Graphics and Posters
Introduction
The collection comprises approx. 400,000 works that document important aspects in the development of graphic design and printmaking. In addition to political, cultural and travel posters, it also covers type design, product advertising and corporate design. Besides iconic works, there are also numerous collections of papers that tell the story of the design, culture and history of printing from a new perspective, such as early colour and screen prints, feminist posters and flyers from the early days of techno culture. The collection is currently being expanded with a focus on female positions and perspectives. The collection can be seen in changing presentations on the 2nd floor.
Image / video
Oops, Chris Campe, Hamburg, 2012, © Chris Campe
Favourite objects
Ein Herz für Kinderarbeit–H&M, Dies Irae, 2016, Foto: MK&G
Poster against child labour
Wherever I travel, I see advertisements in the city. At every stop there is an advertisement for something life-changing. Actually, I ignore most of these banners, but sometimes I stumble across one because it is different and get stuck in my mind. The poster "A heart for child labour - H&M" by Dies Irae always gets me stuck. This anonymous artists' collective puts up posters with socially critical themes, especially in advertising boxes at bus stops. This is how the poster in the exhibition "audio-graphic" originally hung in public space and hopefully inspired people not only to be intoxicated by advertising messages through this adbusting, but also to think about relevant questions to our society. Posters can not only be huge advertising media, but can also make individuals think and discuss, for which I greatly appreciate this poster.
Katharina Müller, Management Graphics and Poster Collection
Abbildung: Paul Theisen, Fons Hickmann m23
The new house font SCTO
LK: I think it's good.
JM: Really? Why?
LK: The whole corporate design is much fresher. In the past, I didn't really want to go to MK&G because it looked so stuffy.
JM: But isn't the new house font, SCTO, somehow anachronistic? It is the "white cube" among typefaces. Its simple forms claim a neutrality that does not exist. And today in particular, there are justified demands that museums not present themselves as neutral, objective, unquestionable institutions.
LK: Yes, but it is just as unrealistic to claim that the whole museum speaks with ONE voice. That is precisely why the SCTO is supported by other writings.
JM: So that the MK&G's polyphony and creative joy becomes clear?
LK: Exactly. Very striking typefaces, in fact. The SCTO, on the other hand, is pleasantly restrained, almost unnoticeable.
JM: Which is great, so as not to draw attention away from the exhibits and the content of the texts.
LK: And the logo is very present on all media, so the museum shows itself as the sender.
JM: How right you are. Love at second sight.
Conversation between Lucia Köhn and Julia Meer, Graphics and Posters Collection
Victor Vasarely, Plakat für Galerie Le Point Cardinal, 1964, © VG Bild-Kunst 2021
Poster for Le Point Cardinal Gallery
Victor Vasarely (1906-1997) is considered the founder of Op Art. His colourful illusions challenge our eyes, our brains: flickering forms, hypnotic images, pulsating patterns. In doing so, he makes use of medical and mathematical insights into perception and decisively shapes the dazzling era of the 1960s and 1970s. I particularly like his works in the transition from the representational to the abstract, like this one. Almost quietly, Vasarely dissolves our learned systems of signs and habits of seeing that lie like stencils on the world. Every day we have to deal with a flood of images, texts and information. Have to filter, focus, be efficient, need order and structure. In this image, too, our eye searches for familiarity, wants to interpret, understand. In vain. Yet liberating. Behind the individual forms, signs and colours, everything unspeakable and unintentional appears. A vast expanse opens up. You can't take your eyes off it, you look, come to rest, your thoughts wander.
Michaela Hille, Press Officer
Virgil Solis, Doppelpokal, Kupferstich, Nürnberg, um 1560, MK&G, Public Domain
Ornamental engraving of a double goblet
An engraving by the Nuremberg goldsmith Virgil Solis (1514 - 1562) dating from around 1560 is currently on display in the exhibition "Function and Diversity". The sheet shows a double goblet - a vessel that has an unusual shape - two goblets similar in form with the rims of the lips placed on top of each other so that the upper one serves as a lid for the lower one. The making of a goblet was one of the requirements of the master craftsman in many goldsmith's guilds, it was ascribed a role in wedding customs and often served as a representative gift. My attention is drawn not only to the simple, harmonious form of the goblet, which reveals the fine goldsmithing techniques and ornamental forms of the 16th century, but also to the function of the printed leaf itself. During the Renaissance, it served as a model for craftsmen and conveyed the most up-to-date stylistic forms. Later, in the 19th century, as a so-called ornamental engraving, it became the object of study and collection of many European schools of arts and crafts and museums. The founding director Justus Brinckmann created an imposing collection of the ornamental patterns, which still forms a valuable basis for museum work today.
Dr Joanna Kłysz-Hackbarth, Graphics and Posters Collection
collecti*f
Collecting together
In the future, we would like not only to preserve feminist works, but also to support them, i.e. we would like to buy them. Become a supporter! With an annual donation, you support the designers and the development of the collection. And you make the feminist collection a joint project: collecti*f.
Grafik: Rimini Berlin
From the collection
Ariane Spanier, Toleranz, Berlin, 2018, Offsetdruck, 100 x 70 cm, Schenkung Ariane Spanier, © Ariane Spanier
Barbara Lüdde, Punk-Poster-Serie „I Not Dance“, 2012, Tusche auf Papier, MK&G, © Barbara Lüdde
Clémentine Hélène Dufau, La Fronde, 1898, Plakat, Lithografie, Sammlung Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg
Kieler Woche 1970, Waldemar Świerzy, Polen, 1970, MK&G