Participating
designers / design studios
1.
75B, Rotterdam
2. Aap-ontwerpers, Utrecht
(since 1996)
3. Boy Bastiaens (1956) /
Stormhand, Maastricht
4. Studio Anthon Beeke,
Amsterdam (since 1989)
5. Frank Beekers (1951),
Amsterdam
6. Jop van Bennekom (1970),
Amsterdam
7. Beukers/Scholma, Haarlem
(since 1998)
8. Ingeborg Bloem (1962)
9. Wigger Bierma (1958), Arnhem
10. Evert Bloemsma (1958) Arnhem
11. Jan Bons (1918), Amsterdam
12. Irma Boom (1960), Amsterdam
13. Studio Boot, Den Bosch
(since 1993)
14. Peter Te Bos (1950), Amsterdam
15. Thomas Buxó (1968), Amsterdam
16. Wim Crouwel (1928), Amsterdam
17. De Designpolitie (since 1995),
Amsterdam
18. Bob van Dijk (1970), The Hague
19. Dorp & Dal/ Jan Middendorp Ghent
20. Jaap Drupsteen, Huizen
21. Studio Dumbar, The Hague (since 1978)
22. Daphne Duyvelshoff van Peski
(1942), Vreeland
23. Eden Amsterdam
24. Marianne Elbers (1957), Amsterdam
25. Faydherbe/De Vringer, The Hague
26. Bureau Piet Gerards (1950), Heerlen
27. Mieke Gerritzen (1960),
NL-Design Amsterdam)
28. Gerard Hadders (1954) /
Bureau Langehaven, Schiedam
29. Melle Hammer (1956), Amsterdam
30. Frits van Hartingsveldt (1954),
Amsterdam
31. Marten Jongema (1951), Amsterdam
32. Kesselskramer, Amsterdam
(since 1996)
33. René Knip (1963), Amsterdam
34. Koeweiden Postma, Amsterdam
(since 1987)
35. Laboratorivm, Amsterdam
(since 1996)
36. Frank Langedijk, Amsterdam
37. Lava Graphic Design
Amsterdam (since 1990)
38. Victor Levie (1959), Amsterdam
39. LUST, The Hague (since 1996)
40. Martin Majoor (1960), Arnhem
41. Karel Martens (1939), Arnhem
42. Mediamatic, Amsterdam
(since 1993)
43. Erik Mels, Amsterdam
44. Mevis en Van Deursen,
Amsterdam (since 1986)
45. Walter Nikkels (1940),
Dordrecht/Cologne
46. Gerrit Noordzij (1931), Hattum
47. Bart Oppenheimer (1969),
Rotterdam
48. Opera (Kees Wagenaars),
Breda (since 1981)
49. Studio Joseph Plateau,
Amsterdam (since 1987)
50. Lex Reitsma (1958), Haarlem
51. Ron van Roon (1953), Amsterdam
52. Gebroeders Silvestri,
Amsterdam (since 1993)
53. Ko Sliggers (1952) Amsterdam
54. Fred Smeijers, Arnhem
55. Joost Swarte (1947), Haarlem
56. Thonik, Amsterdam (since 1993)
57. Ronald Timmermans (1950),
Bloemendaal
58. André Toet (1950) / Samenwerkende
Ontwerpers, Amsterdam
59. Ewoud Traast (1958), Rotterdam
60. Jaap van Triest (1957), Amsterdam
61. Gerard Unger (1942), Bussum
62. Vandejong, Amsterdam (since 1989)
63. Peter Verheul (1965), The Hague
64. Rick Vermeulen (1950), Rotterdam
65. Visser Bay Anders Toscani,
Amsterdam
66. Tessa van der Waals (1960),
Amsterdam
67. Mart. Warmerdam (1955), Halfweg
68. Alex van Warmerdam (1955),
Halfweg
69. Roger Willems (1960), Arnhem
70. ZEE -, Rotterdam (since 1994)
71. Henrik Barends (1945), Antwerp
Exhibition Curator Toon Lauwen
AIGA Director of Competitions and Exhibitions Gabriela Mirensky
Senior Editor Metropolis Magazine Paul Makovsky and AIGA program Director Alice Twemlow
General Director for Cultural Affairs USA at The Netherlands Consulate in New York Jeanne Wikler
Designers and panel discussion participants Anneke Saveur and Vanessa van Dam
Anneke Saveur and Vanessa van Dam
Designer and panel discussion participant Annelys de Vet, flanked by artist friends Jeroen Kooijmans (left) and Erik Weeda (right)
Roadshow of Dutch Graphic Design 1990-2001
The "Roadshow" exhibition presents a selection of the diversity of work produced byDutch designers and design studios over the last decade. From these posters, books, catalogues, brochures, house styles, annual reports, letter fonts, magazines and a few websites, it is evident that graphic design is well integrated in all forms of expression in Dutch companies, cultural institutions and government agencies. This multiform stream of communication is the result of good design schools and professional possibilities for designers. At the same time, the collected work bears witness to the energy, the daring and the entrepreneurial spirit of their clients. This collection characterises our culture, one that offers ample space for individuality, tolerance and progressive opinions.
