9 Postmodernism, the Return of Expression
 

The end of the twentieth century saw the gradual breakdown of the hegemony of the International Style in the face of
challenges that arose as part of the "postmodern" movement. The term "postmodern" is at its heart a chronological term that means simply "after modern" However, the term has been complicated by a variety of different and overlapping definitions that were devised to fit certain situations. One overarching  idea of what constitutes the "postmod­ern" is that it rejects that which is "modern" For the purposes of graphic design, modern refers to the International Style, so one should expect postmodern design neither to look like nor to have the same conceptual basis as the work discussed in the previous chapter. The stylistic conventions of postmodern graphic design include mixing diverse type sizes and weights, overprinting, cluttered pages, deliberate "mistakes" unpredictable historicist references, blurred photographs, and even in some cases an embrace of general messi-ness—all elements that reject the dogmatic rules of the International Style. However, most scholars feel that the modern movement did not end with the beginning of postmodernism, so that modernism and postmodernism actually have existed side by side, with the former losing ground to the latter over the years. While postmodernism cannot be confined to any one specific country or even continent, this chapter and the next will focus mainly on the American and British works that are considered to be at the heart of the movement.

Psychedelic Posters

Despite decades of dominance, the International Style was being undermined as early as the 1960s. At that time a variety of young designers began experimenting with an eclectic variety of styles. Some graphic designers created work that was a self-conscious reaction to the International Style, while other projects seem to have grown organically out of the social circumstances of the 1960s and beyond. An example of the latter phenomenon arose around 1965 in San Francisco, where a critical mass of young people focused their energies on the burgeoning music scene in California.

This group of poster designers, many of them without any formal an training, developed an exuberant, expressionist visual language that neatly complemented the counterculture that was developing among young people during that decade. As the name implies, the "counterculture" refers to the overwhelming rejection, or "countering" of conventional mores and social norms that char­acterized many young people's beliefs in the 1960s. There was a prevailing sense among young people that their parents' lifestyles were stifling and outdated, and that it was necessary to resist mainstream middle-class values that would lead to an inauthentic existence. Profoundly idealistic, young people in Europe and the United States nonetheless succeeded in forcing dramatic changes in the way many people viewed the world.

Psychedelic drugs, particularly LSD, played a significant role in the formation of the counterculture. LSD had a profound effect on the user's brain, causing visual and auditory hallucinations that resulted in a dream-like "trip," which in turn was believed to lead to more enlightened thinking and an expanded consciousness. Especially in California, where drugs were legal until 1966, it quickly became fashionable for artists and designers to adopt a facsimile of a "psychedelic trip" in order to appeal to young consumers. The resulting posters, many of which advertised rock concerts, dramatically contrast with the clarity and legibility that were the norm for graphic designs of all types.

A fine example of a psychedelic poster was created by Wes Wilson (b. 1937) in 1966 (fig. 9.1). This lithograph seemingly contradicts its own reason for existing; why even make a poster if the resulting text and image are so illegible as to be unreadable? The flame-like red lettering seems to zigzag back and forth across the page, with the shape of each letter changing in order to fit into the available space. The red letters seem to project from the cool green background; this use of brilliant complementary colors is a hallmark of the 1960s rock poster. In response to this sacrifice of legibility in the name of expressiveness, the concert promoter Bill Graham (b. 1931) resorted to using asterisks that referred the viewer of the poster to the bottom margin, where die specifics of the concert were rewritten in legible type.

    The psychedelic poster movement in San Francisco manifested another key aspect of postmodernism: the embrace of historicist styles. In 1965, the University of California at Berkeley had hosted exhibitions that highlighted early twentieth-century Expressionist and Art Nouveau styles, and these shows had a clear impact on posters from the following years. For example, Wilson's Captain Beefhart lithograph borrows the vertical format and flat stylized ornament of Art Nouveau and combines it with the undulating letters of the psychedelic. This sort of borrowing need not be so direct, as, for example, the Expressionist element in general of the psychedelic movement probably was influenced by historical posters. Postmodernists borrowed indiscriminately from past styles without adopting the ideology or full aesthetic principles of any given historical movement. Also, postmodernists often mixed together historical references that did not necessarily fit with one another.

