Information Graphics: Innovative Solutions in Contemporary Design
Peter Wildbur and Michael Burke
Thames & Hudson
London
1999
176 pp.
ISBN 0 500 28077 0
£17.95
Keywords Graphic design, Media,New technology, Virtual reality
We know that the tail must wag the dog, for the horse is drawn by the cart;But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old: “It’s clever, but is it art?”
Well, it is a recent title in the prestigious World of Art series, so it must be. Plenty of usually inflated claims are made on behalf of video, computer screens and the range of modern media, and it is useful now to have a well illustrated concise, contextual, informed discussion, all in the standard World of Art format. An introduction gives the background, including film and avant‐garde cinema, and twentieth century movements and influential figures. Then four chapters deal with: media and performance; video art; video installation art; and digital art. There is a select bibliography, but this is still a pioneering work. All is not made clear: there are no critical or generally accepted shortcuts to understanding new concepts associated with such radical new media, or with new ideas about time and duration in narrative art, or virtual reality. But ideas, and approaches to art in or by the new media, are conveniently presented and discussed in a credible context.
Ours may be historically the profession of custodians of the word, but we have always been conscious of (sometimes in the past but in modern times increasingly frequently) graphic images as information, from Sumerian monumental sculpture, through graphic history (or propaganda) in Trajan’s Column and the Bayeux Tapestry, to images and maps on computer screens. Wildbur and Burke’s book is, as it must be, selective both of categories and examples. The subject matter is almost infinite. The topics discussed here are: sign systems and route maps for travellers; diagrams and graphics for scientific or technological purposes; aircraft cockpit design and digital control panels; interactive computer screens; 3‐D interfaces (including a double‐page spread on pop‐up books); and new forms of mapping. Selective they must be, but the book is worth acquiring for its full colour illustrations alone. Add an informed and informative discussion and we have a useful manual or sourcebook illuminating new visual areas both of the world around us and more specifically of our modern information profession.
