Simon Griffee
Department of graphic design, art direction, and photography.

To Zapf

Published 2015 July 1

Typography and calligraphy legend Hermann Zapf died last month.

I have set type with his wonderful typefaces in a lot of my work and am especially fond of Zapfino, visual music I’ve used in various projects after it was distributed with Apple’s first version of OS X.

Goodbye, Mr. Zapf, and thank you for your beautiful work which has enriched my life and allowed me to communicate with the help of your hand. The following poster is in your honor, using your words, in your forms.

Calligraphy is a peaceful and noble art, done by well educated human beings who do their work with full commitment, with intense concentration. For we want to put into our letters a little of our own feelings, of our personality and mood. Letters should have grace and beauty in themselves. No calligrapher pollutes rivers with his ink, or poisons the air we breathe. Calligraphy makes no noise. We don't fight with arms nor with our pens, but we want to convince sometimes with a hand-lettered message of special importance in which we believed.

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