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Writing & research for graphic designers
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These are dividing spaces, each
opening a new chapter in the
magazine. Each month the
magazine commissions another
studio/artist with the design.
Studio: Sagmeister Inc.
Art Direction: Stefan Sagmeister
Design: Traian Stanescu
Photo: Oliver Meckes and Nicole
Ottawa
Client: .copy magazine (Austria)
Year: 2005
Size: 9" × 11.5" (230 × 295 mm)
Referencing, in part, the early twentieth-century progressive
modernist typography parlant (type that metaphorically illustrates
its literal meaning) and quoting the late twentieth century concep-
tually enigmatic, declarative typographies by Jenny Holzer, Barbara
Kruger, Lawrence Weiner, and Ed Ruscha, Stefan Sagmeister’s
environmental typographic work bridges various media formats
and materials. He is as comfortable with twigs and pipe as he
is with ink and pixels. While his typography is associated with
what might be termed the “epigram school” of art, it is not just
regurgitating the other exemplars’ methods but seeking out a new
language while acknowledging existing languages.
His best-known collection of word-images, Things I Have
Learned in My Life So Far, comes largely from a lengthy list
of revelations jotted in his diary. Although each could be
mistaken for self-help maxims (like “Trying to look good
limits my life” and “Being not truthful works against me”),
they nonetheless transcend being simplistic bromides by
virtue of his series of interpretative typographic sculptures,
which have come to characterize Sagmeister’s hybrid output.
Constructing words from such diverse objects as flowers, cacti,
branches, sausages, toys, and toilet paper, not to mention the
quirkier hair, semen, pollen, and intestines, the individual
pieces run the gamut from what might be described as sub-
limely overt to lyrically ambiguous—yet never so abstract or
arcane that an average viewer cannot somehow decipher each
word leading to the message. One thing he rarely does is allow
his words to be made into ham-fisted metaphors: For example,
Sagmeister wisely did not compose “Everything I do always
comes back to me” in a circle, for that would have been
too obvious.
CASE STUDY:
things he has learned
stefan sagmeister
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section 5
writing with images the language of text and pictures
(Text)
143
These are dividing spaces, each
opening a new chapter in the
magazine. Each month the
magazine commissions another
studio/artist with the design.
Studio: Sagmeister Inc.
Art Direction: Stefan Sagmeister
Design: Traian Stanescu
Photo: Oliver Meckes and Nicole
Ottawa
Client: .copy magazine (Austria)
Year: 2005
Size: 9" × 11.5" (230 × 295 mm)
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Writing & research for graphic designers
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142
These are dividing spaces, each
opening a new chapter in the
magazine. Each month the
magazine commissions another
studio/artist with the design.
Studio: Sagmeister Inc.
Art Direction: Stefan Sagmeister
Design: Traian Stanescu
Photo: Oliver Meckes and Nicole
Ottawa
Client: .copy magazine (Austria)
Year: 2005
Size: 9" × 11.5" (230 × 295 mm)
Referencing, in part, the early twentieth-century progressive
modernist typography parlant (type that metaphorically illustrates
its literal meaning) and quoting the late twentieth century concep-
tually enigmatic, declarative typographies by Jenny Holzer, Barbara
Kruger, Lawrence Weiner, and Ed Ruscha, Stefan Sagmeister’s
environmental typographic work bridges various media formats
and materials. He is as comfortable with twigs and pipe as he
is with ink and pixels. While his typography is associated with
what might be termed the “epigram school” of art, it is not just
regurgitating the other exemplars’ methods but seeking out a new
language while acknowledging existing languages.
His best-known collection of word-images, Things I Have
Learned in My Life So Far, comes largely from a lengthy list
of revelations jotted in his diary. Although each could be
mistaken for self-help maxims (like “Trying to look good
limits my life” and “Being not truthful works against me”),
they nonetheless transcend being simplistic bromides by
virtue of his series of interpretative typographic sculptures,
which have come to characterize Sagmeister’s hybrid output.
