Shouting at the wall
Just a few months ago, the publication Crits a la paret i poemes visuals. Josep Pla-Narbona. Cartells 1947-2004, coordinated by the recently departed Professor Anna Calvera, was presented at the Barcelona Design Museum. In the files in my study, I still have the preparatory dossier in Catalan for this book, with a different working title...
Pla-Narbona’s ADG
The Graphic Artist Group FAD published its professional intentions on 6 December 1961. “They were honestly and painstakingly dedicated to all professional undertakings and everything related, either directly or indirectly, to culture, aesthetics and graphic teaching”. This paragraph, signed by Pla-Narbona, the first president of the Group (see previous blog entries), appears at the start...
Pla-Narbona: Letters as partitions
“A chronicle and works by the draughtsman, engraver and sculptor Pla-Narbona” – with no reference to design – is the title of a publication that runs through Pla-Narbona’s career until 1974. As the same long title ran on it elaborated: “works from his beginnings to the present day, compiled, ordered, described and interpreted by Francesc...
Kaleidoscope 4 Graphics
In 1965, Blume editions published a unique volume – a catalogue of an exhibition – bringing together the work of four “outstanding personalities of Spanish advertising graphic-art” of that time: Gervasio Gallardo, Ricard Giralt Miracle, Joan Pedragosa and Josep Pla-Narbona. With a foreword by Joan Teixidor, cover design and illustration by Pla-Narbona, and printing done...
Pla-Narbona’s Cosmo(s)
Pla-Narbona was “entrusted with the responsibility of creating the visual personality” of the Spanish company Industrias Cosmo, as can be read in his magnificent and original Manual of Corporate Identity edited in 1969. This manual in its first part consisted of texts written by Will Burtin, Daniel Giralt-Miracle and the very Pla-Narbona, titled “Reflections on...