# Munich 1972 Olympic Design (Otl Aicher)

> The visual programme Otl Aicher's department made for the 1972 Munich Olympics, the 'cheerful Games' meant to show a democratic, modest West Germany. One grid and one typeface, Univers, governed tickets, programmes, uniforms, signs and posters. The colours were the blues, greens, silver and oranges of the Bavarian landscape, with red, black and gold kept out. Sports pictograms drawn on a 45-degree grid and posters made from photographs reduced to flat bands of the official colours became a model for event and wayfinding design.

- Period: 1966–1972
- Where: Central Europe
- Origin: Munich: the visual design department (Dept. XI, catalogued by the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich as 'Abteilung XI für visuelle Gestaltung', 1967–1972) of the Organising Committee for the Games of the XXth Olympiad, under Otl Aicher, who was asked in 1966 to lead the design and was its design commissioner (Gestaltungsbeauftragter) from 1967 to 1972; the brief was a design to go with Günther Behnisch's stadium and Olympic Park, and Aicher consulted Masaru Katsumie, who had been artistic director of the design of Tokyo 1964. Mark Holt's research names at least 82 members of the team, among them Gerhard Joksch (sports posters and pictograms), Coordt von Mannstein (final form of the emblem) and Elena Winschermann (Waldi)
- Branch: Rational modernism
- Also known as: Munich '72 identity, Design of 'Die heiteren Spiele' (the cheerful Games), Aicher's Olympic pictograms, Dept. XI (Abteilung XI für visuelle Gestaltung)
- Page: https://stylogeny.com/styles/munich-72/

## Use it with care

The Olympic rings are a protected IOC mark and the Munich posters, emblem and pictograms are the work of named designers: borrow the method (one grid, a light landscape palette, grid-drawn figures), not the artefacts. The 'cheerful Games' are also bound up with the Munich massacre of 5–6 September 1972, when Black September gunmen killed 11 members of the Israeli team; use the identity's optimism knowingly.

## How it works

- Govern everything the public touches, from tickets and parking tickets to uniforms, programmes and stadium signs, with one grid, one typeface and one colour code, written into a manual a large team can apply.
- Take a fixed spectrum of seven colours from the Bavarian landscape (blue, green, silver, orange, violet blue, dark green and light orange, on white), mostly blues and greens, and keep out red, black and gold, the colours of nationalism, militarism and the Berlin Games of 1936.
- Give each operational area its own colour of the palette and dress its staff to match, so colour tells visitors where they are and whom to ask.
- Draw every sport and service as a pictogram on one grid: a round head set apart from the body, limbs as straight bars at 0, 45 and 90 degrees, white on a square field of one colour.
- Make posters from sports photographs reduced in the photo lab to a few flat, high-contrast tonal areas, retouched on the film and printed (screenprinted or offset) not in natural hues but in the official colours, each sport dominated by one colour, and sign them all with the same line: München, the rings and 1972 in Univers between hairline rules, the emblem below the rings.
- Keep the voice civilian and cheerful rather than monumental: no eagles, heroes or military imagery; let a striped toy dachshund be the mascot.

## Its design choices

Defining choices make the style, characteristic ones are usual, occasional ones turn up now and then.

### Layout & composition
- [Modular grid](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/modular-grid/) (defining)
- [Column grid](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/column-grid/) (characteristic)
- [Dynamic asymmetry](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/dynamic-asymmetry/) (characteristic)
- [Full bleed](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/full-bleed/) (characteristic)
- [Diagonal axis](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/diagonal-axis/) (occasional)
- [Isolated object](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/isolated-object/) (occasional)

### Space & hierarchy
- [Repetition & rhythm](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/repetition-and-rhythm/) (characteristic)
- [Single focal point](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/single-focal-point/) (characteristic)
- [Layered information](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/layered-information/) (characteristic)
- [Generous white space](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/generous-white-space/) (occasional)

### Typography
- [Grotesque & neo-grotesque](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/grotesque-and-neo-grotesque/) (defining)
- [Flush left, ragged right](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/flush-left-ragged-right/) (characteristic)

### Colour
- [Analogous harmony](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/analogous-harmony/) (defining)
- [Flat fields](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/flat-fields/) (defining)
- [Pastel](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pastel/) (characteristic)
- [Light ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/light-ground/) (characteristic)
- [Limited spot colours](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/limited-spot-colours/) (occasional)

