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Breathtaking Typographic Posters

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You can’t design without type. However, yon can use only type (or mostly only type) to create breath-taking designs. In fact, many graphic designers and artists take exactly this route to communicate their ideas through their works. The results are sometimes crazy, sometimes artsy, sometimes beautiful, but often just different from things we’re used to. Thus designers explore new horizons and we explore new viewing perspectives which is what inspiration is all about.

You can’t design without type. However, yon can use only type (or mostly only type) to create breath-taking designs. In fact, many graphic designers and artists take exactly this route to communicate their ideas through their works. The results are sometimes crazy, sometimes artsy, sometimes beautiful, but often just different from things we’re used to. Thus designers explore new horizons and we explore new viewing perspectives which is what inspiration is all about.

You can’t design without type: this is an argument for it.

This post showcases over 50 breathtaking typographic posters designed by artists across the globe. We feature Oriental, Iranian, Hebrew, Japanese, Chinese and Russian typographic posters as well as a number of further references. This isn’t a “best of”, there is no ranking and the collection isn’t supposed to be complete; it’s rather subjective and quite random. All screenshots are clickable; however, links not always lead directly to the corresponding image (e.g. it’s impossible in Flash-based sites) — sometimes you’ll need to search for it.

Further Reading on SmashingMag:

So what can be achieved out of simple letters and symbols? Please be patient, some screenshots are huge.

Breathtaking Typographic Posters

Christina Koehn / University of Washington, USA

Alex Banks / United Kingdom

Emiliano Lionel Suárez / Argentina

Juanma Teixidó / Asunción, Paraguay

Pablo Alfieri / Buenos Aires, Argentina

HeyHo / France

Vincent Bousserez / Paris, France

Drew Kora / Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA

in the lab

Aron Jancso / Budapest, Hungary

Andre Bergamin / Brazil

Oh Ishi / Siam, Thailand

Alejandro Paul / Buenos Aires, Argentina

mrgraphicsguy / Germany

lee25 / United Kingdom

Shaun Morrison / Brighton, England

25ah / Stockholm, Sweden

Andy Cambiaso / Argentina

Puerto Baires / Buenos Aires, Argentina

Todd Roeth / USA

Piotr Fedorczyk / Florence, Italy

Noel Tanner / Minneapolis, USA

Kate Andrews / London, United Kingdom

Experimental Jetset / Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Farhad Fozuni / Iran

Yaronimus Maximus / Israel

Bunch / UK

Playful applications for the 55DSL 2007 Christmas instore incentive. Tape and posters were designed and sent to each store where the staff were then encouraged to get creative with what they taped up to win 555 GBP worth of prizes.

Alex Trochut / Spain

Arjo Wiggins Poster

Pixelgarten / Germany

Apirat Infahsaeng / New York

Purple Haze / Germany

Rote Sonne Club (2007). Poster design for a clubnight.

Think Experimental / France

Aaron Pou / USA

Job Wouters / Netherlands

In collaboration with Roel Wouters. Printed by Knust. Folded A3 flyers for Jungstar (formaly known as Zeitgeist) a bimonthly party held at the sugarfactory organised by the MRKMLN-group.

There’s always work in progress / you’re always a work in progress.

Sterk Water / Belgium

Poster made for a expo of a local art school promoting the free grahics and the sculpturing department.

C100 / Germany

A Club Poster from Berlin

Mark Andrew Webber / Falmouth, England

Hanna Czapka / Germany

Bonus

Job Woulters 80 of 500 handdrawn typographic posters by Job Wouters are shown in a 3 minute filmclip by Roel Wouters. The posters promote the students final works at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. The handwriting is… beautiful.

References and Resources

Oriental Typography Posters By Malik Anas.

Chinese Typography Pool

DailyType.ru

A creative project run by several russian type designers. Day by day, they create original typefaces and post their results along with routine.