In order to contextualize the handmade design trend, I want to look at historic developments in graphic design to get a better understanding of its origin.
For about a century a modernist approach has influenced popular design. Modernism took over between the 1920s and 1960s. It is deliberately rejecting styles of the past like Art Nouveau and Art Deco and instead emphasizing the use of new materials and techniques. It is supposed to reflect modern society through bold colors, simple shapes and modern fonts. Shortly before this movement, Art Nouveau, which used expensive and labor-intense techniques, was popular. “[…] despite the attempt to move away from the artistic heritage, Art Nouveau had certain plastic borrowings from the artistic styles of the previous times in its graphic language.”1
In 1915 the constructivism movement was founded. It focused on construction and science rather than artistic expression and aimed to influence all mass-produced objects. “Art was to be built.”2 The artists used geometric, simplistic shapes that could be created with utilitarian instruments like compasses and rulers, to break down art into its most fundamental parts. The designs were supposed to speak to political concerns of citizens and fulfill the demands of communist culture. “However, in general the society was not ready to accept the radical artistic techniques of the constructivists.”¹ Art deco, with its opulent and luxurious feel, became a reaction to constructivism.
“In the second half of the 20th century, Functionalism, or as it was called, the ‘international style’, which consistently professed the ideas of Modernism, became more popular”¹ This style emerged from a need of big companies wanting to create their own corporate styles. “It was thought that the search for a new global style was over, and now everything would be done in one way for a long period.”¹ Whilst the international style has stayed popular for a long time, modern society demands a diversity of styles and is not satisfied with just one.
After modernism, came post-modernism. An ironic approach which referenced modernist styles. “The only thing that Postmodernism requires from the designer is the use of modern technologies.”¹
The emergence of the world wide web in the 1990s further impacted popular design styles. In the beginning a functionalist approach was necessary, due to the graphic restrictions of the web. The design was subordinate to the technology which led to the so-called hyper-functionalism. Later swiss style became popular in web design, as it allowed company-styles to be integrated in a still very functional website design. The “New wave” style contrasts the functional and rational rules of the swiss school of design. Computer technologies opened new expressive capabilities, like new fonts and chaotic compositions that indicate an intentional ignorance to logical design schemes. They enable experimental designs and a “Hi-tech” style. This style is characterized by vector illustration, animation as well as 3D graphics. Theses graphic elements and techniques are still very popular. “To achieve their purpose, they mostly use straight lines and forms; gray, white, black silver-metallic colors; rulers, frames; elements of technical and information graphics (icons, arrows, etc.); they also use non-standard materials (for example, business cards are printed on transparent plastic, etc.) when copying the media carriers.” ¹ The high-tech style produced some more avant-garde designs on the internet during the late 90s. These designs had a maximalist approach of graphics, used cultural codes, montages, chaotic structuring and for example pixelated images to hint towards the technological limitations of the medium. The so-called trash-style reflected a desire to add a human touch. The design style let the viewer see, this design was consciously created by a human.
This historical context shows that modernist ideas in graphic design are staying relevant no matter different tendencies and smaller trends that appear. What I find interesting, is that over the years a human and hand-made style did not seem to be relevant at all. It even appears that a more hand-made artistic approach, and the use of outdated technology, has not been popular ever since modernism started. Even though there was a desire to show human-qualities in the design – especially during the establishment of computers – this was done using mainly new, digital techniques (trash style, new wave). And before the digitalization, it seems like the design was strongly moving towards, perfect looking, clean designs (constructivism, modernism, swiss school of design, …), even though analog techniques may not have allowed an execution without small flaws. The use of modern techniques and technologies seem to have dominated throughout all these developments. This might be why the current trends towards using older techniques in different fields, are hard to explain. Be it in graphic design, photography or even audio – old technology is having a comeback even though its use is more expensive and time-consuming. This trend is not necessarily logical or functional. For example, in the audio-field vinyl has had a significant comeback. After being neglected in the 1990s, its sales are now higher than the newer format of CDs. It is the first recording format to return dominance from near-extintion.3 Since similar tendencies can be seen in photography and design, this might become a significant trend in the future. But its source is hard to define.
- https://www.internationalcircle.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/IC_Circular-13-article-Kolisnyk-Kolosnichenko-Pashkevych-V2.pdf ↩︎
- https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-constructivism-brought-russian-revolution-art ↩︎
- Mall, Andrew (2021): Vinyl Revival. In: Journal of Popular Music Studies. Band: 33, Nr. 3,
S.73 ↩︎