### Form & shape
- [Pictogram](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pictogram/) (defining)
- [Stylised figuration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/stylised-figuration/) (characteristic)
- [Rectilinear](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/rectilinear/) (characteristic)
- [Geometric primitives](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/geometric-primitives/) (characteristic)
- [Rounded & pill](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/rounded-and-pill/) (occasional)

### Surface & texture
- [Flat](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/flat/) (defining)
- [Halftone & Ben-Day dots](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/halftone-and-ben-day-dots/) (occasional)

### Ornament
- [Ornament-free](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/ornament-free/) (characteristic)
- [Emblems & badges](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/emblems-and-badges/) (characteristic)
- [Rules & bars](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/rules-and-bars/) (occasional)
- [Cosmic & celestial](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/cosmic-and-celestial/) (occasional)

### Imagery
- [Icons & pictograms](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/icons-and-pictograms/) (defining)
- [Treated photography](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/treated-photography/) (defining)
- [Diagram & data](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/diagram-and-data/) (occasional)

### Medium & production
- [Offset printing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/offset-printing/) (defining)
- [Architecture & signage](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/architecture-and-signage/) (defining)
- [Screen printing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/screen-printing/) (characteristic)
- [Textile & craft](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/textile-and-craft/) (occasional)

### Tone & intent
- [Rational & objective](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/rational-and-objective/) (defining)
- [Warm & approachable](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/warm-and-approachable/) (characteristic)
- [Playful & witty](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/playful-and-witty/) (characteristic)
- [Utopian & idealistic](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/utopian-and-idealistic/) (characteristic)
- [Calm & contemplative](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/calm-and-contemplative/) (occasional)

Avoids: Primary triad, Complementary clash, Ornamented display, Eclectic mixing, Optical pattern, Abundant decoration, Agitational & persuasive

Palette: #8a96c4, #7fc6dc, #9ccf7c, #49aa76, #b8bdc1, #f29a2e

Typefaces: Univers (Adrian Frutiger, 1957), the only typeface of the Games' official communications, with Univers 55 as the house weight, The signature line of the posters: 'München', the Olympic rings and '1972' in mixed-case Univers, divided by hairline rules, with the emblem hung below the rings; at the head of the official Olympic Park poster, at the foot of the sports posters, on a plain field below the image, The sports and service pictograms of Aicher and Joksch, used as a picture alphabet beside the type

Known for: Official poster of the Olympic Park, 'München 1972 26.8.–10.9.', Otl Aicher (with Gerhard Joksch, per the Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum), 1969–70 (V&A; the Qatar copy is dated 1972), colour offset lithograph (V&A), printed by Mandruck (Qatar): Behnisch and Frei Otto's tent roofs and the television tower dissolved into lilac, light blue, white and green with a visible dot screen, the München, rings and 1972 line set in Univers between hairline rules at the head (colours and layout as seen in the Qatar image; V&A E.876-1970; Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum QOSM.2013.6.205); Sports posters 'München 1972', 21 in all, designed in 1970–71 (the prints are dated 1970–72) by Gerhard Joksch with Nanke Claassen, Sepp Klement, György Nagy, Gabriele Pée and Henri Wirthner under the direction of Otl Aicher, from photographs by Erich Baumann, Max Mühlberger and others, their tones reduced to flat, high-contrast areas and printed in the official colours (screenprinted in Poster House's set; the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich catalogues most of its copies as offset): e.g. track and field (hurdlers on green, photograph Albrecht Gaebele), fencing (on blue, Gaebele), basketball (on orange, Mühlberger), weightlifting (on green, Rolf Feser), swimming (orange swimmers on violet blue, Herbert Graaf, Zürich 24-1038), each signed at the foot with the München, rings and 1972 line (Poster House, Munich 1972: Sports Posters of the XXth Olympic Games, 2024–25, curated by Michael Bierut); Sports pictograms by Otl Aicher and Gerhard Joksch, figures drawn along vertical, horizontal and 45-degree lines; still on display in white on green panels at the Olympic Park; Pictogram poster, 'Munich Olympics, 1972', Otl Aicher, 1972, offset lithograph, 169 black and white squares on a silver-grey ground (Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, 1997-19-167); The 'Strahlenkranz' (radiant garland) emblem, a sun of rays with a superimposed spiral: after 2,332 public entries failed to satisfy the committee, a jury chose the version by Coordt von Mannstein (co-founder of Graphicteam, Cologne), who had reworked an original design by Aicher through a mathematical calculation; Waldi, the first official Olympic mascot, a dachshund striped in light blue, lilac, yellow, lime green and orange (V&A B.149-2009, which credits Aicher; Holt's research credits Elena Winschermann); Poster 'Olympisches Dorf', 1972, concept Otl Aicher, design Abteilung XI, offset printed by Klein & Volbert: an axonometric line drawing of the Olympic Village in black on white with a scale bar, titled in light blue at the top right (Museum für Gestaltung Zürich, 40-0383); the information posters also include a 'Time Schedule of the Games', credited to Aicher (Poster House)

