Bringing the World Home

Even in a time when it seems as if everything has already been invented, innovation remains possible. After all, every new era calls for new interpretations. In this one, more than anything else, that’s about raising design to a higher level through collaboration. Max Kisman – instructor, graphic designer, illustrator and animator – sees globalisation as a challenge.

"Some things are just in the air," says Kisman, 53. "You notice the same things cropping up everywhere at the same time. Signs of the zeitgeist are disseminated by the existing information and media networks and received simultaneously in different places. It’s not even so much because of globalisation, but more because of the fact that people around the world have the same needs. I experienced it in the 1980s when I made Vinyl, a pop music and lifestyle magazine; The Face was being published in England at the same time. In the end, Vinyl was brought down by the limitations the Dutch language placed on its potential market. But that’s how things go. I’m not afraid of the exchange effect of globalisation. It’s like water that flows everywhere, over and into everything, washing things away, washing them clean. It’s destructive, and at the same time the source of life."

Kisman is a clear exponent of globalisation. His typographical work, and specifically his fonts, are appreciated and used around the world, and he has lived and worked in Spain and then, until recently, in the United States.

"I feel the need to be home again, but the Netherlands has changed," he says. "Its open character is under pressure. And that’s too bad, because it’s precisely in complicated times like these that an open attitude is crucial. I’m working now for the Centraal Museum in Utrecht on Roam Is My Home, an exhibition about the opening up of the home through letting in the outside world. It will address the necessity of creating identity in the face of our newly acquired mobility, and the struggle with identity as a consequence of dissolving boundaries. What does the concept of house-as-home mean at this point, and what does it have to do with identity?" He smiles. "This project suits me well. I see myself as a kind of nomad."

Compassion flowers

When he speaks to students about the struggle for identity, Kisman is struck by what a hard time they have coming up with examples. "Instead of looking close to home, consulting themselves or their parents or friends, they Google themselves silly, without really knowing what they’re looking for," he says. "It’s best to start as small and as close to home as you can. That worldwide aura designers seek comes naturally if your work is really good."

A perfect example is the way 230 designers around the world collaborated on the Fleurons of Hope project, which Kisman initiated. Fleurons were originally decorative typographical elements used in the art of book printing. "The idea is that the flowers, as positive symbols of love, remembrance and hope, will help to ensure that the disaster remains imprinted in the memory," he says. "I really enjoy juxtaposing different designers as a curator. It gives a good picture of the times, and it’s precisely through combining styles and approaches in that way that you bring about something new." In a similar project, the 1987 book Fax of Life, he asked various friends and colleagues to share, by fax, the experiences they were having at the moment.

Human work

Kisman was one of the first designers in the Netherlands who understood how to work with computers. "My main role model was Jaap Drupsteen, graphic designer for the VPRO (television station) in the 1970s," he says. "He was the first person to develop a characteristic graphic visual language for television. My dream was to succeed him." In the 1990s, Kisman got the opportunity to do so, and for six years he supplied the station’s graphic design (animations, station IDs and announcements), for which he received various awards. His work there garnered him an invitation to join the Wired Television company in San Francisco as art director.

After the dot-com crash in 2001 put an end to his career in the States, Kisman went back to work as an independent designer and returned, somewhat reluctantly, to creating fonts. "Fonts are only interesting to me if they’re part of a larger whole," he says. "Together with image, distinctive letters can express a specific identity. That’s why I’m designing them again. People don’t do that often enough, maybe because they’ve lost the feeling for it."

What he’s saying is that young people should not become obsessed by computers. "Of course, they offer unprecedented possibilities," he says, "but, with them as with anything, the wealth of choices can be paralysing. You must always take account of your own limitations, and not allow yourself to be led by machines. I still make my films in the same way as I did back when I was doing cell animation. As technologically advanced as our society is, art is human work, and it always will be. And globalisation can’t change that."