Maria-Therese Lenart

I would like to think myself into Otl Aicher’s mind by purposefully addressing myself to specific host materials such as paper. I would like to manufacture paper myself and experience and get to know the process.

I would like to adapt Otl’s mode of procedure. Experimentation for its own sake? I intend to design a series of Otl Aicher’s portraits and to honour him with the aid of a variety of printing techniques, digital appraisal and a combination of analogue and digital approaches.

Plenty of unresolved questions emerged and I was at a loss as to where to begin. That’s why I began with straightforward drawings. But what are the many portraits ultimately intended to convey? What will be the final product? Weeks passed and I concluded that it would be good to commence the project with handcrafting. I wanted to incise a portrait of Otl in linoleum and print it on paper I had moulded myself.

Otl Aicher’s approach involved taking stock of what he designed himself. He wanted to design kitchens, for instance, but got together with a chef first and cooked meals in order to discover what exactly they contained.

I created the illustrations with the Procreate program on my iPad. This was the first time I had not had recourse to Adobe Illustrator or hand sketches of my own, and I had to get used to the new interface first as a result.

Photos were used as source material and I began by, for example, redrawing the face of Inge Aicher-Scholl with my Apple Pen. I got better and began taking pleasure in experimenting about a bit: sinuous lines and garish polychrome colours gave the pictorial motifs an interesting modern look.

I thought up eleven motifs, but what was the twelfth to be? After much thought, it occurred to me that I did not have a motif for either FSB or door handles in general. The design of Aicher’s door handle did not really strike me as being a sufficiently compelling motif.

I had another look through the goodies from our FSB excursion and was struck by a drawing by Otl in the brochure Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist. It accorded with the style of my existing motifs, so I considered adapting his drawing to my own style.

The project overwhelmed me somewhat at the start of term. I didn’t have many ideas to begin with and the good ideas others on the course were having put me under a bit of pressure. I then derived a certain amount of inspiration from the exhibition at the Detmold Landesmuseum.

I’m happy to have returned to designing illustrations even if by circuitous means. Comics, periodicals and illustrated editorials have impressed me for some while now.

I was overwhelmed by a surfeit of inspiration initially, but looking back that did me good. It led me to involve myself with my iPad and the Procreate program and to learn something new. I found digital drawing great fun. I was able to retain my own artistic identity and designed the project in a special way that did not exist in Otl Aicher’s day. A memory card game with pictograms was exhibited at the Landesmuseum that initially made me unsure as to whether a further such game were needed.

But now I’m very happy I nevertheless went ahead. My memory game is very lively overall and playing it is a fine way to get to know Otl Aicher.

If I had pursued the memory game idea from the outset, I would now assuredly be in a position to present animated images via Artivive. I would therefore like to continue working with the app once these entries have been submitted and in this way broaden my horizon.