Rococo, and Celtic ornaments that rejected realism for the metaphysical and sensuous.

Jules Chéret

French designer known as the "Father of the modern poster" who popularized vibrant depictions of modern women termed "Chérettes."

Theophile Auguste Steinlen

Artist who created social realism posters and specialized in drawing cats, particularly for Paris's Le Chat Noir nightclub.

Alphonse Mucha

Czechoslovakian designer in Paris who achieved sudden fame after designing a rush theatrical poster for actress Sarah Bernhardt.

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

French artist whose journalistic, illustrative style documented Paris nightlife.

Jugend

A German Art Nouveau magazine whose weekly covers allowed individual designers to create custom logotypes matching their illustrations.

Frank Lloyd Wright

Architect famous for "organic architecture" (Fallingwater, Guggenheim Museum) who also designed the unique font Terracotta.

The Glasgow School

A group of four Scottish artists (Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Margaret and Frances Macdonald, J. Herbert McNair) known for stylized natural forms, mystical ideas, and flat planes of color.

Vienna Secession

An art movement formed in 1897 as a countermovement to floral Art Nouveau when young Viennese artists broke away from the Viennese Creative Artists' Association.

Ver Sacrum

The official periodical magazine of the Vienna Secession ("Sacred Spring") published from 1898 to 1903, distinguished by its unique square format.

Peter Behrens

German artist, architect, and designer considered the first "industrial designer"; first to use sans-serif type for running text and established a Visual Identity System for AEG.