There are many ways by which an artist may give expression to his vision. He may take a piece of marble and chisel it into a form of beauty; he may take a drab of canvas and with a brush transform it into a thing of delight; he may take a piece of paper and, making a few marks with his pen, enable an instrumentalist give forth music which is ;pleasing; or he may write words which speak to us of the fury of battle or the gentleness of love. These things have been done through the ages, and we give honour to men for whom the names of da Vinci, Rubens, Beethoven and Tennyson may stand as representative.

We are accustomed to genius expressing itself in familiar forms. It is part of our birthright and become absorbed into our nature by our upbringing. It is only when results are unorthodox, when new conditions demand new symbols, that we hesitate and ask Why? Sooner or later, perhaps, as we ourselves become attuned to the new harmony or novelty of phrase, they are gradually incorporated into our thought and are reclaimed by general acceptance.

Artists have adopted many kinds of medium, but few have had a type case as a palette, and imposing surface as canvas, type elements as pigments and the hands of a compositor as brushes. This form of art expression is slowly gaining recognition. One of its first, but not its only expositor, is Albert Schiller, who creates pictures with those pieces of type elements (borders, fleurons, rules and similar items) which are found more or less in abundance in most printing offices. Schiller’s first design which could claim to be a type picture was a simple representation of a village church. From this humble beginning, encouraged by success, ambition led him into wider and broader fields. His largest “canvas” (“From a Penthouse Window”) measures 12 inches by 17 inches (30.5 cm by 12.5 cm), and is full of detail. One, a comparatively small example, the lady in a fur coat holding a clock, which is a detail of “The Antique Shop”, contains 244 pieces of metal. In its complete form, the picture measures 19 ½ inches by 8 inches (about 49 cm by 20 cm) and is printed in two colors, the black stock-in-trade and the figures of the customers showing up well against the green wall space.

That artistic ideas should have smouldered in the brain of a young immigrant is perhaps not entirely surprising; there are many examples. Schiller was born in Russia in 1898, and was taken to the United States when a child of six. The artist in his make-up was always seeking an outlet, but prolonged training was denied him; as soon as his elementary education was completed he had to make his contribution to the family exchequer. Almost from the start of his life as a printer, he has been playing with type, and on more than one occasion was sacked for “wasting time”  on experiments which his overseer thought frivolous and absurd. Of this phase Schiller says: “I had a feeling for type, a liking for it, so I went into a small printing office. I had an idea, even at that early period, that pencils and charcoals and paints were not for me. Type fascinated me. I played around with it so much that I got myself fired more than once.”

The early try-outs, this reaching out for something which at the moment eluded him, were a necessary part of the training. A lot can be learnt from books, but it is not until the opportunity comes to create that inherent talent comes to the surface. Schiller found a position with the Advertising Agencies’ Service Co., Inc. of New York as a typographer, and when occasion served continued his experiments, each new effort being more complete and satisfying that the last. At first small “thumb-nail” designs were incorporated in the layouts for customers’ publicity matter; being ornamental and not overwhelming, and above all, eminently fitting to the occasion, they proved acceptable.

With these preliminary ventures, the firm agreed to use the idea in a rather big way, and as a result the first of a series of goodwill greetings at Christmas time in 1924 was composed and circulated. For seventeen consecutive Christmases and New Years a major picture was produced and sent out with a message. The series ended in 1940, for in that year thoughts in America had more urgent and pressing problems to solve, and goodwill was overshadowed; but during the past decade the art of Schiller, which had wilted in the gloom, has blossomed anew.

These annual pictures, even if judged by ordinary publicity standards, were not cheap. One issued in 1934, “A Toast at Christmas” ¹, needed about a hundred hours of planning and almost as many to set; its total cost by the time it was finished was about ₤80, a larger sum than the expense of making the picture with paint and varnish. There is, however, another side to the balance sheet. the canvas of an artist is unique, none other like it exists; but once the forme of type is locked up and the proof passed, copies may be multiplied many thousands of times. Even if a block were made of the original layout, the result would hardly have the same appeal; the fact that the picture is an all-type production gives to it a value—artistic as well as a curiosity—far exceeding the actual cost of production.

¹ “A Toast at Christmas”, issued in 1934, dimensions of original, 39 cm. by 27.5 cm. (the original forme rests in the Typographical Library at the Columbia University, USA); “The Scriptorium”, 1936, 23.1 cm by 23.1 cm; five of the “26 Soldiers of Lead”, a headpiece for one of the series of postcards; “The Magician”, 1951, 17.5 cm by 15 cm.

