Giambattista Bodoni

Then in 1768 Giambattista Bodoni was invited
by Duke Ferdinando of Bourbon-Parma to organize
a printing house inParma, called la
Stamperia Reale (Zack, 2014) . Bodoni’s job
entailed him publicizing the house, and for this
purpose he created specimen books the first
being, Descrizione Delle Feste Celebrate In Parma
L’Anno MDCCLXIX, which was only one in a
long line of books he published (Famous Graphic
Designers, 2015). Soon after, the house began
printing fine editions of classical works such
as Gerusalemme Liberata of
Torquato Tasso and Homer’s literary work.
Because of these publication’s Bodoni gained
favor in the public’s eyes, which allowed him to
open his own publication house called Officina
Bodoni.
MANUALE
TIPOGRAFICO
While operating his own publishing house Bodoni
started straying from Old-Style
typefaces with very decorated details and was
won over by the typographical theories of the
French printer, Didot and the English printer,
Baskerville. By 1787 Bodoni was printing
typefaces without decoration and started creating
modern typefaces of his own design.
Bodoni Punchcuts- metaprintart.info
Manuale Tipografico- luc.devroye.org
Of the many books that he produced during this
period, the best known is his Manuale
tipografico (1788; “Inventory of Types”), a folio
collection of 291 roman and italic typefaces,
along with samples of Russian, Greek, and other
types (Britannica, 2015). He used this manual
to illustrate the four principles of type design:
regularity, clarity, good taste, and charm.
Twenty-seven years later a second edition of
Manuale tipografico was released after an
1840 ‘output inventory’ compiled by Giambattista
Bodoni’s widow that listed 25,491 punches
and more than 50,000 matrices made by the
prolific typographer, printer and punch cutter
(Creative Review, 2013).
TRANSITIONAL TO MODERN
The self-titled typeface, Bodoni that we know today was created in 1798. In
order to create this typeface Giambattista Bodoni made significant changes to
previous letterforms by increasing the stroke contrast, increasing the sharpness
of the serifs, and vertically aligning the axis. These changes were inspired by,
John Baskerville, the first person to introduce typefaces with obvious differences
between thick and thin strokes. These changes lead Giambattista Bodoni to
stray from the Transitional fonts and create a new Modern font. Bodoni accomplished
this by endlessly perfecting his type and always refining. His financial
security provided by the Duke of Parma made this relentless obsession possible
because of this he was able to labor over his letterforms and transcend them
into art (Messmer, 2009).
‘The letters don’t
get their true
delight, when
done in haste &
discomfort, nor
merely done with
diligence & pain,
but first when
they are created
with love and
passion.”
- Bodoni
azquotes.com