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Garamond and the French Renaissance Garamond and the French Renaissance Compiled from Various Writings Edited by Kylie Harrigan for Everyone Ever

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Garamond and the French Renaissance Garamond and the French Renaissance Compiled from Various Writings Edited by Kylie Harrigan for Everyone Ever Garamond and The French Renaissance Garamond and The French Renaissance Compiled from Various Writings Edited by Kylie Harrigan For Everyone ever Design © 2014 Kylie Harrigan Garamond Typeface The French Renassaince Garamond, An Overview Garamond is a typeface that is widely used today. The namesake of that typeface was equally as popular as the typeface is now when he was around. Starting out as an apprentice punch cutter Claude Garamond 2 quickly made a name for himself in the typography industry. Even though the typeface named for Claude Garamond is not actually based on a design of his own it shows how much of an influence he was. He has his typefaces, typefaces named after him and typeface based on his original typefaces. As a major influence during the 16th century and continued influence all the way to today Claude Garamond has had a major influence in typography and design. Claude Garamond was born in Paris, France around 1480 or 1490. Rather quickly Garamond entered the industry of typography. He started out as an apprentice punch cutter and printer. Working for Antoine Augereau he specialized in type design as well as punching cutting and printing. Grec Du Roi Type The Renaissance in France It was under Francis 1, king of France The Francis 1 gallery in the Italy, including Benvenuto Cellini; he also from 1515 to 1547, that Renaissance art Chateau de Fontainebleau imported works of art from Italy. All this While artists and their patrons in France and and architecture first blossomed in France. rapidly galvanised a large part of the French the rest of Europe were still discovering and Shortly after coming to the throne, Francis, a Francis 1 not only encouraged the nobility into taking up the Italian style for developing the Gothic style, in Italy a new cultured and intelligent monarch, invited the Renaissance style of art in France, he their own building projects and artistic type of art, inspired by the Classical heritage, elderly Leonardo da Vinci to come and work also set about building fine Renaissance commissions. Thanks to the enlightened was beginning to emerge. The first flowering in France. Leonardo came to live at Amboise, buildings in his capital city, and outside it. influence of Francis 1, the Renaissance took of the Italian Renaissance came in the early bringing with him paintings and drawings The most magnificent examples of early hold firmly and strongly on French soil. years of the fifteenth century; but it was many of which are still in France today, French Renaissance architecture are the Chateau de Chenonceaux, on the Cher. not for another hundred years, when the notably at the Louvre, which has the world’s royal chateau at Chambord, in the Loire Following the example of Chambord, Renaissance was well established in Italy, largest collection of Leonardo’s paintings, valley, and the rebuilding of the royal palace other Loire valley castles were either built that it began to flourish in France. including of course the Mona Lisa, known in at Fontainebleau south of Paris. The design or rebuilt in the Renaissance style; among The earliest Renaissance architecture in France as La Joconde. of the chateau at Chambord is attributed the most famous and beautiful of these are France is said to be parts of the Loire valley to da Cortona, though it is also suggested Chenonceaux, Azay le Rideau, Valan√ßay and chateau at Amboise, which King Charles that Leonardo da Vinci, who was then Villandry. Thus, along with Paris, it was the VIII began to rebuild in the “Italian manner” living nearby, had a part in the plan. For Loire valley area, notably between Orleans from 1495, employing for this purpose the Fontainbleau, Francis relied on the French and Angers, that saw the finest flourishing Italian architect Domenico da Cortona. mason Gilles le Breton, and a French of the Renaissance in France, and to this day architect Philippe Delorme, who had studied offers a fine choice of monuments from this in Italy. period. To decorate his royal residences, Francis brought other artists and craftsmen from 3 His most influential mentor though was Geoffrey Tory. After about Working by himself from the year 1545 and on Garamond was a ten years of Tory, Garamond‚ Äôs first font came out. Having been independently designing and publishing new typefaces. With the new approached by a fellow printer and scholar Robert Estienne to cut development of the modern paperback book demand for slimmer types Garamond developed a Roman style font that was first published typefaces arose. New printing methods were being developed that in Paraphrasis in Elegantiarum Libros Laurentii