Ahoy / Sports & Exhibit Complex | Benno Wissing & Hartmut Kowalke / Total Design, 1969
(image courtesy of NAGO)
Holland Festival | Magazine Cover | Benno Wissing, Jack Jacobs, 1985
(image courtesy of NAGO)
G. Braque / Museum Boymans Van Beuningen | Catalogue Cover | Benno Wissing, 1956
(image courtesy of NAGO)
Gabo / Museum Boymans Van Beuningen | Catalogue Cover | Benno Wissing, 1958
(image courtesy of NAGO)
4 gaten in de grond | Brochure | Benno Wissing, 1962
(image courtesy of NAGO)
Gard Sivik 21 / Flemish & Dutch Avant-Garde Magazine | Benno Wissing, 1960
(image courtesy of NAGO)
Thyssen-Bornemisza Group: Jaarverslagen 1971 | Annual Report
Benno Wissing & Hartmut Kowalke / Total Design, 1971-75
(image courtesy of NAGO)
[ All work ©Benno Wissing ]
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Benno Wissing (1923–2008) was a Dutch painter, graphic designer, architect, industrial designer and one of the founders of Total Design in 1963. He advocated for the integration of these respective fields as a member of Liga Nieuw Beelden (League of the New Image).
When traveling through Eastern Europe, Wissing had become aware of modernist ideals, ‘I visited Yugoslavia. That made a tremendous impression on me… The confrontation with the basic necessities of life was so terribly direct, that I soon understood there were more elementary things than the whole elementarism of functionalists in Holland after the war.’
–Dutch Type / Ontwerp: Total Design
Wissing remained at Total Design until the early 1970s. He was responsible for a number of remarkable designs for PAM, HV, Holland Festival, Makro, Museum Boijmans van Beuningen and Airworld (the signage system still used at Schiphol Airport today). In 1980 Wissing accepted an invitation to become professor of design at the Rhode School of Design (RISD) in the United States.
Thanks to Antonio Carusone at the formidable AisleOne I learned of the extensive amount of Wissing’s work in the archives of the Dutch Graphic Designers Archive Foundation, NAGO.
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