Oh way to go Berthold. Your first post on design and specifically typography, and what are you going to do? Get in an argument with one of the most reputable typography ressources on the net, I love typography. That’s a smart choice for someone who is still training to become a media designer in the first place.

Still, some of the comments on this article show very clearly what’s wrong with the statement “Typography is not a science. Typography is an art.”. It all comes down to what I see as a misconception of design displayed – oddly enough – mostly by laymen who just expect us designers to “sprinkle on some pretty”, like Feenstaub (ger. pixie dust). How hard can that be, right? The answer, especially for typography is: VERY. Because it is in fact Rocket Science! And I’m going to prove it to you. I’m also going to prove that all artists are imitators and that Lady Gaga is really a man!

First, let me state what I mean by art and science. Art, for me at least, is a very stylised means of communication which conveys a certain message or feeling in a very abstract way – taking into account that some people might not *get* what it is about. Science on the other hand is the most rigorous, concrete way to get something across, researching and explaining every detail *in* detail, trying to eliminate every last bit of ambiguity. It is the Alpha to art’s Omega, the antithesis to everything that makes art art.

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Yeah, so what’s the point?

Now, let me confuse you outright by telling you that what we – being mostly non-artists – perceive as art is in fact a science. Yes, I am saying that art is science, in the same way that technology is magic. If you can follow that statement, you already know what I’m going for. I’m going to try and prove that what we consider great art is a science which is just way too complicated for most of us to understand. Even most artists would struggle.

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Inspiration (insert pretentious quotation mark gesture here)

It’s a fact, that when talking about art in any way, there is no way to do it without talking about inspiration. It is what all great artists, be it painters, sculptors, actors, authors, performance artists, anyone and everyone who dabbles in the mystery that is art, cites as what made them do what they did and how they did it. Now, you can be flattering and say inspiration is some kind of magic Feenstaub these people were born with, to sprinkle on top of their head before getting to work. The blunt truth however is this: They are copying something. All artists are copycats.

Now that I’ve pissed off both designers and artists alike, I might as well try and talk down on scientists as well, right? Well, this is the point where I come back to my earlier statement about all art forms being inherently scientific. If scientists out there could be offended by that, I’d say my work is done.

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Seeing things, but in a good way

Artists, whether consciously or not, are actually very analytic about their inspiration. Their eyes and ears are trained to pick out minutiae that most of us wouldn’t notice when looking straight at them and to remember them on some level for years to come (for painters, this is mostly related to shading, actors focus strongly on emotions etc.). Just to keep this scientific: This can be acquired as an autodidact by literally anyone, and most books about starting in the arts focus first and foremost on the aspect of seeing properly (most notably, because I’m currently working with it, “Drawing on the right side of the brain”, an amazing book by Betty Edwards) and keeping those impressions somewhere safe.

So we’ve established that artists are using an analytical approach to seeing, and much the same can be said for their other senses, especially their sense for emotions: love, hate, desperation, anger. In all big paintings, or in acting, these play a vital role. The Mona Lisa, showing just the slightest of smirks, has puzzled and mesmerized the world of art appreciation for centuries. More recently, Picassos “Prisoner with a dove of peace” conveys a sense of hope or despair. That’s the trouble with Picasso, I really dislike this phase of his; suffice it to say that he was “inspired” by, among other things, wooden masks he’d brought back from Africa. He later copied the art style in one of his self portraits, which leads us nicely to where most people stop understanding arts: Interpretation.

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As easy as it is to fit together Picassos face and an african mask, you first need to know they were the pieces to the puzzle in the first place, and few artists are as forthcoming as Picasso in that regard. The highly acclaimed performance by the late Heath Ledger as the Joker in the 2008 movie “The Dark Knight” is cited to have been based on Kubricks’ “A Clockwork Orange”, especially the title character (and yes, I do act as well, why?), another example where, if you know what to look for, you will see “through the acting”. Oh and for those guessing, this paragraphs’ heading is the meaning of life given in the book “Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy” by Douglas Adams, which is hilarious.

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It’s magic I tell you!

Most artists won’t disclose their sources though, as not to demistify their contribution, and with good reason. When people are told they are just looking at a remix of stuff that has been done before, they have a tendency to focus on comparing instead of enjoying the art as a given or summarily dismissing it as “seen that”, which in turn takes away from the impact the artist wanted to make.

One more comparison, and we’re done folks: What if something is displayed or described that hasn’t existed before? Like spaceships (other than what exists now), aliens (other than Carrot Top and Lady Gaga, one of which really is a dude), foreign worlds? Well, what you used to see were the flying saucer type spacecraft, and anyone can take a guess as to what was the inspiration for those. Today, spacecraft are bulky, because there is no air resistance in space and thus there is no reason to lose any space inside the ships. Science we can understand, right?

Likewise the “little green men”, a term coined by mid-fifties newspapers in describing an alleged extraterrestrial sighting by two Kentucky men. Today we all know aliens are really blue (if you haven’t seen Avatar in 3D, do so now, I’ll wait) because James Cameron quote “[We] wanted to say that there was an otherness, an alien-ness to them. But we wanted to keep them human enough that we could understand their emotions.”.

This movie in particular has some folks up in arms, saying that it’s all eye candy because the plot is essentially [SPOILER ALERT] Dances with Wolves [/SPOILER] wrapped up in expensive special FX. And while that is technically true and another display of someone getting to the source of inspiration, for these critics (some of them friends of mine) it literally ruined the experience of the movie, because they were constantly looking for matching plot points, trying to ignore the jaw-dropping CGI and not getting immersed into an amazing alien world.

So to sum it up, its is every artist’s job to remix the things he takes notice of into something that a) interests people and b) hides its origins (making people believe in Feenstaub).

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But what does it all mean?

How does this relate to typography? We all know Comic Sans is the Antichrist and Impact is illegible in body copy. But how do we pick the right font? How do we become font artists, mixing and matching different sizes, weights, setting? What secrets are people like John from iLoveTypography, the guys and gals at a list apart or most people portrayed in smashing magazines typography articles hiding away from us? Is it magic Feenstaub, and if so, where can we get it?

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There is no spoon

If you payed attention, you know there is no magic Feenstaub to art in the first place, and whether you consider typography an art or a science really doesen’t make a bit of difference. It is all about understanding how fonts get the message across – as John said it: “Read the text“. Design should always support the message, not take attention away from it.

That doesen’t mean you aren’t allowed to play around with fonts, being “creative” with layout and such. If your message is “I’m artistic”, then by all means, use the most outrageous-looking fonts and combine them in crazy ways. If you’re contracted to sell cancer medication however, you probably want something sober and calming, or else you will cause the dreaded disconnect of design and message, a sure-fire sign of people thinking design is Feenstaub.

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The three commandments

So here are the rules:
1. Know as many fonts as possible
2. Understand their meaning
3. Use them in appropriate situations.

I’m sorry I can’t offer you any Feenstaub after all this, but there simply is no such thing. You have to learn the science of typography, just like everybody else (including me) if you want to become great. And I know stuff like Georgia has a feminine angle and fonts that are high and slim convey luxury or exclusiveness, but beyond that, I’m still getting to grips with the vast science that is typography, and by following the rules, you can too.