Permutation

Two spreads from Bruno Munari's 'Character Building' chapter in Design as Art (1966). He says, "the graphic designer works without set limits and without rejecting any possible technique. His (sic) experiments in the visual lead him to try out all possible combinations and methods in order to arrive at the precise image he needs for the job in hand and no other".



The argument for and against consistent 'style' versus a kind of imagery led by the 'concept' goes on. It's a criticism levelled against illustration- a lack of rigour or appropriateness- or style over content. Interesting here that Munari refers to the Graphic Designer; hard to tell but he may be trying to distance himself from the notion of an unthinking illustrator. For me the arguments, in their polarity, are fruitless. Anybody making imagery has to have a rhythm and a language. Inevitably the work, however applied, will be also somewhat self-referential. Without this the results can lack idiosyncrasy, locality and become corporate. Munari's imagemaking, even if it did follow the ethos described above, still has his hand on it all. A certain set of spatial, linear characteristics. Variety with identity is possible. There are a lot of crude distinctions also made between hand-drawn versus digital. Why is one at the expense of another? Is it not possible for someone to arrange objects in a space, or draw a line on paper, or assemble an image on-screen without having to nail their colours to one mast or another, or have to project a kind of obvious stylistic consistency for lazy eyes? Surely a practice can incorporate all of these with integrity.