New Black Face: Neuland and Lithos As “Stereotypography” by Rob Giampietro
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New Black Face: Neuland and Lithos as “Stereotypography” by Rob Giampietro “The Neuland Question comes up regularly, and alas w∂hout much resolution....” –Jonathan Hoefl er 3 4 5 The “Neuland Question” to which of a religious life to his countrymen. delicately interlocking serifs com- Jonathan Hoefl er refers involves not Having experimented w∂h the art of monly used in black letter typography. just Neuland, a “display” typeface calligraphy shortly before enlisting, The result, a font composed of heavy hand-carved in 1923 by Rudolf Koch Koch returned to the art after WWI black forms, was visible from great (fi g. 1), but also Lithos, another “dis- with the intention of making bold, no- distances and easily distinguishable play” typeface digitally created in ticeable typefaces that would shout to from lighter-weight typefaces on a 1989 by Carol Twombly (fi g. 2). other Germans that f∞lowing God’s page. These qual∂ies made Neuland path would help them fi nd comfort suitable to advertising. Koch even at- 1 from the trauma of war. Yale Univer- tempted to set a classifi ed ad in Neu- sity Printer John Gambell suggests land at the end of the German speci- 2 that Koch designed the face with the men book (fi g. 5). The Question can be put simply: How intent of making a modern version of By the time Neuland reached the did these two typefaces come to signi- the German black letter (or black face) United States, its distributor, the Con- fy Africans and African-Americans, style. Black letter fonts were used at tinental Typefounder’s Association, regardless of how a designer uses the time for the setting of important had little interest in Neuland’s uses as them, and regardless of the purpose texts, especially Bibles and church- a modern black letter, and the speci- for which their creators originally in- related documents. men book that they prepared promot- tended them? The investigation of Koch’s “new black face” attempted ed Neuland as exclusively an advertis- this que≥ion has four parts: fi rst, an to preserve the fl ared, interlocking ing typeface, a “type that attracts examination of the environments in forms of the traditional black letter attention.” The American specimen which Koch and Twombly created the style, whµe at the same time adopting book showed Neuland used in adver- original typefaces; second, an exami- the sans-serif style around which tising settings from bank bonds to nation of the gra∫ic culture that sur- modernists, like Paul Renner, were drywall contracting (fi g. 6). rounded African-Americans prior to building their typefaces. Renner’s Fu- Just as Koch was trying to mod- the creation of Neuland through a tura, the quintessential exam≠e of ernize an ancient form of writing close viewing of tobacco ephemera; modernist typography, was designed with Neuland in 1923, so too was Car- third, an examination of the Art Deco in 1927, only four years after the ol Twombly with Lithos in 1989. (French Modern) style, the graphic Klingspor Type Foundry r¬eased Twombly says, “Inscriptions honoring culture most prevalent in the United Koch’s Neuland. States at the time of Neuland’s re- Koch’s settings of Neuland in the lease; and fi nally, an examination of original German specimen book sup- the ways designers use Neuland and port Gambell’s suggestion. He sets the Lithos today. type with minimal leading and kern- Rudolf Koch was born in 1876 and ing as black l√ter was typically set had a career that was both uninterest- (fi g. 3). He inserts woodcuts and 6 ing and undistinguished until he en- Greek cross-shaped (+) ampersands public fi gures or dedications for tem- listed in the German Army in 1907 to as well (fi g. 4), a common pra∆ice ples were intended for public viewing fi ght in World War I. The horrors of with black letter texts. However, Koch in ancient Greece. Geometric letter- war in≤ired Koch to seek r¬igion for broke with bla≈ letter typesetting forms, free of adornment were chis- himself and then preach the benefi ts standards by stripping Neuland of the eled into the ≥one. These basic 4 letterspace. www.tdc.org shapes are the in≤iration for Lithos.” surrounded the tobacco industry from Letterforms like those that inspired the 1850s untµ the 1930s, much of Lithos can be seen not only on ancient which involved racist uses of African- Greek tem≠es, but also on many Americans as mascots. Much of this modern buildings built in the Classi- ephemera took the form of trading 9 cal or Gothic styles many of Twom- cards given out in general ≥ores, on bly’s typefaces, like Lithos, come from street corners, or wherever tobacco ancient architecture: Trajan, a serifed was sold (fi g. 7). These trading cards face, ev∞ved from carvings on col- were common media for advertising umns in ancient Rome; and Char- and generally involved a caricatured lemagne, another serifed