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ABOUT

Vladimir Vendiktorich Yefimov

Vladimir Yefimov (b. Moscow, 1949, d. Moscow, 2012) was the art director and a co-founder of ParaType, Ltd., Moscow (since 1992; before that, starting in 1988, it was called ParaGraph, and he had been staff designer there since its inception). He lectured on type design at the Stroganov Higher School of Arts and Crafts, Moscow (1995-96) and the Higher Academical School of Graphic Design, Moscow (1997-98). He worked at the type department of NPO Polygraphmas (1973-1991). He is the designer of many Cyrillic typefaces, and several Indian, Greek, and Hebrew typefaces, and author on typography and type design.

His typefaces include Bitstream Kis Cyrillic, AdverGothic (1989, after Advertisers Gothic by Robert Wiebking from 1917), Futuris, Futura PT (1991, 22 styles in all, after Renner's famous 1927 design), Compact (1991, ParaGraph, based on Anons by Gennady Baryshnikov), Decor (1989, after a typeface by Gennady Baryshnikov), Zhikharev (1989, after a 1953 original by Igor Zhikharev), Arthur (1994, TypeMarket, based on Agfa Marigold by Arthur Baker, 1989), Fraktura (1987, a Latin Fraktur typeface based on Justus E. Walbaum's Walbaum Fraktur), PT Didona (1992), PT ITC True Grit (1997, a Cyrillic version of Michael Stacey's ITC True Grit from 1995), PT Octava (2000, earlier (1996) called Scriptura Russica, a family commissioned by the Russian Bible Society and based on Lectura, 1969, by Dick Dooijes and Stone Print, 1991, by Sumner Stone. Octava won the Grand Prix of the Golden Biennale in 1996), Standard Poster (1992, based on a design from 1986 at Polygraphmash, inspired in turn by the fat didone style of the Ossip Lehmann type foundry (St.Petersburg)), Mason Sans Cyrillic (2002, Paratype, extending the Mason Sans family of Barnbrook at Emigre (1992)), Petersburg (1992), PT Compact (1991), PT ITC Fat Face (1993, with the help of Gennady Baryshnikov), PT ITC Zapf Chancery (1993, with the help of Gennady Baryshnikov), PT ITC Flora (1993, with help from Emma Zakharova, an extension of Unger's 1989 font ITC Flora), PT Pragmatica (1989, with Alexander Tarbeev and later Isabella Chaeva), the Cyrillic version of ITC Avant Garde Gothic (Paratype, 1993), the Cyrillic version of ITC Charter (1999, called PT ITC Charter) and the Cyrillic version of Barnbrook's Mason. He oversaw the development of the PT Sans (Open Font Library link) and PT Serif superfamilies in 2010-2011. PT Serif was co-designed with Olga Umpeleva and Alexandra Korolkova.

In 2012, Isabella Chaeva and Vladimir Yefimov created a Cyrillic version of Roundhand BT (1966, Matthew Carter) for ParaType. The typeface was posthumously released.

Yefimov Serif (2014) is a contemporary serif face, with low contrast, squarish shapes of round glyphs and emphasized business-like nature. It is one of the last original typefaces by Vladimir Yefimov. The typeface was completed by Maria Selezeneva and released by ParaType in 2014. The companion typeface is Yefimov Sans (2015, by Alexandra Korolkova and Maria Selezeneva).

Adam Twardoch's announcement of his death: Today, the co-founder of ParaType, prolific type designer and teacher Vladimir Yefimov has died in Moscow. Both his original typefaces and his masterful Cyrillic extensions of existing Latin typefaces were truly impressive. He even attempted multi-script extensions such as that of ITC Avant Garde. Among my favorite text typefaces (or actually, serif screen typefaces) is Vladimir's Octava. Matthew Carter praised Vladimir's Cyrillic version of ITC Charter, which I think is one of the finest Cyrillic alphabets ever designed. I was also very fond of Vladimir's Cyrillic extension of Kis, which John Hudson described as "one of his favourite Cyrillic text types as well as a remarkable exercise in historic imagination." Vladimir often collaborated with other designers, many of them were his former students. One of the last projects that he participated in was the monumental PT Sans (Open Font Library link, Github link) and PT Serif project. But he was not only dedicated, skillful and artistically refined---but also kind, generous, modest, warm and funny. I first met him in 1998 at the ATypI Lyon conference, and greatly enjoyed all the subsequent occasions that I could spend some time with him. It's been a great pleasure and a true privilege knowing him (a bit).

Brief CV. At ATypI 2004 in Prague, he spoke about the origin and history of Cyrillic letters. At ATypI 2008 in St. Petersburg, he spoke about designing Latin/Cyrillic fonts.

Obituary by Maxim Zhukov.

FontShop link. Klingspor link. Paratype link. Google Plus link.

EXTERNAL LINKS
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INTERNAL LINKS
Type design in Russia ⦿ Cyrillic type design ⦿ Type designers ⦿ Type designers ⦿ Blackletter fonts ⦿ Type personalities ⦿ Avant Garde typefaces ⦿ Modern style [Bodoni, Didot, Walbaum, Thorowgood, Computer Modern, etc.] ⦿ Chancery hand, cancellaresca ⦿ Typefaces based on Nicolas Kis's work ⦿