Merz to Emigre and Beyond ― Avant-Garde Magazine Design of the Twentieth Century

Merz to Emigre and Beyond is an historical survey of avant-garde cultural, art and political magazines and journals from the early twentieth century to the present day. It examines the publications that were at the forefront of graphic design throughout the twentieth century and which challenged typographic convention, providing a platform for the dissemination of the ideas of the most radical art, design and political movements of the last hundred years.
The book features a unique selection of international publications from Europe and the USA - including Merz (1920s), La Revolution Surrealiste (1920s), View (1940s), The East Village Other (1960s), Punk (1970s) and Emigre (1990s). The design of these magazines, often raucous and undisciplined, was once as ground-breaking as the ideas they disseminated. Many were linked with controversial art, literary and political movements such as Dada, Surrealism, Futurism, the Bauhaus, the New Left and Postmodernism. Merz to Emigre and Beyond surveys the typography and layout that distinguished these journals from the mainstream, and also places the avant-garde notions these magazines represented in their broader artistic, cultural and political contexts.

Steven Heller is Art Director of The New York Times Book Review and co-chair of the MFA/Design Program of the School of Visual Arts.