Material things do not greatly trouble Schiller. He claims that he has adopted this method as his special form of drawing, finding in it plenty of scope for creative expression, in spite of the obvious limitations. “I have set myself the task of producing an acceptable graphic design that might be a drawing, yet somehow entirely escapes that category,” Schiller wrote to a friend. “The result I accept with full confidence that is is an accomplishment, both mechanically and artistically; its very strangeness giving the uninitiated pause.”

Schiller’s work today tends to move away from the large ambitious picture and to concentrate on smaller pieces—designs for the covers of folders, head and tail pieces, the centre ornament of a book plate, a significant detail for a letter heading—and in many ways these smaller pictures are finding a place in the world of commerce, their unorthodoxy itself providing its own unique appeal.

Schiller, however, has aims far outside the realities of business. He claims to be the exponent of a new art form for the new machine age. He once said: “The greatest painting in the world would be so much paint if it were not for the skill or technique of the artist who creates his illusion by the way he applies his oils. I am simply an artist who works in a different and a difficult medium; not only difficult, but one not held by man in any particular esteem, and from which no creative art is expected to result. The difficulty, I suppose, is that typographic pictures defy classification. The museums and galleries cannot quite fit them in. Certainly they are a part of no school and only remotely related to the German style of silhouette compositions. They cannot be said to be modern or traditional. The are, at any rate, wholly personal and original. I feel that the manner in which I use type ornament is my own way—a new way—of drawing. The forme containing a type picture is an affirmation that typographical integrity and typographic hand craftsmanship are not dead in this machine age. Each picture that I make is an illusion created with material what was never intended for the purpose to which I have put it. I like to think that I have created a new art.”

Like all good design, Schiller’s type pictures, be they large or small, have to be thought out. First the idea must be born, and the general outline clearly held in the mind. Then come a few rough lines on paper, and the layout from which the compositor works is evolved. Asked on one occasion to explain his method of working, he said: ” The conception of a type picture usually comes in a flash, inspired by the appearance of a particular ornament or by some circumstance connected with it. Like the mathematical wizards who can add up the numbers on a train of freight cars as they go by, I seem to see the picture at first flush as a sum total already arrived at in the inner councils of my mind. But I see it only dimly, as though it were wrapped in a dozen gossamer veils. I sense much of its detail and can guess at its main structure for I am certain it is there, waiting to reveal itself. the designing task then becomes a series of trial-and-error moves until I think I have duplicated as nearly as possible the image perceived by the mind’s eye.”

Gutenberg laboriously placed side by side the letters he had cast, and made the wisdom of the ages more readily available to mankind, It was his invention which made possible the rapid growth of learning  and the spread of culture. Who shall say that typographic genius has been exhausted with the production of the printed page? Has not Schiller shown us that, in the hands guided by imagination, the pieces of metal which followed from Gutenberg’s triumph can be made to appeal to the mind of man through pictorial representation?

For a new age, new visions. Many of us have handled type and rule for long years, but we will willingly confess that never did we have even a suspicion that they contained in the mass so many hidden beauties as Schiller has been able to demonstrate. Granted that he possesses a kind of sixth sense, enabling him in creating his designs to select just the right units from the heterogeneous material that lies amid the dust of our type cases. Such an admission only says that the man who can produce work of this kind has talent; indeed, he has real genius if he is able to apply his skill with successful and satisfactory results.

We printers examine a piece of well-designed printing with the same technical enthusiasm as an art critic regards the work of a painter in oils; we acclaim the men we recognise as skilled typographers as heartily as our fellows greet those they call artists. Schiller shows us that in a new and wider sense a talented typographer qualifies for admission to this select group in giving expression to his vision by means of pieces of metal and producing a picture which in all its parts serves the purpose for which it has been brought into existence.

That these type pictures—they have been given several different names, typosignet in England, typictures in the United States, Bildsatz in Germany—have a definite place in the publicity world there can be little real doubt. Their usefulness in other spheres has yet to be determined. It is a matter of opinion, but I personally prefer the smaller forms (see house at the head of this article). In the large major pictures there is so much to see that one is momentarily confused; with the smaller efforts each one is comprehended at a glance; it attracts the attention and leaves its message without delay.

The smaller picture becomes at once an ornament, and more than an ornament; it can have its own message. When its detail is connected with the purpose for which it is used, it can be very effective. A row of books and book ends has been used for a bookplate. Moreover, Schiller has plans (“when I have time”) for an edition of Scott’s Ivanhoe, in which type pictures will take the place of the usual engravings. If this ambition is realised and the idea applied to book work is shown to be worth further and serious investigation, yet another method of using Gutenberg’s gift to mankind will be available for exploitation.

This article appeared as an offprint from Gutenberg-Jahrbuch 1952 [the Gutenberg Yearbook of 1952], pp 214–218.

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