    Victor Moscoso (b. 1936), who taught at the San Francisco Institute of Arts beginning in 1966, was one of the only psyche delic designers with formal training in the visual arts, having studied at Cooper Union and then at Yale with Josef Albers. In the psychedelic poster scene of the 1960s, formal art training was not necessarily considered something to be proud of, as it contra dieted the "underground," anti-establishment vibe that dominated the counterculture. Moscoso combined the exuberant hand-drawn lettering of his psychedelic peers with more sophisticated techniques such as photocollage in order to make images of breathtaking originality. His 1967 Youngbloods integrates the let­tering into the forms of a pair of dancing, naked hippies, whose gyrations mimic the kinetic force of the abstract patterns that fill out the image (fig. 9.2). Note how the words "Avalon Ballroom." which caption the image, seem to be expanding and flowing oft the bottom of the poster, a technique that recalls the visual hallucinations of LSD users. The vivid palette adds to the sense of unreality, giving the image the aura of a spectral vision.

    Wilson and Moscoso, along with Alton Kelly, Stanley Mouse (b. 1940), and Richard Griffin, became known as the "Big Five" of psychedelia. In 1967, they founded the Berkeley-Bonaparte agency to market poster art, as they profited from yet another "golden age" of the poster. Griffin's Flying Eyeball poster of 1968 remains one of the most famous works produced by Berkeley-Bonaparte (fig. 9.3). Publicizing a concert headlined by Jimi Hendrix, it shows a monstrous image of a creature climbing through a flaming hole burned into the poster. The ligatures that connect the lettering make them almost illegible. This type of strange, inventive supernatural imagery would become a mainstay for rock posters and record album covers in the 1960s and 1970s.
 

9.1 Wes Wilson, Captain Beefhart & His Magic Band, 1966.
Poster. Color lithograph

Wes Wilson, Posters.

Wes Wilson, Posters.

Wes Wilson, Posters.

9.2 Victor Moscoso, Youngbloods, 1967. Poster.
Museum fur Gestaltung, Zurich. Poster Collection.

Victor Moscoso. Posters.

Victor Moscoso. Posters.

Victor Moscoso. Posters.

9.3 Richard Griffin, Flying Eyeball, 1968

British Psychedelics

The psychedelic movement was not confined to San Francisco, as artists adopted the style elsewhere in the United States and in Europe. In the United Kingdom, Michael English (b. 1940) and Nigel Waymouth (b. 1941) pursued psychedelic graphics under the name Hapshash and the Coloured Coat. A central aspect of these designs is that psychedelic posters for rock bands, such as one for the British group Pink Floyd (fig. 9.4), sought to express the same sense of drug-induced dreamy reverie that was implicit in the bands' music. This poster combines the fantastical elements typical of the genre, seen in the castle-like structure floating on an island in the sky surrounded by flying saucers, with salacious details such as the nude woman/angel who floats toward the viewer. The curvilinear rhythm of her tendrils of hair suggests a knowledge of the Art Nouveau posters produced by Alphonse Mucha . In fact, the overall tone of the poster, particularly the ethereal dreamlike quality of the landscape and the nude, harks back to the Symbolist themes of the late nineteenth century. Of course, both An Nouveau and psychedelic posters mainly served to publicize entertainment aimed at the young and daring—whether they were the denizens of Montmartre's nightclubs or followers of the London counterculture is almost beside the point.

One of the climactic events of the British psychedelic scene was 1967's Love Festival. Michael English created a tantalizing image to publicize the festival, and the poster was destined to become one of the icons of the psychedelic era in Britain (fig. 9.5). The dazzling palette combines with letters that seem to stream out of the suggestive red lips, enticing the viewer with its aura of sensuality and chaotic joy.
 

9.4 Hapshash and the Coloured Coat (Michael English and Nigel Waymouth), Pink Floyd, "CIA-UFO," designed and printed for Osiris Agency Ltd., London, 1967. Poster. Screenprint.

9.5 Michael English. Love Festival, 1967. Poster. Color screenprint.

Magazine and Album Design

Another high-profile publisher of rock graphics beginning in the 1960s was Rolling Stone magazine. Founded by Jann Wenner (b. 1946) in San Francisco's warehouse district in 1967, Rolling Stone was the first publication to focus on the music industry as a core part of modern culture. Before the magazine started publication, rock music was still viewed as somewhat out of the mainstream and not necessarily worthy of such detailed explications as appeared in the pages of Rolling Stone. Wenner was also one of the first people to recognize that rock music intersected with broader themes of social and political values, and these subjects were often given significant space in the magazine, which became well known for its investigative reporting on a variety of issues. At the same time, Rolling Stone greatly amplified the burgeoning culture of celebrity that surrounded young musicians, and its artful photography had a huge impact in creating the aura of glamour that still surrounds popular musicians, or rock stars, to this day.

