Summary: November 2010 Typeradio held a two day workshop in cooperation with Indra Kupferschmid and 12 students of the Hochschule der Bildenden Künste (HBK Saar) in Saarbrücken, Germany. Each student was assigned a typeface designed by a Dutch designer with the question ‘How do you interpret the typeface into a one minute sound piece?’ The resulting 12 sound pieces were the starting point of a new workshop in collaboration with Jan Willem Stas and 12 students of the Type and Media master coarse, The Hague, The Netherlands. Each student was allocated an (anonymously labelled) sound piece and their challenge was to ‘create a typeface inspired by the sound’. The results were quite a surprise! 1) Original typeface: Massive by Donald Beekman 2) Sound piece by Lena Hennig 3) Chinese whispered typeface by Marina Chaccur Listening to the sound, Marina felt really out of her element and had difficulties to start her project. She listened so many times that it felt a bit like a torture for her, listening over and over again. She tried to decompose the sound to understand what she was hearing. This resulted in a three layered proposal. After struggling with her designs she knew she had to step out of her comfort zone. Using the sound in separate parts didn’t work for her, so she restarted with the whole torture feeling; she thought of the sound being tortured and hurt. The idea rose to make a Frankenstein monster. By drawing with different materials she was able to make a monstrous font, and using her left hand to keep herself from having control. Cuts and stitches made the look complete. This resulted in two versions of the Frankenstein typeface. Both versions can be used together and the one without the cut can be used in smaller sizes. left: Massive by Donald Beekman, right: Chinese Whispered Massive by Marina Chaccur
