The Black Aesthetic by Addison Gayle Jr.
A striking sideways arrangement for the title of The Black Aesthetic. Each word appears in a different colour of the red-gold-green Pan-African colours (here rendered as red–yellow–green). The lettering appears to be grunged up typewriter material, made by photographic enlargement I assume. That makes the underlying font the font of whatever typewriter was used. The distortion and the lack of comprehensive exemplars from that time period (and my lack of skill) make exact ID tricky, but I am going to plump for IBM Elite. The small apertures on a, c, s match well, and the NW quadrant of t’s crossing lacks a fillet. “Edited by Addison Gayle, Jr.” is in Helvetica.
From Wikipedia:
In The Black Aesthetic (1971), Addison Gayle argues that Black artists should work exclusively on uplifting their identity while refusing to appease white folks.
The term “Black Aesthetic” was coined by Larry Neal in his 1968 essay “The Black Arts Movement” which is reprinted as one of the essays in this collection.
Also check out the fabulous poster for a 1969 lecture series “Anatomy of the Black Aesthetic: An Examination” over on the People’s Graphic Design Archive.
2 Comments on “The Black Aesthetic by Addison Gayle Jr.”
The designer here is Fred Troller. I spotted the credit on the back cover of the book.
Very nice! Added, thank you.