Design and Science: The Life and Work of Will BurtinIt has been said that Will Burtin (1908-1972) was to graphic design what Albert Einstein was to physics. Burtin pioneered important contributions to international typography and visual design. He is best known as the world leader in using design to interpret science; as a proponent of 'clean', uncluttered sans-serif typography; and for his large-scale three-dimensional models, which carried the craft and the art of display to new heights. His walk-through models included a human blood cell (1958) and brain functions (1960). His major achievement, his clarity and ingenuity with models and graphics made complex information easy to assimilate. Early success in his native Germany brought Burtin unwelcome attention from Nazi leaders courting his services. He fled with his Jewish wife to the United States. Within months he won the prestigious contract to create the Federal Works Agency exhibit for the 1939 New York World's Fair. The wartime Office of Strategic Services drafted Burtin to create Air Force gunnery manuals, cutting recruits' training from six months to six weeks. In 1945, with the U.S. still at war, Fortune magazine lobbied to extract Burtin from the army in order to appoint him Art Director. By the late 1950s he was designing the walk-through exhibits for which he is renowned. The first monograph on Burtin, Design and Science illustrates his leadership in five fields: using graphics to visualize science and information (pre-war); corporate identity (from the mid-1940s); multimedia (which he called 'Integration', from 1948); large-scale scientific visualization in 3-D (from 1958, foreshadowing computer-assisted virtual environments, i.e. CAVE-space); and, with others, promoting Helvetica in North America. Illustrations of Burtin's work that have never before been published make this invaluable book essential reading for design professionals and all those interested in design, visualization, imaging and information technology. |
Contents
Acknowledgments | 6 |
from flex O prop to gunnery manuals | 23 |
Fathering corporate identity | 39 |
Copyright | |
6 other sections not shown
Common terms and phrases
advertising AIGA American Architectural Forum art director artist Atom booklet Brain exhibit brochure Brunswick Corporation building Burtin archive Burtin designed Burtin wrote Carol Burtin Celia Brody Chromosome Puff Cipe Pineles clients Cologne color communications conference corporate identity cover create display Displayers electron Ezra Stoller featured Figure film Fitch Fortune Fortune Fortune magazine Genes in Action George Klauber Germany Graphic Design gunnery manuals Helvetica Helvetica Helvetica Henrion Hilda Burtin Hilde Howard Mont human illustration images industrial Integration Kalamazoo later light Macleod major Max Munk Metabolism mitochondrion moved Mueller-Brockmann Munk permission of Pfizer Pfizer Inc photographs plastic Plexiglas present Robert Fripp Roger Remington Saul Bass scientific scientists Scope structure studio Sy Wexler three-dimensional took trademark tubes typography Union Carbide Upjohn Brain Upjohn Cell Upjohn Company Vision 65 Will's Willem Sandberg William Golden York World's Fair