"Mapping Graphic Design History in Switzerland" toured the US
On invitation by swissnex Boston, Davide Fornari and Robert Lzicar presented the book “Mapping Graphic Design History in Switzerland” they co-edited at four venues in the United States. The tour was supported by the Consulate General of Switzerland in New York, Bern University of the Arts, and ECAL University of Art and Design in Lausanne, SDN Swiss Design Network, and managed by Cécile Vulliemin of swissnex Boston.
The book presentations were also a chance to disseminate the research project “Swiss Graphic Design and Typography Revisited” to a broad audience of design educators, academic scholars and designers.
At Chicago Design Museum, the editors discussed the making of the book and the impact of graphic design education models elaborated in Switzerland with Philip Burton, Marcia Lausen and Jonathan Mekinda (all professors of the School of Design, University of Illinois at Chicago) together with Professor Emeritus Victor Margolin, who praised the follow-up project as a model for elaborating design research today.
The School of the Arts at Yale University in New Haven hosted a book presentation along with the papers “Swiss Style Made in Italy: Graphic Design Across the Border” by Davide Fornari and “Designed Histories: Visual Historiography and Canonization in Swiss Graphic Design History” by Robert Lzicar within the course of Sheila Lavrant de Bretteville (Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in Graphic Design) and Julian Bittiner (Senior Critic).
Alexander Tochilovsky (curator of the Herb Lubalin Study Center of Design and Typography at the Cooper Union) introduced the debate at Cooper Union’s Frederick P. Rose Auditorium in New York City, engaging Juliette Cezzar (Assistant Professor of Communication Design at the New School’s Parsons School of Design), James Goggin (Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at the Rhode Island School of Design) and Lucille Tenazas (Professor of Communication Design at the New School’s Parsons School of Design) on the status of graphic design as a discipline both in the US and in Switzerland.
Finally, swissnex Boston, the Swiss science consulate in Cambridge (MA), hosted the last conversation featuring the editors and Elizabeth Resnick (Professor and former chair of Graphic Design at Massachusetts College of Art and Design), curator of recent poster exhibitions on human rights and citizens’ engagement.
In summary, all people and parties involved highlighted the relevance of both initiatives, “Mapping Graphic Design History in Switzerland” and “Swiss Graphic Design and Typography Revisited”, for the international discourse on graphic design history, as well as their collaborative and integrative approach as models for its academic future.
