€ 40,00The volume is a photographic testimony of the American urban fabric of the late 70’s. Charles H. Traub creates a series of portraits, depicting street tenants of Uptown Chicago and Bowery New York.
The author declares: «I wanted to see, to try to touch at least with my camera the experience of loss». The intent was not to satisfy a sort of voyeurism, but to witness the dignity and humanity of the homeless. They were very different from the contemporary ones; today they are no longer the result of individual destinies but of great social disparities.
A famous book by Nelson Algren, A Walk on the Wild Side, wondered «why lost people sometimes become greater human beings than those who have never been in their lives». Skid Row responds by highlighting a nobility that unites urban communities, even in the worst moments.
Unfortunately, this sensitivity, due to gentrification and indifference, is now systematically suppressed in favor of a transformation made by urban chic.
It is therefore even more necessary to recount these experiences, so as to recall the fundamental role of the “lost nobles” in the construction of the historical identity of a city.
—
Text by Tom Huhn
Book design Bunker21 × 26 cm
112 pages
Hardcover
English
Isbn 978-88-98030-59-0
First published June 2023- € 35,00
The poster collects a hundred images of trees, printed in scale 1:200, with and without foliage, carefully selected from those enclosed in the homonymous volume. Replica of the original poster of L’Architettura degli Alberi from the exhibition of Modena and Reggio Emilia in 1982, corrected in the plates and updated in the graphics. The only difference from the original version is the addition of the
green color.The ink drawings faithfully return the peculiarities of the tree species depicted, allowing us to enjoy their variety and specificity. The scientific nomenclature of each tree is accompanied by vulgar terminology. The images are numbered so as to allow the observer an easy identification of the trees and not only to appreciate their indisputable beauty.
—
Original illustrations by Studio Leonardi-Stagi
Design (based on the original layout from 1982) Bunker70 × 100 cm
Paper: Fedrigoni Arena Smooth Natural 170 g
Offset print 2 Pantone colors
Isbn 978-88-98030-61-3
First published April 2023 - € 27,50
“Antologia di cultura grafica” is the new series dedicated to the history of visual communication. Edited by Alessandro Colizzi and Silvia Sfligiotti, assisted from time to time by one or more guest editors, the series offers a series of volumes, organized around a theme or era, and includes a rich anthology of texts (articles, essays, chapters, excerpts, posters) translated into Italian and introduced by an essay by the editors.
“La questione moderna in Europa”, first volume of the series, addresses the graphic debate within the modern movement of the interwar years, with an expanded look at the European continent to include authors from cultures and national histories hitherto neglected by historiography.
Far from being a unified phenomenon, the modern movement was characterized by a plurality of manifestations and the presence of very different theoretical positions. In particular, modernist graphics was the result of a process of negotiation between actors belonging to different national contexts. Moreover, actors from multiple disciplinary fields participated in its formation: advertising, publishing, architecture, photography, journalism, and the printing industry.
This anthology reflects the variety of orientations and opinions expressed both within individual national events and by the different personalities involved, who interpreted the ideology of the modern in ways and forms as heterogeneous as ever. The panorama that emerges is decidedly more nuanced and hybrid than has appeared in existing publications to date, and allows us to grasp the phenomenon in its theoretical, aesthetic, technological and social complexity.
—
Antologia di cultura grafica 1
Edite by Alessandro Colizzi, Silvia Sfligiotti & Carlo Vinti
Book design Bunker and Alessandro Colizzi
13,5 × 21,5 cm
280 pages
Paperback with flaps
Italian
Isbn 978-88-98030-56-9
First edition February 2023 - € 18,00
Alfazoo is not a conventional zoo. It houses the world’s most unusual animals: wild vowels and consonants nearing extinction.
This ABC turns letters into animals simply by adding a pair of eyes and a mouth to each shape, in a graphic game that invites young readers to play with the letters to invent their own beastly alphabet.
With its freshness and modern design, it is hard to believe that this book by Italian designer Alfredo De Santis was first published in 1968 by Emme Edizioni, the visionary publishing house that brought to the Italian market avant-garde children’s titles by authors such as Leo Lionni, Iela and Enzo Mari, Tomi Ungerer, Yutaka Sugita, Bruno Munari, Luigi Veronesi, Maurice Sendak, Emanuele Luzzati, and Bob Gill.