## Where it comes from, and what it’s close to

- Grew out of: [HfG Ulm Systematic Design](https://stylogeny.com/styles/ulm-school.md) (1953–1968)
- Influenced by: [Japanese Postwar Modernism](https://stylogeny.com/styles/japanese-postwar-modern.md) (1950–1990)
- Influenced by: [International Typographic Style](https://stylogeny.com/styles/swiss-international.md) (1950–1975)
- Alike in its design choices: [British Road Signage (Kinneir & Calvert)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/british-road-signage.md) (1958–present), 71% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Corporate Identity Modernism](https://stylogeny.com/styles/corporate-modernism.md) (1955–1990), 69% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Material Design](https://stylogeny.com/styles/material-design.md) (2014–present), 67% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Total Design & Dutch Functionalism](https://stylogeny.com/styles/dutch-total-design.md) (1963–1990), 64% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Isotype Pictorial Statistics](https://stylogeny.com/styles/isotype.md) (1925–1971), 63% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Flat Design](https://stylogeny.com/styles/flat-design.md) (2010–2016), 62% alike

## Sources

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otl_Aicher (asked in 1966 to lead the design, to go with Behnisch's stadium; consulted Masaru Katsumie; palette of the Alps: blue and white with green, orange and silver; a colour per operational area with matching uniforms; Univers; pictograms on grid systems, partly based on Tokyo 1964; 21 sports posters manually posterised in the official colours, the stadium poster as official poster; von Mannstein 'reworked Aicher's original design through a mathematical calculation'; Waldi; influence on the 1974 US DOT pictograms)
- https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otl_Aicher ('Von 1967 bis 1972 war Aicher Gestaltungsbeauftragter der Olympischen Spiele von München'; uniforms, programmes, posters and parking tickets; Univers)
- https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympische_Sommerspiele_1972 (Univers 55 as house typeface; 'im Farbschema wurde auf die Farben Schwarz und Rot verzichtet, da dies die Farben der Diktatur 1936 waren'; 2,332 public emblem entries that failed to satisfy the committee, and a jury's choice of Coordt von Mannstein's design 'mit Strahlenkranz und überlagerter Spirale'; Waldi proposed by Willi Daume and given form by Aicher)
- https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coordt_von_Mannstein ('Von Mannstein war 1965 Mitbegründer und geschäftsführender Gesellschafter der Design-Agentur Graphicteam in Köln'; designer of the official emblem of the Munich 1972 Games)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1972_Summer_Olympics (motto 'Die Heiteren Spiele' for a democratic, optimistic Germany; hostesses in sky-blue dirndls; Waldi the first officially named Olympic mascot)
- Mark Sinclair, 'Many players on the Olympic stage', review of Mark Holt (ed.), Munich '72: The Visual Output of Otl Aicher's Dept. XI, Eye 101 (Summer 2021), https://eyemagazine.com/review/article/many-players-on-the-olympic-stage (at least 82 team members; Gerhard Joksch's team made the sports posters; Elena Winschermann designed Waldi; blue as the colour of peace; nationalist and militarist imagery barred, so reds, blacks and golds excluded; aims of naturalness, modesty, spontaneity, joy, modernity and good service)
- Quentin Newark, 'This sporting myth', Eye blog, 5 August 2025, https://eyemagazine.com/blog/post/this-sporting-myth (pictograms by Otl Aicher and Gerhard Joksch on a grid of orthogonal and 45-degree components; Mark Holt's critique of the grid)
- Livia Gershon, 'This Graphic Artist's Olympic Pictograms Changed Urban Design Forever', Smithsonian Magazine, 23 July 2021, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/this-graphic-artists-olympic-pictograms-changed-urban-design-forever-180978256/ ('a palette of light, fresh shades of blue, green, silver, orange and yellow'; figures laid out along vertical and diagonal lines; 'Artistic director Masaru Katzumie and graphic designer Yoshiro Yamashita' made the Tokyo 1964 pictograms; influence on the US DOT symbols of 1974)
