In the late 1950s, publisher and antique wood type collector Douglas Morgan began making his collection available to graphic designers. A large and infinitely useful source of vintage American wood type was thrown open and available to the New York hipsters and the young design scene. The result of this was an explosion of cool revivalist American wood type and letterpress printing technology (and assorted Victorian styles).
When this source of exciting materials popped up, it changed American graphic design. Youthful New York design circles exploited the stuff they found unmercifully. When the really hip cool designers like Push Pin tripped across this resource, there was an explosion of innovative and truly FUN type and imagery everywhere it mattered—posters, magazines, billboards, advertising, record covers, everywhere.
The stodgy old-school European design-influenced world of NYC in the postwar period suddenly gave way to an avalanche of fun, colorful, crazy AMERICAN-inspired typography and imagery. That rebellion/revival became the very first “postmodern” design style and movement in America. Push Pin Studios’ style owes its impact to this revivalism of Victoriana and American industrial design of the last century. We never looked back—before.
However, Push Pin weren’t the only design group pursuing this line of thought. Postwar New York design was overflowing with adventurous new creative kids surging into town. The postwar job search, the return of the vets looking for a new life, the sudden flush of money, the general restlessness of the times created the perfect atmosphere for openness and change. The newly emerging “graphic design” profession became a floodgate for young men vigorously seeking a new world.
Among the bazillion kids plowing into the new ad scene was a guy by the name of Mo Lebowitz. He was one of the very earliest letterpress junkie designers I’ve ever encountered. Lebowitz had gathered up a serious collection of old wood type, vintage ad cuts and letterpress equipment into his basement, and called it The Antique Press. He “designed” with this treasure trove as if it were pencils and paper. In other words, real print-driven graphic design modernism, but run through archaic equipment and technology. Sound familiar?
However, unlike most of the cottage letterpress underground designers of today, he didn’t exploit the physical qualities of the letterpress technology for its inherent beauty so much as he exploited the visual and design qualities of the process and what that can say. He also did not treat his materials with the almost religious reverence that today’s “collector” designers do. He had no qualms about physically cutting up his type and slapping trash into his chase to get a desired effect.
Lebowitz did a lot of small personal projects, and in my opinion it was his very best design work. However, he also did a lot of work for major corporations of the era, designing brochures and annual reports and the like. He was not just some hobbyist slouch. He was a hard-hitting hardcore corporate designer who did some beautiful, smart graphic design work. But he also had this “other” world he worked in that was as opposite from his money-making activities as he could manage.
This image I show today is one of the many absolutely brilliant design pieces he did with his Antique Press studio. He cut a couple of chunks of box wood (likely) into a vague numeral “1” (borrowing the numeral shape from designs from the antique era he loved). He took this HUGE “11” and locked it into his chase and inked it and printed it straight across, picking up the wood texture and cracks and flaws as the essential motif of the design. But, he didn’t bother to clean anything! Look at the “hickeys.” (Hickeys are chunks of dirt that get into the press and leave little blobs of ink in the image, usually surrounded by a halo of untouched paper.) It creates a white “circle” in the image. This thing is absolutely filthy. He didn’t clean it ON PURPOSE.
Then, to create and complete the astonishing contrast he was focusing on, he set the text below in the most delicate script face he likely had in his collection. The juxtaposition of opposites is one of the best-kept secrets in design—it makes for an delicious buzz that explodes into your eyes. It’s a brilliant choice. The pitch battle between the huge dirty nasty chunks of wood and the fussy little curlicue lettering below is like an insult to the eyes. I love it.
Page 200 shows a simple announcement to celebrate his 11th wedding anniversary. It speaks volumes. It is brilliant design work, and it uses what a printing press can do (and a little of what it can’t do) as part of the message. I’ve spent most of my adult career trying to emulate what I learned from looking at Mo Lebowitz’s early Antique Press work. That stuff was so smart and so modern and so anti and so cool. He took everything that was staid and true in the postwar NYC design world and stood it on his head. At that time, he was postmodern in the truest definition. That was downright punk.