face, evolved picture of a “Negro” and a ·ogan in from carvings found in Byzantine dialect (“Sho’ fl y, git away from dar”) temples. on the front and information about 10 11 Although Twombly left Trajan and the product on the back (fi g. 8). To Charlemagne relatively unaltered keep costs down, the text on the back Typographic Milestones, typophile from their original forms, she made a of these cards was often poorly set Allan Haley charges “Neuland is not substantial alteration in Lithos. with cheap woodblo≈ type rather considered a particularly practical, Twombly decided to create a bold than with more expensive metal type. useful, or attractive typeface.” He later weight for Lithos in addition to its While today woodblock type has a re∂erates his point, saying, “[Neuland book weight, even though bold- certain nostalgic appeal, designers is] not especially attractive, nor even weighted letterforms were nonexis- very useful...its realistic applications tent in ancient Greece. John Gambell are quite limited.” suggests that Twombly “may have felt Apart from being perceived as the font was not marketable today cheap “garbage,” woodblock type car- without a bold weight.” Regardless of ried with it a legacy of cultural stereo- her reasons, Lithos’ bold-weighted type. Woodblock type was also anachronism is now Neuland’s bas- known as “circus type” because of its tard child. Lithos’ fl ared edges, heavy frequent use in promoting circuses. lines, square chara∆ers, and pen-like An entire culture of “stereotypogra- strokes are analogous to Neuland’s el- phy” developed around these playful ements, and the fonts are virtually 7 woodblock typefaces as certain “cir- identical to the untrained eye. Indeed, cus types” came to stand for stereo- Lithos’ close formal approximation to typical visual associations that Amer- Neuland makes it interchangeable icans held about the cultures that the with Neuland for designers. “circus types” were designed to repre- Because Lithos f∞lows Neuland sent. For exam≠e, circus owners used historically and formally, and because the woodblock type Tokyo when pro- printers and designers used Neuland moting performers from Asia (fi g. 9). in African and African-American Hometown, another “circus type,” is a projects before Twombly even con- near match for Neuland (fi g. 10), as is ceived Lithos, the resolution of the Othello, a heavy (black) sign-lettering Neuland Question rests in recon- typeface whose name alludes to the structing Neuland’s history. black hero of Shakespeare’s tragedy African-Americans did not have the (fi g. 11). buying power or the social acceptance Beyond the circus’ stereotyping of required to cultivate a signifi cant 8 non-Western cultures via woodblock gra∫ic culture. What graphic culture and typophiles into the 1950s saw type, cigarette pa≈ages, in add∂ion they did have centered around their woodblock letters as nothing but low- to their advertising, often employed depiction in advertisements for prod- er-class. Immediately upon its r¬ease, stereotyped and racist themes on their ucts associated with slavery: tobacco designers and typophiles linked Neu- packaging. Two cultures often stereo- and c◊ton. land’s forms with woodblock type and typed were Egypt (on the packages of Tremendous amounts of ephemera responded accordingly. In his book Oasis, Café-Noir, Zima, Egyptian He- 5 letterspace. www.tdc.org roes, and Crocodile cigarettes) and Turkey (on the packages of Fatima, Omar, and Turkey Red) (fi g. 12). The dominance of these cultures in antiq- uity ties them to Lithos’ Greek forms. Their use on cigar√te packaging ties them to Neuland. Finally, their status as cultural “Others” to the West, in the same way that Africa was seen as a cultural “Other,” fi gures prominent- ly intodetermining the cultural impli- cations of the Neuland Question. Before Neuland’s release, the gra∫ic culture of African-Americans 12 exemplifi ed by trading cards, “circus each character set of Neuland was means “not according to prescribed, type,” and cigarette packaging typi- subtly diπerent from all the others; o∑cial, or customary forms; irregu- fi ed the racial and socioeconomic ste- this wonderful quality has been lost lar; uno∑cial; suitable to or charac- reotype of the “Po’ Negro.” since the type’s adaptation into photo- teristic of casual or familiar speech or Art Deco, which grew up in France type and then digital forms. writing.” “Informal” is inartistic, low- around 1900, adopted much of the In his Advertising Typographers of er-class, and outside the establish- fantasy of Art Nouveau. Oftentimes America Type Comparison Book, ty- ment. “Informal” is an assertion of this fantasy included “a taste for the pophile Frank Merriman groups Neu- American society’s perception of Afri- exotic… [including] ancient Egypt.” land under the heading “Informal can-American art and, indeed, of Af- Like cigarette pa≈aging that drew Sans” with true Art Deco faces such rican American peo≠e themselves.