The canon of graphic design:

Paula SCHER,
essay written by kassy bull,
graphic design, 1st year.

The Canon of
Graphic Design

Who are the graphic designers practicing today that will be remembered
in 20 years time? Why will they be
remembered and canonised? What is
the canon of graphic design? Who
decides? Well, in this case, you do.

What is a canon?

he meaning of the word canon can be implied

as a rule, principle, official, the best and even
a Saint. When using the term canonisation
in the context of Graphic Design, it can be described
as taking a well established Graphic Designer who has
a special knowledge and appreciation of design and
exulting them to a place of high esteem amongst their
peers.
I believe canonisation presupposes a hierarchy of
design objects and designers and those
included become the established canon of design
history. A canon can provide a fundamental amount
of knowledge, a shared foundation for judgment and a
starting point for discussion. It acquaints us to essential
material we might usually overlook, and helps set the
agenda. It is one more approach in accessing and
understanding graphic design history, our past and
magnifying the potential of graphic design.
However it would seem that Design theorist, Clive
Dilnot, argues that too much emphasis is placed on
individual designers instead of
adopting a more rational and historical approach and
examining designs against their place in
history and the then current economic and
cultural climate (1a).

The Canon of
Graphic Design
P

aula Scher, born in 1948, is

a New York based Graphic
Designer and was educated at
the Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia,
where she majored in Illustration.
As a student Scher stayed away from
Graphic Design as she was short
of structuring and ordering her
work, and she did not like aligning
Helvetica on a framework,The act
of organizing the Helvetica typeface on a grid reminded me of
cleaning up my room, she admitted.
Drawing was her main focus and so
implemented illustration work into
typography. Scher was inspired by
a Polish illustrator named Stanislaw
Zagorski as he said to her illustrate
with type not try rub down on a
corner with press type. This advice
served as an inspiration for the rest of
her career.
One of Schers first jobs was
becoming an art director for
numerous records and advertisements
at CBS Records and Atlantic
records. The music industry provided
opportunities of innovation and
experimentation for Scher and
she drew inspiration from her
knowledge of 20th Century art and
design history. In particular, Russian
Constructivism, Futurism and Dada
(1). An example of one her well
known and most dynamic piece
of work is her CBS records 'Best
of Jazz' poster (1979) (Fig1). This
poster was handmade by cutting
and pasting and re-sizing the type by
hand, using American wood-type. I
would say her work is influenced by
Russian Constructivism, however
Scher believes that the influence over
her work came from where she lives,
New York City. Scher describes this
piece as being crowded and compact

(Fig1) The Best of Jazz Poster (1979)

like the buildings of New York, with

its grids and skyscrapers. In relation
to her design of the poster, I admire
the use of dark bold colours and
condensed type however its fairly hard
to read and comprehend due to the
spaced out sentencing of the words,
'The Best of Jazz' and this can not be
seen clearly enough therefore I don't
believe it communicates well to an
audience.
Paula Scher is best known for her
work with Pentagram and becoming a
principal in 1991. Scher's early much
acclaimed Pentagram works was
New York's Public Theater identity
(1994). It was so successful that it
won a Beacon Award for integrated
corporate identity strategy (2).
Scher's work for the Public Theater
was so great that she became the voice
of the theatre. Her style and work
for them came about based on being
extremely loud and visible with her
typography. The design style for the

(Fig2) Bring in da noise, bring in da funk poster (1995)

identity of the theater followed into

her poster work for them. A great
example is the 'Bring in da noise
funk, bring in da funk' poster (Fig2).
It was designed for a tap, rap musical
and so Scher's large, bold condensed
type presented in different horizontal
angles, demonstrated the 'noise' that
the musical would produce. I believe
the large typography and vivid colours
really made this poster speak clearly to
an audience. The letter pressed type
gave a sense of urgency, out spoken
opinions and immediacy as in you
must go see it now. The simplicity
of colour choices added great effect
to the underlying message of the
poster. The use of bright yellow in
the background really catches the
audiences eye if they were to walk
past it, and the black type seems
to represent the actors talking or
almost shouting at the public. The
poster succeeds in saying something
more about the kind of theater and
organization the Public Theater is. It

