handmade 3.5.–29.7.2005, Plakatraum Graphic take away, Bastien Aubry and Dimitri Broquard, 2003, © Flag

Contemporary graphic design is relaxed about its use of a boundless repertoire of design devices and printing techniques. “handmade” presents posters whose makers have used their own hands for a whole variety of reasons—autonomy, spontaneity, independence or delight in experiment. This can manifest itself in analogue processing of a digital aesthetic, more radically still in the inclusion of solids and material in the making of the poster or in duplicating one by hand. Here handmade is never seen as doing without something, but as a creative necessity. These works are a long way away from retro-romanticism, representing a productive relationship between the designers and their activity. The exhibition brings together Swiss and international works ranging from the vital charm of the imperfect to the most precise and careful work by the artist's own hands.

Publication:
Series "Poster Collection" No. 11,
Museum für Gestaltung Zürich and Lars Müller Publishers.

Project manager: Bettina Richter