Source: collection.cooperhewitt.orgCooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, Gift of Ken Friedman. License: All Rights Reserved.
Poster, Cranbrook Graduate Program in Design, 1989; Designed by Katherine McCoy (American, b. 1945); offset lithograph on heavy perforated card stock; 71.1 x 55.7 cm (28 x 21 15/16 in. ); Gift of Ken Friedman; 1997-19-287
The design of Katherine McCoy’s iconic poster reflects the influence of French post-structuralist theory — authors such as Jacques Derrida, Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault et al. — on the course at that time. Linguistics and semiology clearly inspired the “see/read/image/text” matrix which frames the montage of pictures at the heart of the composition. The typography displays an unlikely mix of Futura Medium and ITC Franklin Gothic Heavy.