Typography and Today’s Art

By Alexa Lyons
10/27/2013

Typography is a major component in Graphic Design. In fact, using typography and manipulating it in your work is an art all in itself. This is why contemporary artists have started using typography within their pieces. They play with fancy lines and letter forms, bright backgrounds, and force the viewers to think twice about the subject. It introduces ironies into cultural language and a body of ideas that will then be embedded in the viewers’ brains.

Below is a sampling of contemporary art that includes typography. Watch as the typography brings the art to life in a way that cannot be done using only an image.

Featured Artists:

•Alfredo Jaar

–Is a multimedia artist born and bred in Chile. His artwork stems a lot from politics and events going on during his time. He attempts to try different strategies for representation of reality.

•Jenny Holzer

–Jenny Holzer is an American conceptual artist belonging to a feminist branch of artists who came about during the 1980’s. She is well known for her large scale public displays and billboards that use words and ideas all within a public space.

•Roy Lichtenstein

–Roy Lichtenstein is a Pop Artist who favored creating comic strip art which was a mixture between advertising and comics . His work defined pop art more than almost any other artist of that time through parody.

•Barbara Kruger

–Barbara Kruger is a conceptual artists who is famous for using famous black and white images and lay text on top of them, making a statement that leaves the viewers second guessing their own reality.

•Kay Rosen

–Kay Rosen is a typographic artist who uses anagrams, puns, and textual puzzles, to make the viewer think more about how to think of typography and language; as a visual form, rather than just a textual one.