Dear Margaret,

Your note raises three topics. They are related, but distinct.

One involves the name of a collection.

The second involves the purpose.

The third involves the location.

There are hundreds of graphic design collections around the world. I
do not know whether any is named "graphic design," but the name is
less important than the purpose and focus of the collection.

The vast majority of all collections of all kinds are research
collections and archives. These tend not to be kept out on public
exhibition. They are generally accessible to scholars on request,

Specialized collections and research collections tend to focus on a
specific idea, issue, medium, period, designer, manufacturer, artist,
genre, etc.

Many kinds of collections involve graphic design. All these kinds of
collections may be used fruitfully for specific kinds of graphic
design research. Some collections are to be found within museums and
galleries. Others are found in universities, libraries, research
centers, or the archival holdings of professional associations, trade
associations, or other kinds of societies. Still others are located
in the archives of specific firms including printers, publishers,
binders, architecture and design practices, monument manufacturers,
tombstone manufacturers, newspaper publishers, government printing
offices, university presses, book packagers, and more. Some of these
collections are held in specialized museums and archives. Some
sponsor public exhibitions. Most do not. Those that do not hold large
public exhibitions often host modest in-house exhibitions or displays
for visitors or visiting scholars.

There are specialized collections dedicated to many different kinds
of artifact or process involving graphic design. One may approach a
specific research topic, theme, or issue within graphic design
through any one collection or across several. One may also choose a
research topic, shape an issue or theme that requires drawing on the
resources of many, or several collections.

advertising,
advertising (broadcast),
advertising (display),
advertising (magazine),
advertising (newspaper),
advertising (point of purchase),
alphabet history,
ancient graphic arts (pre-printing),
Assyriology,
Bibles,
Bible design and production,
block printing,
book binding (the process),
book bindings (the artifacts),
book covers,
book design,
book production,
bookmaking,
books,
broadcast graphics (onscreen),
calligraphy
cartoons (general),
cartoons (editorial),
cartoons (political),
charicature,
chart construction,
chart design,
charts (astrological),
charts (astronomical),
charts (celestial),
charts (economic),
charts (general),
charts (geographic),
charts (geological),
charts (maritime),
charts (meteorological),
charts (oceanographic),
charts (scientific),
charts (statistical),
comic books,
comics,
computer assisted design (CAAD),
computer-based typesetting,
computers,
computing,
cuneiform,
diagrams,
diagrammatic reasoning,
drafting,
drafting (architectural),
drafting (engineering),
drafting (general),
drafting (mechanical),
Egyptology,
emblemata (medieval woodcuts),
globes,
graphic user interface (GUI) design,
hieroglyphics,
incunabula (books printed before 1501),
labels,
manga,
maps,
maps (early),
maps (general),
maps (global),
maps (military),
maps (road maps),
maps (surveying),
newspapers,
packaging,
postage stamps,
poster art,
poster design,
posters (advertising),
posters (art),
posters (exhibition),
posters (general),
posters (political),
posters (travel),
rubber stamps,
signage,
Talmud,
Talmud design and production,
tattoo art,
tattoo design,
tattooing (process)
type,
type cutting,
type founding,
typesetting,
typography,
underground press,
wayfinding,
Web design

There are probably more kinds of artifact of process involving
graphic design than I have named here. There are certainly more
perspectives, themes, and issues than I name here, involving any of
the myriad aspects or issues that touch on, feed into, or arise from
graphic design.

Graphic design collections, like most kinds of collections, are
organized for specific purposes.

That purpose may be planned and thematic. A collection of manga by a
comic book museum would fit this category. So would a collection of
movie posters by a fan of 1940s film noir who gave a completed film
noir collection to a university archive on film arts.

The purpose may relate to the role a certain collection has within a
larger frame. The poster collection of the film noir fan would be an
example of this, especially if the posters are collected in relation
to books, manuscripts, film memorabilia, and copies of the actual
films. A collection on multi-language page design in an archive on
Bible design would be such a collection. A achieve on Bible design in
a larger museum dedicated to church history would itself be an
example of such a collection.

The purpose may relate to a specific person or moment in history.
Sea-charts and routers form an important part of maritime history and
the spread of the first great colonial powers. The archives of a
presidential museum in the United States would tend to be rich in
political posters and campaign literature. So would the archives of
major political parties in any modern democracy.

Locating these collections involves research. To find what you want,
you must select your research topic and identify the issues and
themes that are relevant to you.