A timeless design lesson to read forms and symbols through a different visual lens.
—
Illustrations by Alfredo de Santis
Text by Marta Sironi
Book design Bunker
(from original design by Emme Edizioni)21 × 21 cm
48 pages
Hardcover
Italian
Isbn 978-88-98030-57-6
First edition February 2023 - € 19,00
Why Pino Tovaglia kept this unpublished work, or what its true genesis is, we will never know. The fact is that his daughter Irene, getting her hands on her father’s materials, found these 24 plates, held together with tape, with an intriguing cover where the Pirelli logo stands out, front and back. The mystery deepens because the managers of the famous brand claim that there is no trace of such a project in their archives; even during the years of the collaboration between the designer and the multinational company nothing leads back to this pamphlet, which appears to be a real prototype.
Whatever its origin, it is in any case an interesting and singular study of the elongated form, which Tovaglia evidently enjoys doing of his own free will. The association with the brand, as far as we can surmise, probably arises by analogy with the content, or vice versa.
The 56 pages of A story as long as are thus a valuable exercise in style, reproposed in its formal integrity, but adapted for a contemporary publication, accompanied by a short text by Marta Sironi, which allows us to investigate and enhance the more human side of one of the most significant figures of Italian graphic design in the second half of the twentieth century.
Dedicated to fans of graphic design, illustration and simple admirers of a great protagonist who spontaneously addresses children, with a hint of mystery…
—
Illustrations by Pino Tovaglia
Text by Marta Sironi
Cover by Flavia Ruotolo
Book design Bunker and Flavia Ruotolo21 × 12 cm
56 pages
Paperback with dust jacket
Italian
Isbn 978-88-98030-54-5
First edition November 2022 - € 58,00
Photography is an act of self-awareness towards oneself and one’s cultural background. In his sixty-year career Franco Fontana has photographed what cannot be seen, succeeding in fixing through framing an ‘other’ image that is abstracted from reality, free from the portrayed subject. Geometry, proportions and composition have allowed him to reach, by progressive degrees, a conceptual synthesis that has been translated into linguistic unity and its formal manifestation, images.
Today, the crisis of the liquid society opens to the author the opportunity to explore new territories of the invisible ‘naked eye’, expanding the visual horizon and the iconographic structure while maintaining stylistic coherence and identity. If unity originates from the hybridization of differences, from the affirmation of unity itself originate the differences, in a system in constant balance between conceptual and formal, invisible and visible.
Invisible, a 168-page book with more than 100 photographs, is the restitution of meticulous archival research from which many previously unpublished shots have emerged: from the most experimental research to more intimate evidence of expressive freedom, which constitute the fertile ground from which grew the unmistakable style that has made Franco Fontana internationally famous.
Dedicated to those who know or approach the expressive path of the author, to those who want to explore that inner space, beyond reality, which belongs to the subjective interpretation, where you go in search of the image that is not yet there and that only the sensitivity of the photographer’s eye can capture and translate into a unique and unrepeatable shot. Thus, suddenly, the invisible becomes visible.
—
Photographs by Franco Fontana
Editing by Lorenzo Respi
Book design Bunker22 × 27 cm
168 pages
Hardcover
English
Isbn 978-88-98030-58-3
First published November 2022 - € 16,00
There are places that exist only in memory, some of them so bizarre that they seem instead to be the figment of a child’s imagination-or perhaps an artist’s or even a designer’s. This is not the case with The Shops of Aoi Huber Kono: the meticulously illustrated facades in this leporello, which Aoi began composing in 1974, correspond to places that did indeed exist, everyday and familiar places.
If we are all accustomed to going to the bakery or the fish market, what happened instead to the confectionery, the dairy, the milliner or the haberdashery? Perhaps someday we will tell our children, as if it were a legend, that toys were not always crammed into the aisles of a shopping mall but that there were stores in which to spend hours looking at them all, magical places to be taken to after being at the doctor’s, or grandparents in secret. Or that once upon a time, when the world was a little less interconnected and much more diverse, there were no places in which to find everything from celery to tires: there were stores.
In this book, whose plates were designed for a small volume in the Tantibambini series, edited by Bruno Munari for Einaudi, Aoi Huber Kono illustrates the facades of 16 stores, making a summary of the most characteristic features of each: some still exist, but who can say for how long?
