Pictograms

An early progenitor of the artist's book genre, Warja Lavater was born in Winterthur, Switzerland in 1913. She worked as an illustrator for the magazine Jeunesse from 1944-1958, and moved to New York shortly thereafter where she began a wonderful series of artist's books. These books were published between 1962 and 1971, an exceptionally ripe time for artists to turn to the book form, a time when the most often cited "first" artist's book also appeared, Twentysix Gasoline Stations (1962) by Ed Ruscha. Many of Lavater's books were made using the accordion-fold binding. Her aesthetic has been aptly described as "very clean, very Swiss. " Each book tells a story, sequentially, like traditional books, but varying from them by rarely using words. Instead she chooses a symbol to represent, for example, a character, as in the red dot standing in for Red Riding Hood in Little Red Riding Hood.

An early progenitor of the artist''s book genre, Warja Lavater was born in Winterthur, Switzerland in 1913. She worked as an illustrator for the magazine Jeunesse from 1944-1958, and moved to New York shortly thereafter where she began a wonderful series of artist''s books. These books were published between 1962 and 1971, an exceptionally ripe time for artists to turn to the book form, a time when the most often cited "first" artist''s book also appeared, Twentysix Gasoline Stations (1962) by Ed Ruscha. Many of Lavater''s books were made using the accordion-fold binding. Her aesthetic has been aptly described as "very clean, very Swiss. " Each book tells a story, sequentially, like traditional books, but varying from them by rarely using words. Instead she chooses a symbol to represent, for example, a character, as in the red dot standing in for Red Riding Hood in Little Red Riding Hood.