The Canon of
Graphic Design
makes the 'Public' relevant, vibrant,
and opinionated. This poster therefore
did become successful and a great
influence to other designers however
this meant companies were copying it
and the Public Theater wasn't being
noticed enough so she had to change
her design strategies.
After Scher's career with the Public
Theater, she was approached
by architects in the year 2000,
to design the inside of theatres
taking environmental graphics
onto buildings. Scher had never
done this type of work before and
admitted that she didn't even know
how to read an architectural plan
(3). One of Paula's main aims with
her work was to make it bigger and
stand out. By doing super-graphics
this really allowed Scher to explore
how big and expressive she could
go with her typography. A great
example I believe demonstrates
this, is the use of typography on
the Lucent Technologies Center
for Arts Education (Fig3). Scher
placed words such as 'Music','Dance',
'Poetry' and 'Drama' onto the building
using a simple square shaped sansserif, placing them horizontally and
vertically around the walls of the
theatre and even on the vents. Even
though the typeface is fairly plain
and simple, the size of it stills helps to
communicate the energy and liveliness
within the building. I find it interesting
that the use of minimal colour thus
diminishes the harshness of vibrant
colours that she usually portrays such
as in her 'Bring on da noise...' poster.
By doing so she has managed to
capture the essence of simplicity but
the importance of expressing a clear
message to the public. This is also
seen by the stability of the font size

(Fig3) Lucent Technologies Center for Arts Education (2001)

Citi bank logo (1998,2012)

Paula Scher Map of the world poster Poster (1998)

and weight.
Recently Paula has written 2 books
and starred in an auto-biography
film explaining about her lifes work.
Scher is now 85 and happily re-tired
in her home town of Philadelphia.
Her last project in 2026 was
designing illuminated Typography
of all 7 Continents and having them
temporary erected from the ground
50ft high for 1 month so the type
could be seen from space. This idea
stemmed from the maps she used to
paint in her own time. They portrayed
a complicated narrative about how
she felt about the world from her
own experiences and memories. The
Continent typography didn't prove
to be so popular with communities
living around the 'monuments' as
it did block scenery and created
light pollution. However due to
advancement in technology it was
able to produce electricity as a source
for locals. Fortunately this was a first
in terms of international typographic

design and making the largest type in

the world. From this
she won her last ever design award
for it and was also entered into the
Guinness book of world records for it.
In conclusion I believe Paula Scher
is among one of the best designers
of her generation. She cut a path for
herself creating an approach to design
that is articulate yet unpretentious,
open to influences yet decisively
individualistic. Her formulation to
making all her work bigger is an
inspiration to others as it shows she
likes to push the boundaries and
go to the extreme. Scher has been
a designer for over 50 years and
produced not only astonishing visual
work, but her profession led her
to become a glorifying lecturer,
advocate, agitator. She has therefore
helped put an intelligent face on
the field of graphic design. She has
become the canon.

References
(1a) Clive Dilnot, The State of Design History: part 1:Mapping the field, in
Margolin, Victor ed., Design Discourse, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1989, pp.213-232
(1) and (2) Dictionary of Graphic Design and Designers page 214
(3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atn22-bmTPU Paula Scher: Great
design is serious (not solemn)
(Fig 1) http://d5media.co.uk/graphic-design/most-influential-designers-paula-scher/
(Fig 2) http://d5media.co.uk/graphic-design/most-influential-designers-paula-scher/
(Fig3) https://www.uniteditions.com/blog/supergraphics-paula-scher/
Other Referencial websites:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paula_Scher
http://www.csun.edu/~pjd77408/DrD/Art461/LecturesAll/Lectures/
UCLA_PaulaScher.html

Word count for preface: 184 words

Word count for main essay: 1135 words