From the Collection: Greatest Hits of Social Media, Part 2

Rediscover Archive gems in a continuing series showcasing our most popular posts from Instagram and Twitter.

Three popular Letterform Archive posts on Instagram with a heart animation in the background.

Welcome to our second installment of highlights from the Archive’s collection through the lens of social media. Joining our earlier post, these are some of the most loved and shared images from the last year or so.

Ahn Sang Soo

Mano, AG Typography Institute, 1988-2014.

Ahn Sang Soo is a designer from South Korea, and is often known as the father of contemporary Korean type design. His first typeface designed in 1985 broke the molds of Hangeul’s traditional design and paved a path of experimentation for the young script. In 2012, Ahn founded the Paju Typography Institute (PaTI), an alternative design school, as well as AG Typography Institute, an organization that’s dedicated to not only the design of new typefaces, but research, writing, exhibitions, and book design. This typeface, Mano, plays with the fixed-width stroke modules.

Hunter Saxony III

Hunter Saxony III (AKA The Last Black Calligrapher in San Francisco) is an artist who applies historical ornamental lettering styles to contemporary messages. In 2018, after Nia Wilson was murdered by a White man at the MacArthur BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) station in Oakland, California, Saxony created a calligraphy series in her memory titled Nia Wilson / Say Her Name / No Silence. The series alters vintage photographs of Southern gentry, writing over them with Wilson’s name.

Johanna Calle

Johanna Calle is an artist who lives and works in Bogotá, Colombia. She received her BA from the University of los Andes in Bogotá in 1989 and her Master’s degree at the Chelsea College of Art and Design in London in 1993. This book reproduces a set of handwritten alphabetic compositions of ink on grid paper. Read this piece out loud and you get the sound of awe and satisfaction we made when we first saw it: “Ahhhh”.

Polish Hotel Luggage Labels

Hotel luggage labels, Poland, ca. 1960s–70s.

While we haven’t had a chance to share very much yet, we have a broad and deep collection of ephemera with delightful lettering, including labels, letterhead, maps, poster stamps, and matchbooks. Stay tuned as we dig deeper and share more of these in blog posts, salons, and the Online Archive. This set of hotel labels from Poland charmed our followers on Twitter last year. Get a closer look below and see more luggage labels in the Online Archive from France, Germany, Japan, and Kenya.

Kelli Anderson

Kelli Anderson is an artist, designer, animator, and tinkerer who pushes the limits of ordinary materials by seeking out possibilities hidden in plain view. We are so proud to be working with Kelli on the upcoming book, Alphabet in Motion: A Pop-Up Book for Typophiles. Catch some more animated sneak peeks of her prototypes below, and make sure you’re signed up for our newsletter to get the latest updates about this Archive publication.

- Instagram post of Kelli Anderson’s risograph animations