A Dream World Made by Machines

In 1967, the American novelist and poet Richard Brautigan published a poem titled “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace.” This is also the perfectly chosen title of a three-part documentary by Adam Curtis — a true maverick of the airwaves — that started screening this week in the UK. This complex, demanding, uncompromising and visually audacious piece of television has generated a tremendous buzz.

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Unearthly Powers: Surrealism and SF

Richard Powers was a book cover auteur who found opportunities — an astonishing quantity of opportunities — to express his vision for financial reward on the handy, ubiquitous tablets that paperback publishers duly provided. He is a vital link between science fiction and Surrealism and any future study needs to take him into account.

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Books Every Graphic Designer Should Read

I have contributed a list of 20 books every graphic designer should read to the Designers & Books website, which is rapidly growing into a wonderful resource. The Dictionary of Visual Language, first published in 1980, is one of the titles. This durable classic shows that effectively redeemed clichés are the crux of graphic communication.

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Paul Stiff, the Reader's Champion

This week I was reminded again of the British design educator, writer and editor Paul Stiff, who died in February, by the arrival of a collection of design essays that has just been published in Poland. It contains an article titled “Stop Sitting Around and Start Reading,” a rigorously argued riposte to the claims made about reading in the 1990s by experimental typographers.

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Rick Poynor is a writer, critic, lecturer and curator, specialising in design, media and visual culture. He founded Eye, co-founded Design Observer, and contributes columns to Eye and Print. His latest book is Uncanny: Surrealism and Graphic Design.

Recent Book

Uncanny: Surrealism and Graphic Design
Rick Poynor
Moravian Gallery, 2010
More books by Rick Poynor >>

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