Unique gifts showcase UI talent, honor Zapf and Bourgeois
By Melissa Mitchell, News Bureau Staff Writer (217) 333-5491; melissa@illinois.edu
When Ken Carls, interim director of the School of Art and Design, learned that a type designer and an artist had been selected to receive honorary degrees from the UI this year, he decided it was fitting that art and design faculty members and alumni should honor the recipients in their own original, creative ways.
Carls first summoned his own imagination to come up the idea of presenting each recipient – Hermann Zapf and Louise Bourgeois – with a unique gift that showcased the talents of the School of Art and Design.
For Zapf, whom Carls calls "the most important type designer of the 20th century," the gift took the form of a limited-edition, large-format book featuring designs by 85 Illinois graphic design alumni. Each alum contributed a page to the book, titled "From A (&D) to Z(apf)." Designers were free to select their own content; their only requirement was to set the text in one – or more – of the many fonts designed over the years by Zapf, a typographer and graphic designer who lives in Darmstadt, Germany. Among the best-known of Zapf's typefaces are Palatino, used for the university's letterhead, and Optima, which appears all around campus on university signs. Designers and computer users everywhere also are familiar with Zapf Dingbats. Rather than a letter, numeral, or other standard keyboard symbol, each character represents a different icon or design element – ranging from boxes and check marks to flowers and snowflakes.
"There's not anyone involved in design or typography that wouldn’t consider his name a household word," Carls said. "Those alumni who responded and contributed to the project loved it. It’s a one-of-a-kind opportunity for them." And, he said, the fact that a typographer and graphic designer were chosen to receive an honorary degree "is a real milestone. This is a validation of design as a form of cultural expression."
Renate Gokl, adjunct professor of art and design, UI alumna and senior designer at the University of Chicago Press, coordinated the project. Gokl, who also designed the book's format and contributed a page herself, said the designers interpreted the assignment in their own, unique ways. "The content was whatever they wanted," she said. "Some were just congratulatory statements, some were quotes or statements. Some were timely or poetic."
A favorite of both Gokl and Carls was Chicago designer Bill Biderbost's playful design using Zapf Dingbats. "It's a black-and-white photograph of a garden, superimposed with flower dingbats in bright yellow and pink, scattered in the photograph. It's really sweet." Gokl said many of the designers had fun with the dingbats. Another particularly powerful and striking dingbat-inspired design, she said, is Bob Faust's contribution featuring a single dingbat, blown up to extremely large proportions. The dingbat he chose is the peace-sign icon, a hand with the index and second fingers in the "V" or "peace" formation. "When it arrived," Gokl said, "it was during the war. It really hit me ... I'd never seen it used that way, as just one large character."
UI alum Chris Hohn supervised the binding of the book at Lincoln Bookbindery in Urbana, which specializes in small, limited-edition book production. Twelve copies were made. The first edition was presented to Zapf at Art and Design's May 18 commencement ceremony; others were reserved for university dignitaries. Carls hopes to have the remaining editions deposited at "internationally important libraries," including the UI Library, Newberry Library in Chicago and Library of Congress. Carls also wanted to honor Bourgeois, a sculptor and painter hailed by ARTnews magazine as "one of the 20th century's 25 most influential artists," in an equally inventive manner. For ideas, he approached metals professor Billie Jean Theide, who had nominated Bourgeois for the honorary degree. Theide said it was her husband, Rimas VisGirda, who came up with the idea to recreate one of Bourgeois’ sculptures – tall, vertical works the artist calls Personages – in miniature. Theide created a 3-inch-long brooch, carved in wax and cast in 18-karat yellow gold. When the piece is not being worn, it can be displayed on a stand Theide fabricated from sterling silver. The brooch is based on an untitled work made of painted wood and latex that is part of the artist's private collection. The original was exhibited last year at the Krannert Art Museum and is listed as No. 42 in the catalog written by museum director Josef Helfenstein. "I think that I've been successful in capturing the simplicity and rawness of her forms," said Theide, who added that this was the first time she had attempted to create art based on someone else's work. "I don't copy things in my own work," she said. "When I saw it in wax, I was amazed at how close it looked to the original." Theide was equally awed by how well the gold casting turned out. When she first saw the results, "it was a relief," she said. "It was a clean casting – not a single bubble. I think she [Bourgeois] is going to be very amazed by it." Bourgeois, who is in her 90s and lives in New York, was unable to travel to last week's commencement ceremonies. Kathleen Conlin, the dean of the College of Fine and Applied Arts, plans to present the brooch to Bourgeois this summer.
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