Constructing words from such diverse objects as flowers, cacti,
branches, sausages, toys, and toilet paper, not to mention the
quirkier hair, semen, pollen, and intestines, the individual
pieces run the gamut from what might be described as sub-
limely overt to lyrically ambiguous—yet never so abstract or
arcane that an average viewer cannot somehow decipher each
word leading to the message. One thing he rarely does is allow
his words to be made into ham-fisted metaphors: For example,
Sagmeister wisely did not compose “Everything I do always
comes back to me” in a circle, for that would have been
too obvious.
CASE STUDY:
things he has learned
stefan sagmeister
(Ray)
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section 5
writing with images the language of text and pictures
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143
These are dividing spaces, each
opening a new chapter in the
magazine. Each month the
magazine commissions another
studio/artist with the design.
Studio: Sagmeister Inc.
Art Direction: Stefan Sagmeister
Design: Traian Stanescu
Photo: Oliver Meckes and Nicole
Ottawa
Client: .copy magazine (Austria)
Year: 2005
Size: 9" × 11.5" (230 × 295 mm)
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“We created the saying for the O.K. Zentrum in Linz,” says Sagmeister.
“Austrian school kids built the maxim out of 25,000 black and 35,000 white
cloth hangers. Four hangers were bound together with wire fasteners to form
a square; six of these completed squares formed a cube; and the cubes in turn
formed pixels, creating the typography. Each letter stands about 10 feet (3
meters) high, with the entire sentence configuring a 125 foot (38 meter)-long
block, a lacy typographic sculpture placed parallel to the building’s façade on
the Spittelwiese, a pedestrian zone in the center of Linz.”
Concept: Stefan Sagmeister
Design: Stefan Sagmeister, Matthias Ernstberger, Craig Toomey, Brian Toomey
Curator: Martin Sturm, Paolo Bianchi
Coordination: Michael Weingartner, Rainer Jessl
Construction: Aron Rynda
Permits: Norbert Schweitzer
Production: Anet Sirna-Bruder
Documentary Photography: Otto Saxinger
Client: OK Zentrum Linz, Linz 2009, Linzer City Ring
Year: 2007
Size: 60,000 plastic hangers, 147'8" × 10' × 3'3" (45 × 3 × 1 m)
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section 5
writing with images the language of text and pictures
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“We created the saying for the O.K. Zentrum in Linz,” says Sagmeister.
“Austrian school kids built the maxim out of 25,000 black and 35,000 white
cloth hangers. Four hangers were bound together with wire fasteners to form
a square; six of these completed squares formed a cube; and the cubes in turn
formed pixels, creating the typography. Each letter stands about 10 feet (3
meters) high, with the entire sentence configuring a 125 foot (38 meter)-long
block, a lacy typographic sculpture placed parallel to the building’s façade on
the Spittelwiese, a pedestrian zone in the center of Linz.”
Concept: Stefan Sagmeister
Design: Stefan Sagmeister, Matthias Ernstberger, Craig Toomey, Brian Toomey
Curator: Martin Sturm, Paolo Bianchi
Coordination: Michael Weingartner, Rainer Jessl
Construction: Aron Rynda
Permits: Norbert Schweitzer
Production: Anet Sirna-Bruder
Documentary Photography: Otto Saxinger
Client: OK Zentrum Linz, Linz 2009, Linzer City Ring
Year: 2007
Size: 60,000 plastic hangers, 147'8" × 10' × 3'3" (45 × 3 × 1 m)
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Six newly commissioned
two-page spreads for the
Austrian magazine .copy.
Together they read:
Having / guts / always /
works out / for / me.
Design: Sagmeister
Inc./Bela Borsodi
Art Direction: Stefan
Sagmeister
Design: Matthias
Ernstberger,
Miao Wang, Stefan
Sagmeister
Photo: Bela Borsodi.
Client: .copy magazine
(Austria)
Year: 2003
Size: 9" × 11.5"
(230 × 295 mm)
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