In that small space he proved the mastery of minimalism communication clearly achieved without the use of a period or a comma. All the elements on the card were restricted to the purest of necessary elements. All content was in a singular sans serif face, all lowercase, and no punctuation to speak of other than the umlaut and hyphen in his distinguished name.
It was on light gray paper stock printed with a solitary color of cool gray ink. He was taken aback as we scurried around to take a peak at the card revealed novice typographers eager to see his miniature piece of art.
As JMB casually pulled the business card out of his coat pocket, there was a frenzy like fish at a pond when the morsels are tossed in. Reduction of content can make all the difference in the outcome of a design.Ī student from the back of the room shouted out a wish to see JMB’s business card. As he came around to my desk to view the layout I was working on, his soft-natured brief critique was all I needed to remind me to be persistent in the refinement process.
My class happened to be working on grid systems at the time. Despite that, once I was in his calm, yet playful, presence, the impact of his stopover became clearly apparent. I was foolishly unaware of the relevant living ones. Up to that point, my focus in studying the history of design was restricted to the past generation of typographers and designers. Prior to JMB’s arrival, I was naive about the significance of his visit. Because of Müller-Brockmann’s interest in design education, he accepted the invitation. The program director for the design department at ASU at the time was the famous Rob Roy Kelly, known for putting together successful design programs, many of which became blueprints for other design schools. With great fortune, a professor of mine had heard that Müller-Brockmann was going to be in the country and asked him to add a stop in Tempe, Arizona. I was a young, wide-eyed student of 21 years studying at Arizona State University. In February of 1989, I had the pleasure of meeting Josef Müller-Brockmann.
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