Making and Breaking the Grid

Historical Interlude

The Seeds of Deconstruction

Until the late twentieth century, the design industry tended to focus on the more or less steadily increasing influence of rationalism when it traced its development or promoted itself, and with good reason: emphasizing the pragmatic, rational aspects of design helps clients understand and trust the design industry as a resource. But every field of artistic endeavor comprises different schools of thought, some of them contradictory, and graphic design is no exception.

Just as the use of grids in modern design practice grew from developments in technology, aesthetic thought, and industrialization, the use of alternate, intuitive methods of composition—prevalent in current design practice—grew from ...