Then the search begins. You can locate collections in many ways. One
is to start with a careful search on the World Wide Web. The book
reviews in recent issues of Design Research News give useful books on
web search and literature search that will help. While the literature
search will not necessarily yield direct pointers to collections, the
end matter of any book rich in references and illustrations will give
you the names and locations of all the collections on which the
author draws.

To locate book and catalogues, you can run appropriate library
searches. You can also use reference tools such as ARTBibliographies
Modern and you can use the on-line catalogues of the Library of
Congress, the British Museum, Museum of Modern Art, and the several
hundred research library catalogues that are now accessible on-line
from anywhere in the world.

The next step is to ask experts. Specialists in any field know the
collections in that field. They can also help you to meet other
experts and relevant curators. As you begin to develop and
demonstrate expertise, other experts will become willing to share
increasingly useful and valuable resources, and they will introduce
you the specific experts who can give you the greatest help.

You can also make direct contact with likely museums, archives,
libraries, and universities.

Finally, I suggest that you pay a visit to an experienced librarian.
Librarians are specialists in helping scholars to find the
information they need. If you are taking a Ph.D. in design, your
university likely has a librarian with a specialty in design or art
and design. That librarian is the person who knows where you must go
to learn what you need to learn. It is often possible that he or she
will have immense specialist resources on hand, and it is probable
that he or she will know the specialist librarians and reference
tools who have the exact knowledge you require.

It is the scholar's task to bring evidence and issues together in the
form of an original contribution.

The collections exist. If they are not identified in a way that fits
the perspective or frame you feel vital to graphic design research
today, one contribution you might make is to organize and publish an
annotated list of collections structured in relation to your research
topic. This would be a valuable appendix to the dissertation, and it
might well provide the basis of a stand-alone reference book or Web
site.

The United Kingdom is rich in graphic design collections. The world's
oldest active publishing firm and the world's oldest active Bible
publishing companies are located in the UK. So are several of the
world's oldest multi-language publishing firms and many of the
world's best and largest map and chart collections. These and more
like them constitute an incomparable range of graphic design
resources.

These resources may be matched elsewhere, but they are unsurpassed in
any other single nation. Other nations have important special
collections on local, regional, and national themes. Many nations and
regions hold superior specific collections. As whole, though, I doubt
that any one nation holds a greater range and depth of scholarly
resources on graphic design.

It is the very age and depth of these resources that mean they do not
bear the label "graphic design." If you wish to study the early
graphic design of demographic and economic documents, you should not
be searching under "graphic design," but under "pipe rolls" or
"Domesday book." The very earliest examples of graphic design applied
to demographics and statistics are proto-cuneiform tablets from Uruk.
These are housed at the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities in
the British Museum. When these were collected, they were not stored
under the rubric "early graphic design of demographic and economic
statistics." Even so, they are the oldest known examples of graphic
design of demographic and economic statistics that have been
translated. (Earlier possible examples may exist, but since we do not
know what they mean, we do not know this to be the case.) Part of the
work of scholarship is locating all the cases and examples of your
theme or topic, wherever they are housed and however they are labeled.

The need to search applies to recent artifacts as well as ancient
artifacts. The graphic design collections of a specific organization
or university may not be labeled "the graphic design library," but
"The Roberts Bequest," or "Travers Ink and Print Production Archive."
Collections that began under ancient names in 1792 or 1907 may now
house hippie posters from the 1960s, along with copies of underground
newspapers, and a full run of Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers comics.

One of the scholar's contributions to research is to identify
archival and collection resources and to reframe them in the context
of current topics and themes.

There is no single collection on graphic design in any one place.
Neither is there such a collection for painting, sculpture,
automobiles, or any other product of human invention.

Instead, there are thousands in many places.

If you follow the steps I outline here, you will find them.

Best regards,

Ken Friedman







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I am having this dilemma about writing my dissertation on this topic
as there is no specific answer to! Most of people(studying art and
design) know that -graphic design - is very much influenced by art
and culture!

BUT THERE IS NO COLLECTION OF GRAPHIC DESIGN WORKS IN ONE PLACE
(museum, gallery) FOR STUDENTS OR THE PUBLIC TO VIEW?

There were single exhibition occasionally on Futurism (Esoteric
Collection) or the one last year (2000)in V&A and that is all.

Most exhibitions are given the name either 'ART' or 'DESIGN' or
'POSTERS'.Even Typography I heard has its own museum in Battersea,
London - but not graphic design.

I would really appreciate some comments on this topic!

Margaret

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