Stylogeny combining ACT UP × Corporate Identity Modernism

Try

Style combination · Contrasts

ACT UP × Corporate Identity Modernism

Stands here for the logo logic of SILENCE=DEATH, one emblem and clean sans capitals repeated like a corporate mark; the advertising Gran Fury and ACT UP otherwise copied was 1980s brand campaigns and mastheads (Benetton, Nike, Coca-Cola, The New York Times) rather than mid-century corporate identity. Set an AIDS-era slogan in a corporate format when the point is to turn a brand's own voice against it.

From the research on ACT UP & Gran Fury AIDS Activist Graphics

Mix them and make something ACT UP Corporate Identity Modernism

NOTICEACT UP × Corporate Identity1987 · 1955
A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Corporate Identity Modernism, their arrangement from Corporate Identity Modernism, the finish from ACT UP. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

01

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

ACT UP & Gran Fury AIDS Activist Graphics Corporate Identity Modernism

Type from ACT UP
Colour from Corporate Identity Modernism
Form from Corporate Identity Modernism
Composition from Corporate Identity Modernism
Surface from ACT UP

Corporate Identity Modernism avoids photocopy & distress: this is where the two pull against each other, which is the point of the contrast.

02

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · ACT UP

Notice

Anton; ACT UP used Gill Sans Bold Extra Condensed in white capitals reversed out of black for SILENCE=DEATH (1987), settled on after months in which the collective 'argued about issues, images and fonts' and Futura Extra Bold, Extra Bold Oblique and Extra Bold Condensed in black or white

Text · Corporate Identity Modernism

Modernist reduction applied to corporate communication. A company's whole public face (trademark, logotype, stationery, packaging, vehicles and signage) was unified by an abstract symbol, a single typeface and one colour, all policed by a graphic standards manual. Pioneered by Paul Rand, Chermayeff & Geismar, Unimark and Lippincott & Margulies, it made the reductive mark and the grid the visual language of multinational business and government.

Inter; Corporate Identity Modernism used Helvetica and Univers

03

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Corporate Identity Modernism, with a counter-accent from ACT UP. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

ACT UP & Gran Fury AIDS Activist Graphics Corporate Identity Modernism

  • #ffffff ground · 36%
  • #111111 ink · 14%
  • #d7261e accent · 18%
  • #0a4fa0 accent · 14%
  • #f06ea9 accent · 10%
  • #a4a9ad accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #ffffff;
  --ink: #111111;
  --accent-1: #d7261e;
  --accent-2: #0a4fa0;
  --accent-3: #f06ea9;
  --accent-4: #a4a9ad;
  --font-display: "Anton", sans-serif;
  --font-text: "Inter", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

ACT UP & Gran Fury AIDS Activist Graphics: These are the graphics of a movement of gay men, lesbians and people with AIDS who were burying their friends, and many of their makers and subjects are living or died of AIDS (Mark Simpson, who appears in Kissing Doesn't Kill, died in 1996; Oliver Johnston in 1990); HIV remains a global health issue and ACT UP is still active. The pink triangle recalls the homosexual prisoners of the Nazi camps and was turned to point up as 'a disavowal of victimhood' (in Finkelstein's account; the Henry Ford's history says the inversion began as a mistake that the collective kept): do not use it, the SILENCE=DEATH equation or the kissing couples as decoration, Pride merchandise or brand campaigns, since the style was made to turn advertising against corporate greed, and do not picture people with HIV as victims or as a threat. SILENCE=DEATH is © 1987 The Silence = Death Project, which lent it to ACT UP (the poster reads 'Used by permission by ACT-UP'); Gran Fury's website declares its own artwork public domain, but the photographed people and quoted brands are not: write your own slogan and stage your own photograph, and never present a generated image as a period work.

04

The two styles

A black-and-white close-up shows a hand holding a bottle labeled HIV medication with a price of $2,800 per month. Below it, an oversized black headline on a bright pink band reads “PROFITS KILL,” followed by statistics and demands for lower drug prices. 1987–1995 · North America ACT UP & Gran Fury AIDS Activist Graphics The graphics of New York's AIDS activist movement: the SILENCE=DEATH poster of 1987, a pink triangle above white capitals on black, and the posters, stickers, T-shirts, billboards and bus ads of Gran Fury (1988–1995), ACT UP's 'unofficial propaganda ministry'. Professional offset print and the language of Madison Avenue (staged photographs, one-line slogans, facts in small print) were placed where advertising goes, to accuse government, church, press and drug companies of letting people with AIDS die. A blue circle sits above two mirrored red tapered shapes separated by a widening white gap. Large, bold black lettering reading “Apex” appears underneath on a white background. 1955–1990 · North America, Western Europe, Global / networked Corporate Identity Modernism Modernist reduction applied to corporate communication. A company's whole public face (trademark, logotype, stationery, packaging, vehicles and signage) was unified by an abstract symbol, a single typeface and one colour, all policed by a graphic standards manual. Pioneered by Paul Rand, Chermayeff & Geismar, Unimark and Lippincott & Margulies, it made the reductive mark and the grid the visual language of multinational business and government.

05

More combinations

With ACT UP

All 14 combinations with ACT UP

With Corporate Identity Modernism

All 28 combinations with Corporate Identity Modernism

Every style combination