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Soviet Lettering

soviet lettering from headlines and poster design

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
13 views38 pages

Soviet Lettering

soviet lettering from headlines and poster design

Uploaded by

sasman2
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Soviet style lettering

When I think of Soviet Era design I think mainly of the


Stenberg Brothers, El Lissitzky and Alexander Rodchenko. That
means cyrillic block sans serif faces which, for the most part,
are set on diagonals
Cyrillic - History
The Cyrillic script (/sɪˈrɪlɪk/ sih-RIL-ik) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia and is used as the national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and
Iranic-speaking countries in Southeastern Europe, Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Central Asia, North Asia, and East Asia.

The writing system dates back to the 9th century AD, when the Bulgarian tsar Simeon I the Great – following the cultural and political course of his father Boris I – commissioned a new script, the
Early Cyrillic alphabet, to be made at the Preslav Literary School in the First Bulgarian Empire, which would replace the Glagolitic script, produced earlier by Saints Cyril and Methodius and the
same disciples that created the new Slavic script in Bulgaria. The usage of the Cyrillic script in Bulgaria was made official in 893.[6][7][8] The new script became the basis of alphabets used in
various languages in Orthodox Church dominated Eastern Europe, both Slavic and non-Slavic (such as Romanian). For centuries Cyrillic was also used by Catholic and Muslim Slavs too (see
Bosnian Cyrillic).
Cyrillic is derived from the Greek uncial script, augmented by letters from the older Glagolitic alphabet, including some ligatures. These additional letters were used for Old Church Slavonic
sounds not found in Greek. The script is named in honor of the Saint Cyril, one of the two Byzantine brothers[9] Saints Cyril and Methodius, who created the Glagolitic alphabet earlier on. Modern
scholars believe that Cyrillic was developed and formalized by the early disciples of Cyril and Methodius in the Preslav Literary School, the most important early literary and cultural centre of the
First Bulgarian Empire and of all Slavs:
Unlike the Churchmen in Ohrid, Preslav scholars were much more dependent upon Greek models and
quickly abandoned the Glagolitic scripts in favor of an adaptation of the Greek uncial to the needs of Slavic,
which is now known as the Cyrillic alphabet. [7]

The earliest datable Cyrillic inscriptions have been found in the area of Preslav. They have been found in the medieval city itself, and at nearby Patleina Monastery, both in present-day
Shumen Province, in the Ravna Monastery and in the Varna Monastery.
With the orthographic reform of Saint Evtimiy of Tarnovo and other prominent representatives of the Tarnovo Literary School (14th and 15th centuries) such as Gregory Tsamblak or
Constantine of Kostenets the school influenced Russian, Serbian, Wallachian and Moldavian medieval culture. That is famous in Russia as the second South-Slavic influence.
In the early 18th century, the Cyrillic script used in Russia was heavily reformed by Peter the Great, who had recently returned from his Grand Embassy in Western Europe. The new letterforms,
called the Civil script, became closer to those of the Latin alphabet; several archaic letters were abolished and several letters were designed by Peter himself. Letters became distinguished
between upper and lower case. West European typography culture was also adopted.[10] The pre-reform forms of letters called 'Полуустав' were notably kept for use in Church Slavonic and are
sometimes used in Russian even today, especially if one wants to give a text a 'Slavic' or 'archaic' feel.
• Peter the Great, Tsar of Russia, mandated the use of
westernized letter forms (ru) in the early 18th century. Over time,
these were largely adopted in the other languages that use the
script. Thus, unlike the majority of modern Greek fonts that
retained their own set of design principles for lower-case letters
(such as the placement of serifs, the shapes of stroke ends, and
stroke-thickness rules, although Greek capital letters do use
Latin design principles), modern Cyrillic fonts are much the same
as modern Latin fonts of the same font family. The development
of some Cyrillic computer typefaces from Latin ones has also
contributed to the visual Latinization of Cyrillic type.
Lowercase forms[edit]

