Karel Martens: Printed Matter / Drukwerk (3rd reprint)
Posted in Editions, graphic design, history, Motto Berlin store, printmaking, typography, writing on December 19th, 2010Tags: Hyphen Press, Karel Martens
Printed Matter / Drukwerk, Karel Martens with Jaap van Triest and Robin Kinross
Revised and extended, third edition, 50 years of work.
Published by Hyphen Press
The work of Karel Martens occupies an intriguing place in the present European art-and-design landscape. Martens can be placed in the tradition of Dutch modernism – in the line of figures such as Piet Zwart, H.N. Werkman, Willem Sandberg. Yet he maintains some distance from the main developments of our time: from both the practices of routinized modernism and of the facile reactions against this. His work is both personal and experimental. At the same time, it is publicly answerable. Over the now 50 years of his practice, Martens has been prolific as a designer of books. He has also made contributions in a wide range of design commissions, including stamps, coins, signs on buildings. Intimately connected with this design work has been his practice as an artist. This started with geometric and kinetic constructions, and was later developed in work with the very material of paper; more recently he has been making relief prints from found industrial artefacts. This book looks for new ways to show and discuss the work of a designer and artist, and is offered in the same spirit of experiment and dialogue that characterizes the work it presents.
Out Of Print
