GRAPHIS 20
Volume 3, No. 20, 1947

Cover by Piero Fornasetti

Walter Herdeg (Editor): GRAPHIS 20. Zurich: Graphis Press 1948. Volume 3, No. 20, 1947. Original edition. A near fine original magazine with trivial edgewear and slight bruising to the spine tips. Truly a collectors copy. Cover by Piero Fornasetti.

9.25 x 11.75 magazine with 126 pages of b/w and color examples of modern graphic design, circa 1947. Text in in English, French and German. Graphis was (and still is) one of the most important and influential European graphic design publication. Graphis has been revered for its artistic presentation, impeccable design, and exemplary production qualities. Global in scope, Graphis is a compelling record of the most significant and influential communication work being produced today. In visually driven articles, Graphis beautifully presents the best work produced internationally in Graphic Design, Advertising, Branding & Identity, Illustration, Publishing, Packaging Design, Typography and Photography. with a focus on modern European designers. Graphis is still being published, but the most influential and groundbreaking years are from the 1940s to the early 1960s.

Excellent original edition of Graphis with a very strong editorial content:

• Piero Fornasetti and his Almanacki: 10 pages with a bound-in sample from Fornasetti's legendary Almanack.
• Paolo Garretto
• Christmas and New years Cards: Piero Fornasetti and others
• and much more.

"I believe that one day, when he was young, Fornasetti must have had a truly startling vision. I don't know if it was during the day or by night, but suddenly he must have seen the whole world explode into the air, the whole world and all of history and all the accumulation of its figures, memories and all the stones, the bodies, the trees, the houses and the monuments. Everything flew into the air and finished up in an infinite, opaque cloud full of rubbish that rose like a nuclear mushroom and then, slowly, in chilling silince, began to descent, falling heavily - perhaps on fornasetti's head, or perhaps on his table or on his paintbrush or perhaps even simply on the floor of his room. it must have been a bit like in an Michelangelo Antonioni film ..." Ettore Sottsass

Piero Fornasetti is widely recognized as a visionary designer, artist, illustrator, printer, graphic designer, craftsman, manufacturer and businessman. He established an enduring reputation as a designer with a style that was all his own, a style based on illusionism, architectural perspectives and a host of personal leitmotifs, such as the sun, playing cards and fishes, from which he spun seemingly endless variations. 'He makes objects speak' said Gio Ponti, his friend and longtime collaborator.

These periodicals are much harder to find than the well known Graphis Annuals, which are essentially pictorial "best of" collections and lack the depth and text of the originals. These publications are also more valuable as they are the original documents. Many of the articles are written by important artists, critics and scholars.

out of stock