The title on the cover is a small jewel of design and graphics, the result of the intense collaboration between husband and wife: Max Huber made the curtain strips with colored cutouts and composed the lettering, Aoi embellished it with a punctuated hemming.
—
Illustrations by Aoi Huber Kono
Book design Bunker23 × 16 cm
16 pages
Leporello with jacket
Italian
Isbn 978-88-98030-51-4
First published July 2022 - € 22,50
Many typefaces created today are related to types of the past, and interest in older letterforms is stimulated by the great number of visual resources available. We are surrounded by digital fonts based in one way or another on historical models, but it is clear that we cannot consider all of them as revivals. So, how to distinguish a type revival from a typeface that is loosely based on historical forms? More reflection on this subject is necessary, both to help navigate the landscape of contemporary typefaces, and to give greater clarity to discussions on the history of type. This 104 pages pamphlet provides tools for researching and designing revival types. A concise publication that will show a practical perspective and fresh content, fuelling the conversation among and between designers and scholars.
The content is organised into four parts. The authors begin by defining the theoretical ground, including a definition of revivals, and a discussion on the boundaries of a revival project. The second part introduces the framework of analysis developed for recording the relevant design features of the type used as a model. In the third part, Olocco and Patané apply the framework to the roman type cut by Francesco Griffo for the De Aetna (1496). Based on this analysis, the fourth part showcases the process of reviving this historical type.
Although the authors are focusing on defining a procedure to design a type revival, those suggestions can be adopted beyond the scope of a revival project. Their approach will ensure a strong connection with the original source and a substantial help towards understanding how to employ historical models in a contemporary context.
—
Texts by Riccardo Olocco and Michele Patanè
Preface by Gerry Leonidas
Book design by Riccardo Olocco and Michele Patanè12.5 × 21 cm
112 pages
Paperback
English
Isbn 978-88-98030-48-4
First published May 2022
Discover the author
Luca Barcellona
He is the leading name in the world of contemporary Italian and international calligraphy (as well as a partner of the publishing house).
- € 45,00
“Writing becomes art and individual letters take on a life of their own”.
– La RepubblicaThe first published monograph on the artist is now available in a new, larger softcover edition. The book features hundreds of drawings including commissioned works, personal projects, performances and many never-before-seen works. Barcelona is internationally regarded as one of the most important lettering artists working today. Ideal for calligraphers, graphic designers, type designers, art directors, advertising professionals, illustrators and students.
For Luca Barcellona, letters are the building blocks of his creations. From Carolingian to tags, from quill pen to spray can, Barcellona takes the ancient craft of lettering to new heights with the inventiveness and talent of a contemporary virtuoso. His surprising, expressive and original forms and compositions open up unexplored territory, laying the foundations for a new style of lettering. Barcelona’s versatile work is admired and commissioned by major brands in fashion, music, film and publishing.
With contributions by: Charles ‘Chaz’ Bojórquez, legendary urban artist from Los Angeles, who began his career in the Chicano scene of the late 1960s and over the years has successfully transitioned from the street to the art gallery; Giovanni De Faccio, professional calligrapher, typeface designer (his best known is Rialto DF), and founding member of the Associazione Calligrafica Italiana. He is internationally renowned for his teaching and dedication to the promotion of calligraphy. He teaches calligraphy and type design at the New Design University in St. Pölten, Austria. Nicola ‘Dee Mo’ Peressoni made his debut in the late 1980s as an illustrator of European hardcore punk covers, posters and fanzines and went on to work in hip hop, becoming a pioneering figure in graffiti and Italian rap. His writings have been published in “Max”, “Rumore” and “Rolling Stone”.
—
Texts by Luca Barcellona, Giovanni De Faccio and Nicola ‘Dee Mo’ Peressoni
Interview by Chaz Bojórquez
Original book design by Pitis
Paperback edition with revised layout by Bunker23 × 33 cm
240 pages
Over 400 full color illustrations
Paperback
English/Italian
Isbn 978-88-98030-02-6
First published March 2016 - € 500,00
“Luca Barcellona shatters the boundaries as he blends his street sensibility with fine penmanship.”