Letters Ge, De, I, I kratkoye, Me, Te, Tse, Be and Ve in upright (printed) and cursive (handwritten) variants. (Top is
set in Georgia font, bottom in Odessa Script.)
Cyrillic uppercase and lowercase letter forms are not as differentiated as in Latin typography. Upright Cyrillic
lowercase letters are essentially small capitals (with exceptions: Cyrillic ⟨а⟩, ⟨е⟩, ⟨і⟩, ⟨ј⟩, ⟨р⟩, and ⟨у⟩ adopted
Western lowercase shapes, lowercase ⟨ф⟩ is typically designed under the influence of Latin ⟨p⟩, lowercase ⟨б ⟩, ⟨ђ ⟩
and ⟨ћ⟩ are traditional handwritten forms), although a good-quality Cyrillic typeface will still include separate small-
caps glyphs
Cyrillic
• The Cyrillic writing system is used for the following languages:
• Slavic - Belarusian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Serbo-Croatian,
Ukrainian
• Non-Slavic languages of Russia
– in various states in the Caucasian and other groups in Siberia and the
Russian Far East
• Non-Slavic languages in Central Asia – Kazakh, Kyrgyk, Mongolian,
Tajik, Turkmen, Uzbek
RUSSIA
N
ALPHAB
ET
Russian Cyrillic

Russian (Russian: русский язык, romanized: russkiy yazyk) is an


East Slavic language mainly spoken across Russia. It is the
native language of the Russians, and belongs to the
Indo-European language family. It is one of three living East Slavic
languages,[a] and is also a part of the larger Balto-Slavic languages.
Besides Russia itself, Russian is an official language in Belarus,
Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, and is used widely as a lingua franca
throughout Ukraine, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and to some extent in
the Baltic states.[28][29] It was the de facto language of the former
Soviet Union,[30] and continues to be used in public life with varying
proficiency in all of the post-Soviet states
The Soviet Union

The Union of the Soviet Union was a federal union of 15 national republics with its central republic being the Russian SFSR from 1922 – 1991. Russian was one of the official languages of each of these national
republics, becoming a language of interethnic communication, and assumed the role of an official language.

The republics were:


Russian SFSR, Ukrainian SSR, Byelorussian SSR, Uzbek SSR, Kazakh SSR, Georgian SSR, Azerbaijan SSR, Lithuanian SSR, Moldavian SSR, Latvian SSR, Kirghiz SSR, Tajik SSR, Armenian SSR, Turkmen SSR, Estonian SSR
Soviet Typography
• Typography plays a crucial role in communicating, entertaining and educating.
But, it can also be used to chart the rise and fall of the Soviet Union from its
post-revolutionary optimism to it fracture and collapse just over 70 years later.
• The new Russia came with the rejection of everything old and ornate. In the
wake of the 1917 revolution, the country was in the process of freeing itself
from the grasp of the Tsarist autocracy. First the Assembly for Considering
Simplification of Orthography was created to standardize written Russian. Four
letters of the alphabet were retired by degree. Next the state
encouraged Soviet designers. They saw it as their patriotic duty to create an
entirely new artistic language in service of their new socialist utopia. Art was a
reflection of a modern, industrial society. It had no place in an artist’s studio,
or even in a museum. Instead "
the streets shall be our brushes, the squares our palettes”. State-sponsored
art was designed and mass-produced in laboratories and factories. It served
the regime by singing socialist praises in books, magazines and on posters.
• The aesthetic that emerged was Constructivism. It was defined
by asymmetrical composition, a striking departure from before.
Artists treated typography as a visual element in and of itself. It
communicated, engaged and entertained. Typefaces were
readable, but they didn’t just sit on a page. Artists like El Lissitsky
would regularly manipulate type and its placement to emphasise
a message. Words were
kaleidoscopic, with dynamic rhythmic designs and were symbolic
machine-age modernity. In a single sentence, letters could
change in size or shape to create a feeling of movement or
depth. Its impact was felt far beyond Russia’s borders, with
Bauhaus and other avant garde movements taking and
incorporating elements of Constructivism in their own work.
• Russian Constructivism was considered more of a philosophy than just an art style. It
reflected a belief in art for social change rather than personal expression. The Russian
Constructivists were proponents of functional art and design as opposed to decorative,
expressive art (such as easel painting). This echoed the revolutionary mood of the times,
as the revolutionary proletariat movement was replacing the bourgeois culture.
• The tools and techniques of more traditional, figurative painting and art styles were
replaced with “constructed” photomontages and strong typography. Russian
Constructivism characteristically used minimal color palettes, often just red, black and
sometimes yellow. These works frequently had diagonal elements with circular and
angled type and images. The resulting work was extremely dramatic, containing layered
images coupled with powerful type treatments. The effect was exciting, often jolting, and
even shocking, which was in line with the artists’ goal to change society. This movement
was a dramatic shift from previous, more conventional movements and philosophies of
art.
• Although originally intended for political messages, the Constructivist style seeped into
product advertisements and posters of all kinds, as well as book covers and their
interiors.
Alexander Rodchenko (1891-1956)

