History Of Graphic Design (Timeline)

PART 1: 15,000 BC to 1900

~The first known visual communication, with pictographs and symbols in the                            Lascaux caves in southern France.

~ The Blau Monument, the oldest artifact known to combine words and pictures.

~ Chinese government official Ts’ai Lun credited with inventing paper. 

Pi Sheng invents movable type, allowing for characters to be individually placed for printing.

~ Printing arrives in Europe with a paper mill in Fabriano, Italy. Johann Gensfleisch zum Gutenburg credited with perfecting the system for printing type in books.

~ Albrecht Pfister the first to add illustrations to a printed book.

~ Nicolas Jenson, considered one of history’s greatest typeface designers, sets news standard for Roman type.

~ Claude Garamond opens first type foundry, developing and selling fonts to printers. First Caslon Old Style font developed, later used for the printing of the Declaration of Independence.

~ Industrial Revolution begins, setting the stage for advances in graphic design production. Author Aloys Senefelder develops lithography.

~ Lord Stanhope invents first printing press made of all cast-iron parts, requiring 1/10 the manual labor and doubling the possible paper size. First sans-serif font makes a subtle entrance as one line of a book.

~ Godefroy Engelmann is largely credited with bringing lithography to France, and later, commercializing Chromolithography. In 1837 he was granted an English patent for a process of chromolithography that provided consistently high quality results.

~ Williams Morris, who became a highly influential figure in design history, sets up art-decorating firm. Development of halftone screen allows for first photo printed with a full range of tones.

~ Art Nouveau movement begins and changes design, making its way into all types of commercial design and utilizing all types of arts.

PART 2: 1900-1990

~ James Montgomery Flagg designs famous “I Want YOU for the U.S. Army” poster. The poster, a self-portrait, was actually an American version of a British poster by Alfred Leete.

~ The Bauhaus, a German school, is founded, eventually providing the framework for modern design.

~ Stanley Morison oversees design of Times New Roman font, commissioned by the Times of London. First issue of Print Magazine printed. Paul Rand designs IBM logo using City Medium typeface.

~ Max Miedinger designs Neue Haas Grotesk font, later renamed Helvetica. First issue of Communication Arts printed.

~ Douglas Engelbart develops first computer mouse, setting the stage for the future tool of graphic design. Apple releases first Macintosh computer, featuring bitmap graphics.

~ Aldus, formed by Paul Brainerd, develops PageMaker software. Brainerd coins the phrase “desktop publishing.” In the same year, New York firm Manhattan Design creates the MTV logo.

~ Photoshop version one released, and physicist Tim Berners-Lee develops the world wide web, along with HTML and the concept of website addresses.

Source: Philip B. Meggs, Alston W. Purvis. “Meggs’ History of Graphic Design.” Fourth Edition. John Wiley and Sons, Inc. 2006.