— Letter Arts ReviewFor Luca Barcellona, Italian graphic designer and calligrapher, letters are the building blocks of his creations. From Carolingian to tags, from the quill to the spray can, Barcellona takes the age-old craft of lettering to new heights with the inventiveness and talent of a contemporary virtuoso. His striking, expressive, and original letterforms and compositions open onto uncharted territory, laying the foundations of a new writing style.
Take Your Pleasure Seriously (a quote by the designers Charles and Ray Eames) serves as a leitmotif for Barcellona who turned his passion into a way of life, first as a graffiti artist and then as a professional calligrapher. His production spans a broad spectrum from the reproduction of a world globe from 1569 to brand identities, book covers, ad campaigns, and performances.
This beautifully designed artist book features hundreds of drawings made over the last decade including commissioned work (Carhartt, Dolce & Gabbana, Nike, Red Bull, Universal, etc.), personal projects, performances, and many never-seen-before work. The book will fascinate and inspire anybody who works with letters or is interested in how they look.
Contributors: Charles “Chaz” Bojórquez legendary urban artist from Los Angeles, began his career in the Chicano scene of the late 1960s and over the years shifted successfully from street to gallery artist; Giovanni De Faccio is a professional calligrapher, typeface designer (his most well-known is Rialto DF), and founding member of the Italian Calligraphic Association. He is internationally renowned for his teaching and dedication to the promotion of calligraphy. He teaches calligraphy and type design at the New Design University in St. Pölten, Austria; Nicola “Dee Mo” Peressoni debuted in the late eighties as an illustrator of European hardcore punk covers, posters, and fanzines, and went on to work in hip hop, becoming a pioneering figure in Italian graffiti and rap. His writing has been published in Max, Rumore, and Rolling Stone Italy.
—
Text by Luca Barcellona, Giovanni De Faccio and Nicola “Dee Mo” Peressoni
Interview by Chaz Bojórquez
Book design PitisCollector’s Limited Edition of 50 copies
Each book signed, numbered, and personalized by the artist with the purchaser’s name
Includes an original work by the artist on cotton paper 16 × 18 cm (6 ¼ × 7”).
Housed in an embossed clothbound clamshell box
19 × 27 cm (7 ½ × 10 ½”)
224 + 32 pages
Over 400 color plates.
Clothbound with poster jacket.
English/Italian
First published November 2012 - Out of Stock€ 68,00
“Luca Barcellona shatters the boundaries as he blends his street sensibility with fine penmanship.”
— Letter Arts ReviewFor Luca Barcellona, Italian graphic designer and calligrapher, letters are the building blocks of his creations. From Carolingian to tags, from the quill to the spray can, Barcellona takes the age-old craft of lettering to new heights with the inventiveness and talent of a contemporary virtuoso. His striking, expressive, and original letterforms and compositions open onto uncharted territory, laying the foundations of a new writing style.
Take Your Pleasure Seriously (a quote by the designers Charles and Ray Eames) serves as a leitmotif for Barcellona who turned his passion into a way of life, first as a graffiti artist and then as a professional calligrapher. His production spans a broad spectrum from the reproduction of a world globe from 1569 to brand identities, book covers, ad campaigns, and performances.
This beautifully designed artist book features hundreds of drawings made over the last decade including commissioned work (Carhartt, Dolce & Gabbana, Nike, Red Bull, Universal, etc.), personal projects, performances, and many never-seen-before work. The book will fascinate and inspire anybody who works with letters or is interested in how they look.
Contributors: Charles “Chaz” Bojórquez legendary urban artist from Los Angeles, began his career in the Chicano scene of the late 1960s and over the years shifted successfully from street to gallery artist; Giovanni De Faccio is a professional calligrapher, typeface designer (his most well-known is Rialto DF), and founding member of the Italian Calligraphic Association. He is internationally renowned for his teaching and dedication to the promotion of calligraphy. He teaches calligraphy and type design at the New Design University in St. Pölten, Austria; Nicola “Dee Mo” Peressoni debuted in the late eighties as an illustrator of European hardcore punk covers, posters, and fanzines, and went on to work in hip hop, becoming a pioneering figure in Italian graffiti and rap. His writing has been published in Max, Rumore, and Rolling Stone Italy.
