MoMA 2011
A rather puzzling news item reached us in January 2011---the MoMA in New York has acquired 23 digital typefaces for its collection. I wonder how one acquires a typeface? Is there only one original? The typefaces were chosen with a foresight of the scope of the digital revolution, and they all significantly respond to the technological advancements occurring in the second half of the twentieth century. Each is a milestone in the history of typography. One can easily set up a web site that shows those 23 fonts, so what is the point of all this? The 23 acquired typefaces are: - American Type Founders: OCR-A (1966)
- Wim Crouwel: New Alphabet (1967)
- Matthew Carter: Bell Centennial (1976-78)
- Matthew Carter:ITC Galliard (1978)
- Erik Spiekermann: FF Meta (1984-1991)
- Zuzana Licko: Oakland (1985)
- Jeffery Keedy: Keedy Sans (1991)
- Erik van Blokland and Just van Rossum: FF Beowolf (1990)
- Barry Deck: Template Gothic (1990)
- P. Scott Makela: Dead History (1990)
- Jonathan Hoefler: HTF Didot (1991)
- Neville Brody: FF Blur (1992)
- Jonathan Barnbrook: Mason (1992)
- Matthew Carter: Mantinia (1993)
- Tobias Frere-Jones: Interstate (1993-95)
- Matthew Carter: Big Caslon (1994)
- Albert-Jan Pool: FF DIN (1995)
- Matthew Carter: Walker (1995)
- Matthew Carter: Verdana (1996)
- Jonathan Hoefler and Tobias Frere-Jones: Mercury (1996)
- Matthew Carter: Miller (1997)
- Jonathan Hoefler&Tobias Frere-Jones: Retina (1999)
- Tobias Frere-Jones and Jesse Ragan: Gotham (2000)
There are obvious biases here towards certain designers. The destructionist era of Brody and Emigre is overrepresented, and Zapf and Frutiger are underrepresented. This is not meant to be a list of best fonts, only those that had a technological design element, but then why is Monaco not there? And if impact is at least a partial criterion, why is Helvetica missing? Also interesting to note that about 50% of the typefaces in the list are interpretations of older designs.
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