Raffaella Della Olga Timothy Epps
- (typographer) Christopher Evans
- (psychologist)
Medium: Silkscreen and embossing on paper. Hot stamped unique hand made rubbed covers Pages: 28pp Size: 270mm Binding: Plastic spiral coil binding in wrap around cover Inscription: Signed by the artist Edition: 17/26
Type: Alphabet book
Place publication: Paris Publisher: Three Star Books
Additional notes: The subject of the artist’s obsession for Line Up is Alphabet: a typeface developed by Timothy Epps and the experimental psychologist Christopher Evans in England in the late 60’s.
Alphabet was the result of a challenge for them to find a system that would enable early computers to recognise fonts. Working within a five x five grid, Alphabet was designed entirely from vertical and horizontal lines. For Raffaella della Olga, who is instinctively attracted by geometric and/or programmatic art, Epps and Evans’s font was the perfect object of study and inspiration. Her interpretation led her— and the production team at TSB— to develop an original and free interpretation of Alphabet using basic silk screen printing and paper embossing to create
stunning geometric trompe-l’oeils.
Page after page the twenty six letters of Alphabet create compositions toying with the history of both optical and abstract painting. Indirectly quoting the works of Sol Lewitt, Josef Albers and OP ART artist Bridget Riley. Line Up by RDO proves again that with simple shapes and minimal means an artist can bring a viewer to new territories.