Printing Types: New Zealand Type Design Since 1870

The word 'Designer' is a loaded term which for most of the population inspires visions of glamorous personalities, high fashion and covetable objects. Let's face it, the glossy and multifaceted world of design has held us enthralled for decades. Within the varied sub-industries of design however, there are numerous career pathways that garner relatively little public acclaim, despite occupying important roles within contemporary society. Type design is one of these roads less travelled.

For these reasons it was rather surprising that a hit feature at the 2007 Auckland International Film Festival was - you probably guessed it - all about type design. Gary Huswit's documentary Helvetica was a runaway success documenting the use, abuse and global popularity of this now ubiquitous typeface. Helvetica attracted numerous attendees, many of whom probably hadn't paused for long to consider the history and of a typeface we most often turn to when composing the majority of our daily correspondences.

So where do we fit into this picture here in New Zealand? Does our local type design history consist of Koru motifs, borrowed and embellished ad infinitum? The answer is that this kind of perception couldn't be farther from the truth. A small and discerning industry with many entertaining and intriguing stories of design success and failure, the history of type design in New Zealand has unfortunately been inadequately documented.

Printing Types: New Zealand Type Design Since 1870 is a new exhibition which directly addresses this important field. Exhibition curator Jonty Valentine observes that "the purpose of this project is to begin to establish, or at least begin to lay the case for such a series of stories" and to question "why there is so little written about this subject." Highlights uncovered in Printing Types include the 1960s achievements of internationally celebrated New Zealand-Samoan Joseph Churchward who is the subject of a new book, Joseph Churchward (ed. David Bennewith, published by Clouds, 2009) and Tom Elliott (designer of the iconic 1970s Air New Zealand typeface).

Contemporary type designers in New Zealand are exemplified by designers such as Kris Sowersby and more speculative practitioners like Luke Wood, who are producing work of great intelligence and wit. The result of these projects is sometimes taken far beyond what the designer originally intended. For instance, Wood's McCahon typeface (2000) has had a very eventful life which highlights the value of typefaces as commodities. In its short life it has been appropriated by a multinational, found its way onto ‘Charlie's' fruit juice bottles and been used in the branding for an important Colin McCahon exhibition!

Print publication: A catalogue (66 pages) and typeface specimen posters (A0) for this exhibition will be available for sale at Objectspace.

Curator's talk: 11:00am Saturday 1 August 2009 at Objectspace.

(above image: Luke Wood, McCahon (detail), typeface design, 2000)

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