—
Text by Luca Barcellona, Giovanni De Faccio and Nicola “Dee Mo” Peressoni
Interview by Chaz Bojórquez
Book design Pitis19 × 27 cm (7 ½ × 10 ½”)
224 + 32 pages
Over 400 full-color illustrations
Clothbound with poster jacket
English/Italian
Isbn 978-88-98030-00-2
First published November 2012
The Printing Office
This is the name we have chosen to define a network among publishers who collaborate in disseminating visual culture texts. Paraphrasing Beatrice Warde’s famous manifesto (“from this place words may fly abroad”) this appellation indicates both a network of relationships and a careful selection of books.
- € 40,00
Published in 1997, this volume, the catalogue of the Roy Lichtenstein exhibition held at the Anthony d’Offay Gallery in London from 23 October to 27 November – only three weeks after his death –, contains six lithographic plaquettes of new paintings and two interviews with the artist, both recorded by David Sylvester, the influential British modern art critic of the second half of the 20th century. The first was recorded in January 1966, the second in April 1997 – a few months before Lichtenstein’s death.
The first interview was commissioned by the BBC’s Third Programme for a non-specialist audience, who might have been interested in learning about the then exciting new phenomenon called Pop Art, probably largely without ever having seen an example of it in the original, and therefore altogether more general and theoretical. The second interview is a brief collection of information about an interesting new technical development in Lichtenstein’s work; as it was to be published in the catalogue of an exhibition for a specialised audience, the interviewer assumed the reader’s knowledge of the artist’s long previous career.
Sylvester, unaware of the events, thus arrives at some considerations that, with hindsight, sound like a definitive summary of Lichtenstein’s work, which he has always claimed to have been inspired by Cubism, and likens him – perhaps unexpectedly – more to Braque and Picasso than to Gleizes and Metzinger.
—
Published by Anthony d’Offay Gallery, 1997
16.3 × 29 cm
40 pages
6 colour plates
Hardback
English
Isbn 094756473X - € 50,00
This book celebrates two ‘titans’ of 20th century book design: John Mardersteig and Jan Tschichold. Hans Schmoller tells the story of two men who, from humble beginnings, became influential typographers of the last century: Tschichold as head of design at Penguin Books and Mardersteig as founder of Officina Bodoni. Illustrated with 30 examples of their work, this book was printed at the Stamperia Valdonega in Verona by Mardersteig’s son Martino. Schmoller was also a recognised book designer and was Tschichold’s successor in designing Penguin Books. The book was prepared for printing by Abe Lerner.
—
Published by Typophiles, 1990
11 × 18.5 cm
96 pages
30 illustrations
Hardback with slipcase
English
Isbn 9780945074014 - € 90,00
A collection – compiled by Carla Marzoli and published in 1962 by La Bibliofila – of seventy-two calligraphic manuscripts and specimens ranging from the 16th to the 19th century, from the Italian, French, Dutch and Spanish schools, catalogued, described and richly illustrated with 210 illustrations and an introduction by Stanley Morison. Each 178-page volume, originally printed in 2000 copies, is numbered; design by Max Huber.
—
Published by La Bibliografica, 1962
Compiled by Carla Marzoli
Introduction by Stanley Morison
Book design Max Huber17 × 24.5 cm
178 pages
210 illustrations
Paperback
English - € 30,00
Teoria del type design (Type Design Theory), the first comprehensive theory of type design, is published in its first Italian edition by Ronzani Editore.
Written by Gerard Unger – a Dutch designer and lecturer internationally recognised as one of the most authoritative exponents of the discipline – and published in its original edition in 2018, the theory immediately established itself as a classic of typographic literature.
The book is divided into 25 short chapters, each addressing a specific aspect of type design, from the relationship to language to styles, from the importance of historical patterns to digital evolution, from legibility to expressiveness. The chapters are accompanied by more than 200 images and practical examples; terminology is clarified by a comprehensive glossary.
The ‘Theory’ will appeal to anyone with a sincere interest in typography; the comprehensiveness of the treatment and the clarity of the exposition make it suitable for a wide audience: from professionals in the field to students of typography and design, to simple enthusiasts of this marvellous art that has been giving shape to our words for more than five centuries.
—
Published by Ronzani Editore
Preface by Gerry Leonidas and a recollection by Riccardo Olocco16.5 × 24 cm
252 pages
Dutch hardback
Italian
Isbn 978-88-94911-43-5
Work with us
Are you a bookshop?
Readers