Book #17
Aaron Marcus
1971
Book #17
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Born in 1943 and educated at Princeton and Yale Universities, Aaron Marcus is a graphic artist best known for his computer-science-based design and experimental proto-AI compositions. Combining handwork with coding, he anticipated forms of computer-assisted ...
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Book #17
Aaron Marcus
1971
New York.: Wittenborn and Company
Unpaginated [110 pages]
24.6 × 27 cm

Born in 1943 and educated at Princeton and Yale Universities, Aaron Marcus is a graphic artist best known for his computer-science-based design and experimental proto-AI compositions. Combining handwork with coding, he anticipated forms of computer-assisted practice that have since become widespread among contemporary artists and designers.


 


In an interview with Kate Long for the Letterform Archive in San Francisco, Marcus traces the arc of his lifelong fascination with typography:


 


“I have been interested in the history and transformation of alphabets since childhood. I recall a full-page table in the Funk and Wagnall’s Encyclopedia that my parents had obtained as a give-away. We couldn’t afford the full set, but I had access to the ‘Aa-Az’ volume. I loved looking at the changes of Egyptian (hieroglyphics to hieratics to demotics), Hebrew, and our own Graeco-Roman alphabet. I learned at an early age to read Hebrew as well as English languages, and later learned enough Greek to read signs in Greece and some Russian signs. As a graphic design student, I was introduced to the formal study of letter shapes, their counters, their contours, their history of transformations, and became fascinated with specific fonts in which I had interest, like Helvetica and Times Roman. Along the way, I designed alphabets based on the circle, and I explored letterforms that had lateral symmetry, like E, B, H, etc. and produced small, short books about them.”


 


This publication is an early graphic experiment. It announces Marcus’s ongoing exploration of scientific chart papers, letterform landscapes, and visual and concrete poetry.

New York.: Wittenborn and Company
Unpaginated [110 pages]
24.6 × 27 cm

Born in 1943 and educated at Princeton and Yale Universities, Aaron Marcus is a graphic artist best known for his computer-science-based design and experimental proto-AI compositions. Combining handwork with coding, he anticipated forms of computer-assisted practice that have since become widespread among contemporary artists and designers.

 

In an interview with Kate Long for the Letterform Archive in San Francisco, Marcus traces the arc of his lifelong fascination with typography:

 

“I have been interested in the history and transformation of alphabets since childhood. I recall a full-page table in the Funk and Wagnall’s Encyclopedia that my parents had obtained as a give-away. We couldn’t afford the full set, but I had access to the ‘Aa-Az’ volume. I loved looking at the changes of Egyptian (hieroglyphics to hieratics to demotics), Hebrew, and our own Graeco-Roman alphabet. I learned at an early age to read Hebrew as well as English languages, and later learned enough Greek to read signs in Greece and some Russian signs. As a graphic design student, I was introduced to the formal study of letter shapes, their counters, their contours, their history of transformations, and became fascinated with specific fonts in which I had interest, like Helvetica and Times Roman. Along the way, I designed alphabets based on the circle, and I explored letterforms that had lateral symmetry, like E, B, H, etc. and produced small, short books about them.”

 

This publication is an early graphic experiment. It announces Marcus’s ongoing exploration of scientific chart papers, letterform landscapes, and visual and concrete poetry.

DESCRIPTION

Born in 1943 and educated at Princeton and Yale Universities, Aaron Marcus is a graphic artist best known for his computer-science-based design and experimental proto-AI compositions. Combining handwork with coding, he anticipated forms of computer-assisted practice that have since become widespread among contemporary artists and designers.

 

In an interview with Kate Long for the Letterform Archive in San Francisco, Marcus traces the arc of his lifelong fascination with typography:

 

“I have been interested in the history and transformation of alphabets since childhood. I recall a full-page table in the Funk and Wagnall’s Encyclopedia that my parents had obtained as a give-away. We couldn’t afford the full set, but I had access to the ‘Aa-Az’ volume. I loved looking at the changes of Egyptian (hieroglyphics to hieratics to demotics), Hebrew, and our own Graeco-Roman alphabet. I learned at an early age to read Hebrew as well as English languages, and later learned enough Greek to read signs in Greece and some Russian signs. As a graphic design student, I was introduced to the formal study of letter shapes, their counters, their contours, their history of transformations, and became fascinated with specific fonts in which I had interest, like Helvetica and Times Roman. Along the way, I designed alphabets based on the circle, and I explored letterforms that had lateral symmetry, like E, B, H, etc. and produced small, short books about them.”

 

This publication is an early graphic experiment. It announces Marcus’s ongoing exploration of scientific chart papers, letterform landscapes, and visual and concrete poetry.

New York.: Wittenborn and Company
Unpaginated [110 pages]
24.6 × 27 cm

Born in 1943 and educated at Princeton and Yale Universities, Aaron Marcus is a graphic artist best known for his computer-science-based design and experimental proto-AI compositions. Combining handwork with coding, he anticipated forms of computer-assisted practice that have since become widespread among contemporary artists and designers.

 

In an interview with Kate Long for the Letterform Archive in San Francisco, Marcus traces the arc of his lifelong fascination with typography:

 

“I have been interested in the history and transformation of alphabets since childhood. I recall a full-page table in the Funk and Wagnall’s Encyclopedia that my parents had obtained as a give-away. We couldn’t afford the full set, but I had access to the ‘Aa-Az’ volume. I loved looking at the changes of Egyptian (hieroglyphics to hieratics to demotics), Hebrew, and our own Graeco-Roman alphabet. I learned at an early age to read Hebrew as well as English languages, and later learned enough Greek to read signs in Greece and some Russian signs. As a graphic design student, I was introduced to the formal study of letter shapes, their counters, their contours, their history of transformations, and became fascinated with specific fonts in which I had interest, like Helvetica and Times Roman. Along the way, I designed alphabets based on the circle, and I explored letterforms that had lateral symmetry, like E, B, H, etc. and produced small, short books about them.”

 

This publication is an early graphic experiment. It announces Marcus’s ongoing exploration of scientific chart papers, letterform landscapes, and visual and concrete poetry.

MORE BOOKS

Born in 1943 and educated at Princeton and Yale Universities, Aaron Marcus is a graphic artist best known for his computer-science-based design and experimental proto-AI compositions. Combining handwork with coding, he anticipated forms of computer-assisted practice that have since become widespread among contemporary artists and designers.

 

In an interview with Kate Long for the Letterform Archive in San Francisco, Marcus traces the arc of his lifelong fascination with typography:

 

“I have been interested in the history and transformation of alphabets since childhood. I recall a full-page table in the Funk and Wagnall’s Encyclopedia that my parents had obtained as a give-away. We couldn’t afford the full set, but I had access to the ‘Aa-Az’ volume. I loved looking at the changes of Egyptian (hieroglyphics to hieratics to demotics), Hebrew, and our own Graeco-Roman alphabet. I learned at an early age to read Hebrew as well as English languages, and later learned enough Greek to read signs in Greece and some Russian signs. As a graphic design student, I was introduced to the formal study of letter shapes, their counters, their contours, their history of transformations, and became fascinated with specific fonts in which I had interest, like Helvetica and Times Roman. Along the way, I designed alphabets based on the circle, and I explored letterforms that had lateral symmetry, like E, B, H, etc. and produced small, short books about them.”

 

This publication is an early graphic experiment. It announces Marcus’s ongoing exploration of scientific chart papers, letterform landscapes, and visual and concrete poetry.

MORE BOOKS