My Takeaway from the Film
Before watching this film I never truly understood the impact that something as small as type-font could have on the world. Watching this documentary really opened my eyes to how often Helvetica is used in our society. I also grew to appreciate the design of Helvetica. Looking back on what used to be used just seems a little more annoying and difficult. While some other fonts may add some “flavor” to the text, Helvetica is straight forward and gets the job done. Which I like.
Wim Crouwel
“The meaning is in the context of the text and not in the typeface, and that is why we loved Helvetica very much“
As I stated in my introduction, a large reason as to why I came to appreciate Helvetica so much throughout this film is because of the simplicity and uniformity. I feel personally as though while sometimes typeface can add some spark to the text, most of the time you don’t want people distracted from the message trying to be communicated. Rather than having people focus on the design, they are almost selfless and would rather people not focus on the design.
Paula Scher
“Helvetica is the font of the Vietnam War”
Rather than particularly agreeing or liking this quote, it somewhat confused me. Helvetica is a text that is used in such a large scale I feel like it is hard to pin the typeface for supporting one individual thing. The typeface is used on so many things that it could practically be claimed as supportive to most things. If a typeface is used on a company, does that lead everyone to believe Helvetica for example supports Toyota?
Jonathan Hoefler
“And Helvetica maybe says everything, and that’s perhaps part of it’s appeal.”
This quote sort of goes along with the first one I used in this post. The largest thing about Helvetica that is appealing to the masses is the fact of how versatile it is. This typeface is used on everything from logos to advertisements and street signs. It doesn’t have much personality to it other than it’s “modernism”. And the Modernism is what keeps it that way as well.