Graphic design is, traditionally, a discipline open to developments in the fine arts, architecture and photography. Dutch professionals have always had an affinity with the French pictorial poster, but they have equally responded to the influences of the Swiss School and New Realism typography. At the moment, their influences are far more difficult to pinpoint. Since the late 1980s or early 1990s, the graphic designer (like everyone else) has been continuously inundated with an excessive new visual culture, based on advertising, television and new media, the internet and other computer-generated images. Today, the graphic designer in the Netherlands yet again seems to prefer to react to this abundance with accustomed sobriety, and shows tremendous interest in the potentials of typography and clear, decisive photography.
This exhibition was previously shown in:
- Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Institut Neerlandais in Paris, France
- Musee des Beaux ArtsNilla Steinbeck in Mulhouse, France
- Musee des Beaux Arts in Valence, France
- Maryland Institute, College of Art in Baltimore, USA
- ADGFAD, Premios Laus, Barcelona, Spain
- Erasmus House, Netherlands Embassy, Jakarta, Indonesia
"Roadshow Dutch Graphic Design 1990-2001" is curated by Toon Lauwen and packaged by Lauwen Projects Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
New fonts
The availability of new fonts, or electronically generated letter types, has increased dramatically in the last ten years, and takes on a wide variety of forms, from conceptual to more traditional letter styles. The introduction of the Apple computer and its lay-out software made it easy to manage new font production and technical realisation. Although the design of a new family of letters can still be very time-consuming, the process is accessible to a greater number of designers and is more flexible. Since then, we in the Netherlands now boast an internationally leading group of young letter designers whose new fonts are being successfully distributed through such independent publishing houses as Fontshop, founded by Erik Spiekermann and Nevil Brody, Rudy Vanderlans" Emigre Fonts and The Enschede Letter Foundry, headed by Mathias
Noordzij.
Books
In the growing market for books, an increasing number of publications are intended not to convey information, but to more generally communicate. In the Netherlands, there are still designers who consider books as principally for reading. For them. books must be clear in both legibility and information. There are also designers who intentionally break with the book's traditional service role. Certainly, when it has less informational content, the book's form takes on the major role, and designers opt for stylistic means that are "strange" or "different", freely borrowing from magazines, websites or advertising. This need not per se fall short: publications with slightly less stringent cohesion requirements, such as catalogues, are frequently interesting visual experiences because a designer has assumed the role of director or art director.
Posters
Borders that used to be so clearly defined, such as those separating graphic design and the fine arts, or graphic design and advertising, are slowly vanishing. Flexibility is the norm for a large portion of graphic design, which is geared to change. In posters and magazines, the visual languages of photography, typography and the fine arts are easily mixed together. This is not so strange, for designers are using the same computers and software as the fine artists, the photographers and the advertising studios. We (like the French) find our strongest visual culture in announcements for cultural events, such as theatre performances, festivals or exhibitions. Thanks to the great creative freedom that cultural institutions extend their designers, posters also reflect changing mores: sexual openness. pluriform ethnic culture and sometimes even an almost alienating compulsion for innovation.
Corporate styles
Corporate identity, whose classic criteria drifted in from America and England in the 1960s, is also moving with the times, and is becoming more open in vision and form. "Lifestyles", "trends" and "mood boards" have worked their way into the jargon and thinking of design studios and young designers busy creating house styles for companies, institutions and large or small government departments. For large concerns, such as KPN Telecom, the PTT postal service and Rabobank, the approach of a cohesive whole of house styles, logos, lettering on buildings and vehicles and soon, is a comprehensive, complex and expensive process. Corporate identity includes the various printed materials, the stationery, company forms, annual reports, etc., but the uniforms, commercials, websites, trade stands, buildings and other image determinants must also meet the norms set by the house style designer. It is more than noticeable that nearly all Dutch federal departments and ministries, provinces, cities and townships, even the police, customs and local public transport, down to and including the museums, present themselves to the world with a modern house style. In the Netherlands, everything is designed.
Trend sensitive magazines
A good designer is one who is frequently copied. Eclecticism, imitating and going on to surpass the inspiration source are amongst the most elemental of graphic design functions. Magazines for and by designers, such as "View on Colors", "Mediamatic", "Sec" and "Re-Daily Life" represent the avant-garde of new taste in colour, typography, photography or the use of pioneering, interactive media. They often bear references to the French "Purple". Public magazines are by definition trend followers. Particularly in media such as BlvD. and Dutch, focused on youth culture, the eye is met with a computer-generated feast in multi-layered layouts of photography and conceptual typography that lean towards the dynamics of MTV, computer games and websites. But in the more earnest periodicals, the architecture magazine. "Forum", for example, fashion and the spirit of the times certainly play a role, which is why their designers are frequently changed.