- Lily Gildor, 'Faster, Higher, Stronger', Cooper Hewitt, 29 December 2017, https://cooperhewitt.org/?p=27675 (pictogram poster, 1997-19-167: 169 black and white squares on silver-grey; rules and grids fix the proportions of the figures)
- Poster House, Munich 1972: Sports Posters of the XXth Olympic Games (14 November 2024–13 April 2025, curated by Michael Bierut), https://posterhouse.org/exhibition/munich-1972-sports-posters-of-the-xxth-olympic-games/ (programme made by a team over nearly six years; captions of the basketball, hurdles, fencing and weightlifting posters, crediting Aicher with the photographer)
- Poster House, exhibition booklet for Munich 1972: Sports Posters of the XXth Olympic Games, https://www.posterhouse.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/PH_Exh_Munich-Olympics_Archive.pdf (silkscreen posters designed 1970–71 by Gerhard Joksch with Nanke Claassen, Sepp Klement, György Nagy, Gabriele Pée and Henri Wirthner under Aicher's direction; photographs by Erich Baumann, Max Mühlberger, Albrecht Gaebele, Rolf Feser, Herbert Graaf and others, captioned 'Designer: Otl Aicher / Photographer: ...'; tones reduced with lab techniques to flat, high-contrast areas, films retouched; 'a palette of seven colors, no more, no less', 'blue, green, silver, orange, violet blue, dark green, and light orange', each from the Bavarian landscape; grids of 45- and 90-degree angles for icons, page layouts and Waldi's markings; the manual's 'cheerful, easy, dynamic, apolitical, not linked to pathos, free of ideology'; the 'vibrant, dizzying colors' of the posters; a 'Time Schedule of the Games' poster credited to Aicher)
- Victoria and Albert Museum, E.876-1970, https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O138170/ (Otl Aicher, poster for the Games, 1969–70, colour offset lithograph); B.149-2009, https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1153892/ (Waldi: 'striped body made of coloured bands of light blue, lilac, yellow, lime green and orange'; 'The pastel colours express the gaiety and joy of the Olympic Games')
- 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum, Munich 1972 Olympic Poster, QOSM.2013.6.205, https://collections.qm.org.qa/objects/munich-1972-olympic-poster-qosm20136205 (Otl Aicher and Gerhard Joksch, printed by Mandruck, dated 1972; 'based on a photograph, the colours of which were adjusted to correspond to the visual identity of the Games'; image viewed: mixed-case 'München', rings and '1972' between hairline rules at the head, emblem below the rings)
- Museum für Gestaltung Zürich, Plakatsammlung (eMuseum): 'München 1972' sports posters 24-1038 (swimming, photograph Herbert Graaf, Franzis-Druck), 40-0394 (soccer, D. Frinke, Franz Rehm Verlag), 64-1616 (Erich Baumann, Augsburger Druckhaus), 84-2880 (equestrian, Gerry Cranham) and 64-1538 (rowing, Fritz Fenzl, Fehling), all offset, design credited to Aicher and, on most records, Gerhard Joksch, with 'Organisationskomitee der XX. Olympischen Spiele München, Abteilung XI für visuelle Gestaltung, München, DE 1967 - 1972'; 'Olympisches Dorf - Olympiade München 1972', 40-0383 (concept Aicher, offset, Klein & Volbert); e.g. https://www.emuseum.ch/en/objects/238012/munchen-1972 and https://www.emuseum.ch/en/objects/230060/olympisches-dorf--olympiade-munchen-1972 (images viewed: the signature line in mixed-case Univers at the foot of each sports poster, one dominant colour field per poster; the village as a black axonometric line drawing on white)
- Fonts In Use, Organisationskomitee für die Spiele der XX. Olympiade: design manual, https://fontsinuse.com/uses/38873/organisationskomitee-fuer-die-spiele-der-xx-o (Univers as the only typeface of official communications, the first large German project to use it exclusively; after Otl Aicher, Richtlinien und Normen für die visuelle Gestaltung, facsimile Niggli 2019, and Markus Rathgeb, Otl Aicher, Phaidon 2006)
- Wikimedia Commons, Henning Schlottmann, 'Olympic games 1972 pictogramms olympic station 0877.JPG' (CC BY 1.0), https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Olympic_games_1972_pictogramms_olympic_station_0877.JPG (athletics and football pictograms in white on green panels, viewed)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_massacre (5–6 September 1972; Black September; 11 Israeli team members killed; competition suspended for 34 hours)

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