• Alexander Rodchenko was a Russian designer, photographer, painter, and sculptor


who was considered one of the founders of the Russian Constructivist movement.
In fact, the term “Constructivist” was originally coined by the artist
Kazimir Malevich in reference to the work of Rodchenko. Although his original
focus was painting, Rodchenko later went on to play around with photography,
typography, and imagery, combining them into what was then referred to as
montage or photomontage. He eschewed easel painting for “industrial art,” as he
called it—that is, art with a social purpose and message for the masses. Although
he created much of his earlier work for political purposes, he went on to apply this
artistic movement to ads for ordinary objects such as beer, pacifiers, cookies,
watches, and other consumer products.
• In March 1923, Rodchenko published an article in which he said, “There is now a
new illustrative method: montage of printed and photographic materials focused
on a certain subject. Providing ample material of great demonstrative value and
conviction, it dispenses with illustration by drawing.”
El Lissitzky (1890-1941)
\
• El Lissitzky was a Russian-born painter, designer, and typographer who was
associated with both the Suprematist and the Constructivist movements. He
studied engineering and architecture in addition to art, giving him a very linear,
logical approach to all that he did. His work, especially that which incorporated
the Suprematist philosophy, was highly abstracted with minimal color, geometric
shapes, and in some cases, deep symbolism. As with all Constructivists, he
believed in using art as an agent of change.
• El Lissitzky designed many books, posters, exhibitions, and other kinds of Soviet
propaganda. Most of his work was politically oriented, as was most work
produced in that era. These quotes by El Lissitzky express two of his design
philosophies: “Typographical design should perform optically what the speaker
creates through voice and gesture of his thoughts,” as well as, “Art can no longer
be merely a mirror, it must act as the organizer of the people’s consciousness…
No form of representation is so readily comprehensible to the masses as
photography.” His thoughtful, somewhat cerebral work influenced modern art,
including the Bauhaus and De Stijl movements.
Vladimir Stenberg(1899-1982) and
Georgii Stenberg (1900-1933)
• The Stenberg brothers were Soviet artists, sculptors, and designers. They always
worked in collaboration and designed over 300 movie posters (what they are most
known for) in the decade before Georgii’s untimely death from a motorcycle accident
in 1933.
• The new Bolshevik government was completely supportive of the cinema industry,
especially its power to propagandize and spread its new message aimed at the
masses. At that time, over 60% of the population was illiterate, so the Constructivist’s
work, with its strong, jarring images and powerful design, was able to catch their eye
and help spread this new ideology.
• The Stenberg’s primary technique was montage. They designed their posters to be
eye-catching and even shocking: “We deal with the material in a free matter…
disregarding actual proportions… turning figures upside down; in short, we employ
everything that can make busy passerbys stop in their tracks.” Their work rejected
traditional styles in favor of other ways to convey the motion, dynamism, and rhythm
that characterized the work of the 1920s. They frequently used unconventional
viewing angles, radical foreshortening, and unsettling close-ups. Their posters even
hold up today and can appear as striking as they did in their day.
Ussr and Stalin
• With the rise of Stalin came the death of artistic
freedom. He believed that art should be 'true-to-life' and
easily understood by the masses. Bold asymmetrical
Constructivist fonts quickly disappeared from public
view. The avant garde was considered the enemy of the
people, and artists who practiced it were counter-
revolutionaries. Like the Nazi’s who sent
Paul Renner into exile, many Soviet artists fled to
Europe. Those that stayed were banished, imprisoned,
or even executed.
• Stalin stripped artists of their right to independently create art. Artists
had to follow strict guidelines on subject and aesthetic. Art was now an
official tool of the state. Through informal pressure, and later through
policy, Socialist Realism became the sole artistic style of the Soviet
Union. With this new aesthetic, came a new challenge for designers.
Posters with propaganda slogans like ‘Workers of the World Unite’ and
‘Peace, Land and Bread’ needed a new typeface. They couldn’t borrow
from the Europeans as their typefaces didn't have Cyrillic characters.
Instead, they turned to Polygraphmash, the only type foundry in the
USSR. In the late 30s, Polygraphmash created Literaturnaya, a serif
typeface. Informally called "the favourite font of Russian
typographers", it was used in books, magazines, newspapers,
advertisements and posters most popularly from 1950s – 1990s. There
was little other experimentation or variation in this period.
CYRILLIC SANS SERIF BLOCK
LETTERS
Constructivist designners used sands serif block letters for simplicity
and ease of readability. Slight variations existed amongst early Soviet
typograpghers and artists with different letter designs and x heights
5 x height.
7 x height condensed
5 x height Super bold
1970s
1970s

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