Lin Yü-Bingnan

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Lin Yü-Bingnan [Yü Bing-nan] In 1956, as a young graduate of the Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts, calligrapher and type designer Yu Bingnan (also Lin Yü-Bingnan or Yü Bing-nan) was sent to East Germany to work on a Latin typeface. There, he studied at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig (Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig, thereafter HGB), one of the best and oldest art institutes in the world at that time. One of his teachers there was Albert Kapr. From early 1959, Yu Bingnan started conceiving a Latin typeface. He improvized a unique writing instrument---a bamboo pen that was chopped off from a traditional ink brush commonly used in Chinese calligraphy. Yu named his Latin typeface Freundschafts-Antiqua, a symbol of solidarity and friendship between China and Germany. Yu Bingnan graduated in 1962. That same year, Freundschafts-Antiqua was published by Typoart. These typefaces can be found in Jaspert's book and in Hildegard Korger's Handbook of Type and Lettering. It is a very readable old style serif, with many calligraphic elements, and original curvy characteristics. As the first Latin typeface ever created by a Chinese designer, Freundschafts-Antiqua has won the Gutenberg Prize (the first Asian winner), the Best Contemporary Typeface award, the German Minister of Culture Award, the Tokyo Type Director's Club Award and many other awards. Yu Bingnan became professor at the Academy of Fine Arts of Tsinghua University. A first digital revival was done in 2010 by AR Types, which writes about Freundschafts-Antiqua AR: Freundschafts-Antiqua AR is based on a 20th-century German type design. Freundschafts-Antiqua (which was also called Chinesische Antiqua) was designed by the Chinese calligrapher Yü Bing-nan when he was a student at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst at Leipzig in 1960. It was cast in 1964 by VEB Typoart, Dresden, in 9-pt and 28-pt (Didot). The design combines the best German traditions with the Chinese bamboo pen. It is a unique, wholly modern, yet quiet and dignified typeface which is well suited for text-setting in many sizes. In 2017, Roman Wilhelm and 3type, a Shanghai-based type foundry, released a six-style extension called Freundschafts Antiqua Neue. 3type has also fashioned a sans-serif member of the Freundschafts-Antiqua Neue family.	EXTERNAL LINKS Lin Yü-Bingnan [Designer info] Klingspor Museum page MyFonts search Monotype search Fontspring search Google search INTERNAL LINKS Type design in China ⦿ Type designers ⦿ Type designers ⦿ German type scene ⦿ Calligraphic typefaces ⦿