The original Rolling Stone logo was itself a product of the San Francisco psychedelic music scene, as it was drawn by the poster artist Richard Griffin (1944-1991). The fundamental shapes of Griffin's letters are still used at Rolling Stone to this day, although the aggressively illegible letterspacing and elaborate ornamental curlicues were toned down in later years. While the logo is instantly recognizable, the most striking aspect of Rolling Stone's design has always been the photography, which during the 1970s was mainly the work of the famed artist Annie Leibovitz (b. 1949). Leibovitz's captivating images of musicians, such as the July 17,1975, cover featuring Mickjagger and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones (fig. 9.6), imbued her subjects with a poise and gravitas that belied their years and reputations. Under art director Tony Lane, the covers had been simplified in the 1970s, with large single photos often bleeding over the logo, so that the entire composition resembled a contemporary rock poster. It was not until 1981 that Rolling Stone covers started to appear without the insistent framing device shown here, as the photos were finally reproduced in full-bleed style on glossier paper.

In England, Oz magazine, first published in January 1967, featured a wide range of graphic experiments that challenged the notion that clarity must be a designer's primary concern. Edited by Richard Neville (b. 1941) and Martin Sharp (b. 1942), both originally from Australia, where Oz had its first incarnation, the magazine featured social and political satire. Not just a lifestyle magazine, Oz took unpopular positions characteristic of the coun­terculture, including opposition to the war then raging in Vietnam. A staunch promoter of anti-establishment values, Oz was the most recognized product of the so-called "underground press." While Sharp was responsible for the magazine's overall design, the cover of issue no. 8 (January 1968; fig. 9.7) was devised by John Goodchild and Virginia CliveSmith. The cover is a compendium of mismatched type and image overprinted one upon another. The topless young woman in the background, pre­sumably representative of "Playboy's dirty flics," seems to bear no direct relationship to the war cartoon in the foreground. The car­toon itself was reproduced in brilliant fluorescent inks so that it appears to almost jump right off of the page. This use of frag­ments of popular culture outside their original context—in this case, a cartoon from a newspaper—is clearly part of the phenome­non that the art critic Lawrence Alloway termed "pop art." Pop artists often used the strategy shown here, reproducing an emo­tionally charged image from popular culture without commenting on it, allowing viewers to come to their own conclusions. In 1971, the editors of Oz were brought up on obscenity charges, and their trial became a cause celebre for proponents of the counterculture ndudingjohn Lennon. Accused of "conspiracy to corrupt public -orals," the three defendants were eventually acquitted.

The connection between graphic design and rock music also played a significant role in pop art graphics, as the artists Peter Blake (b. 1932) and Richard Hamilton (1922-2005) both designed album covers for the Beatles. Blake's cover for the 1967 album Sergeant Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, perhaps one of the most famous and influential rock albums ever recorded, shows the band posed in uniforms made up of psychedelic colored fabric (f.9.8). In an example of the postmodern love of pastiche, the actual members of the band are shown surrounded both by a set of wax figures of themselves borrowed from Madame Tussaud's famous museum and a disparate group of celebrities that includes both Marlene Dietrich and Edgar Allan Poe. The whole ensemble is posed as if in a park, with the band's name spelled out in topiary. At the time he made this design, Blake was a well-known painter in the pop art movement. Once again, pop art ideology sought to erase the distinction between fine and commercial art, so Blake considered his album covers, for example, to be just as significant as his paintings. This battle to collapse the hierarchy between the fine and applied arts had been fought intermittently since the late nineteenth century. Despite the efforts of generations of artists, there is still some semblance of this hierarchical belief in place today, in the twenty-first century.
 

9.6 Jann Wenner, Rolling Stone, July 17, 1975. Magazine cover.

9.7 Jon Goodchild and Virginia dive-Smith,Oz,no.8,
Jan 1968. Magazine cover.

9.8 Peter Blake and Janna Hawortti, Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, 1967. Album cover.