Even though the newsletters are sent to nearly 750,000 email addresses, it is the book format that brings the weight the interviews deserve – if only for the fact that computer monitors do not yet allow one to truly inspect the details of a text face.

A brief foreword by Jan Middendorp is followed by 180 pages filled with 26 richly-illustrated interviews featuring typeface samples as well as reproductions of sources of inspiration and examples of completed works. Questions mainly revolve around the subject of typeface design, but sometimes meander into more personal matters. As a result, the book offers a remarkable window into the souls of the typographers. The reader can see how their common passion for letters is expressed and how the designers differ in their specific approaches to font design. In Volume I – indicating that there will be further volumes – David Berlow, Jean François Porchez, Veronika Burian & José Scaglione, Jos Buivenga, Alejandro Paul, Mark Simonson, Dino dos Santos, Christian Schwartz, František Štorm, Tomáš Brousil and the fellows from Underware all speak about their fonts.

After the book was delivered and I unwrapped it, I was surprised by how large it was; subconsciously and based on the images posted online, I had expected the book would be smaller. The book format does offer plenty of space for illustrations, but in any case don’t think that this is a book you would be able to read during your morning commute. At first I was taken with the elegant cover decorated with scores of different variations on the ampersand printed in partial gloss on a black background. But I literally reacted with a start as soon as I opened the book. Heavy and full, the pages seem like promotional fliers. It seemed as though every graphic design element was oversized, and the Auto text face at that font size did not encourage me to read at all. I can’t help but feel that the artistic design that was used, which stands in direct opposition to Jan Middendorp’s highly readable text, harms this otherwise excellent book.

Jan Middendorp: Creative Characters. Design: Nick Sherman. Dimensions: 21.5 × 28 cm, 192 full-colour pages, printed flexible covers, ISBN: 978–90-6369–224-7.

Posters of the Velvet Revolution marks the 20th anniversary of the events that led to the fall of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia. The posters and flyers that hung on nearly every street corner and important place in Czech cities created an indelible backdrop for those revolutionary days. Most of them were hand-drawn or painted, but nevertheless, only a few days after 17 November, a number of the posters printed under semi-legal circumstances were produced in large editions using offset or screenprint technology. Some were made by anonymous creators, but others were by experienced artists, including Aleš Najbrt, Michal Cihlář, Pavel Šťastný, Rostislav Vaněk, Ivan Král and František Skála.

Context is added by enlightening essays by design theoretician Iva Knobloch and historian Jiří Suk. The atmosphere of November and December 1989 is recalled in pictures by leading Czech photographers Tomki Němec, Karel Cudlín, Miloš Fikejz and Pavel Štecha, which capture the transformation of grey Czech cities into brightly coloured areas for postering.

The book was put together by graphic designer Filip Blažek, who personally collected the posters at the end of 1989; as a student, he helped out at Prague’s Mánes art gallery, which overnight became one of several informal centers of opposition to the totalitarian regime.

Filip Blažek presented his poster collection during the ATypI conference in Mexico. The book was officially announced by Michael Kocáb, Minister of the Government of the Czech Republic for Human Rights at Straka Academy, the seat of Czech PM.

Published by Prague’s XYZ Publishing House. Price incl. postage fees: €19.90. You can order the book directly at Typo.cz website.