Vallae by Erasmus. allowed for smaller books. With smaller books smaller type was needed 4 Following the type De Aetna by Aldus Manutius Claude Garamond but it still had to be readable. changed and tweaked it to fit the needs of his commissioner and his Italic fonts were the solution that many designers saw to this new own personal tastes. format. Italics could be condensed and the design of italics lent itself to King Francois I saw the typeface and liked it enough to commission slimmer letters which took up less space. Garamond was one of the first a personal typeface. The commission of a typeface from King Francois I to design an italic typeface. While he did not start the trends he used signified Claude Garamond‚Äôs move from talented designer to hugely in his design (slanted uppercase letters as well as lowercase letters), his popular talented designer. The king asked for a Greek influence type. designs were so important that they would later influence many other In 1540 Garamond produced the typeface Grec Du Roi for the King typefaces of that nature with the same characteristics. Garamond‚ Äôs that was exclusively used for the printing of Greek books by Robert new designs were published in his first book Pia et Religiosa Meditatio Estienne. From this point on Garamond started to work on original by David Chambellan. The typefaces in the book were exclusively typefaces sans commissions and started publishing independently designed by Garamond. The publishing of his first book started his as well. personal business. He from this point started to sell his typefaces. He was the first person to start a type foundry. In 1530 he started his business of developing and creating typefaces and then selling them to printers. While being a pioneer in the typeface selling business he was not very successful and ended up at the end of his life with little money and little typefaces left. Francis I Azay le Rideau The Renaissance took hold, nonetheless, very much in vogue. One of the most throughout France, and fine Renaissance extensive examples of Renaissance painting buildings were put up in towns and cities in France can be seen in the decoration of across the land. In Besancon, capital of the ceiling vaults of the Cathedral of St. Franche-Comte, now France but then part Cecelia in Albi (Midi-Pyrenees), painted in of the Hapsburg empire, Cardinal Granvelle, the early sixteenth century, even before the Chancellor to Francis’ arch rival the Francis 1 came to the throne of France. Emperor Charles V (Charles Quint), built During Francis’ reign, Fontainebleau himself a small but impressive Renaissance became the hub of artistic activity, but the palace which stands to this day. In nearby Fontainebleau school was the only home- Burgundy, the chateau of Ancy le Franc is grown school of French renaissance painting. one of the purest Renaissance chateaux It is best represented by Jean Clouet and his in France. The Renaissance even reached son Francis Clouet; other important painters the furthest corners of Brittany, where for of the school include Jean Cousin and instance the mid 16th century chateau Antoine Caron; but apart from the Clouets, de Kerjean is a fine example of French none made any great mark on posterity. Renaissance architecture. It was not until the seventeenth century While it is in architecture and interior that French painters were to make a major decoration that the French Renaissance contribution to the history of art. style is most visible today, the Renaissance also saw the slow development of a French school of art, though Italian artists remained Azay le Rideau Claude Garamond died in 1561. He had at one time entertained Printing Office picked a typeface that had been used by the 17th financial success but by the end of his life he barely owned any of century Royal Printing Office. The typeface they picked, while at the his typefaces. He had been the first designer to create typefaces and time was under the name of another designer at the time, was later sell them but for him the business ventures did not end up working identified to be the work of Garamond. out favorably for him. After his death his widow was forced to sell Cardinal Richelieu had supervised the Royal Printing Office and had 6 what little typefaces he still owned as well as some of the punches name the font Caracteres de l‚ÄôUniversite which he used to print his he still had. As a result his typefaces and punches were distributed own writings. The French National Printing Office named the actual around Europe. With the scattering of his typefaces after his death font creator as Garamond. With this renaming the revival of ‚ÄúClaude Garamond‚Äôs fonts fell out of use for some time. With the decline in Garamond‚Äôs‚Äù typeface began. Christopher Plantin was major the use of his typefaces only the general idea of what characteristics they buyer of Garamond‚Äôs work and contributed individually to the contained were remembered.
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