The Venetian Script: Michael Rock and Irma Boom

0:03Welcome to Chanel Connects, the Venice Biennale edition.

0:36It's important to be free. world. Listen in to the artists, curators, thinkers, and makers behind the Venice Biennale, the world's most important exhibition of contemporary art, now in its 60th edition. Each of our guests is focused on what matters most and what happens next. I'm Yana Peele, Global Head of Arts and Culture at Chanel. Thank you for connecting with us.

1:10Colleagues and friends for over 30 years, Michael Rock and Irma Boom meet today in the Palazzo Persico in the City of Books to discuss the art of bookmaking and what it means to be a designer. Irma Boom is widely considered the premier book designer of this generation. Leading the conversation is Michael Rock, the celebrated graphic designer and co-founder of 2x4. To begin, Michael tells us about the rich history and craftsmanship of bookmaking.

1:46The shift from the handwritten manuscript that had been around for thousands of years to mass-produced books famously originated in Germany in the mid-15th century. But within 50 years of Gutenberg creating his Bible, really the center of book production moved here to Venice. And the first shops opened around 1469, but within three years there were 230 printers in this tiny island. And of course the most important is Aldous Minucius and the Alden Press. And he was the humanist scholar who really found these classical texts and brought them to the public. And he's also known for inventing italic text and even universalizing the use of the comma.

2:31So a really important person in writing in general. And then over that next century, there was an explosion of books across Europe where by 1600, there's already 200 million copies of books in Europe. And it was really one of the first capitalist-driven mass production businesses, really, where you had an entrepreneur, printer, an assembly line of workers, and then this product that could be tailored for different audiences, different languages. And so it was really this kind of beginning of not only a new industry, but a new kind of economy. And in the 500 years since then, the book has proved to be a remarkably durable, resilient medium that we're still, 500 years later, reading them, talking about them, collecting them, and for some of us, making them.

3:16So making is the case with Erma and me. And Erma, Boom, and I, Michael Rock, have been friends for colleagues for over 30 years. And Erma's perhaps the premier book designer of our generation. And my practice is maybe more ranging, but books have always been a really central concern as well. So it's a pleasure to meet here in the city of books, the city that practically invented the modern book, and to talk about books and typography, but also about the future of designing them. Erma, welcome to the Palazzo Persico, and so happy to see you. Yeah, I'm happy to be here, indeed. And for me, of course, doing also a study at the Vatican Library already for five years.

3:59All books lead back to Venice. And for me, doing this study, so what happened to the book, is interesting because things change in bookmaking, in typography, because of events of certain circumstances. And that's what I think is also interesting. It's not just that the book is inventing itself. No, it is because of certain sometimes political events or crisis or whatever. And I think that's interesting. And the pocketbook, which was invented in 1501 by Aldus Manusius, is interesting because he was complaining that people were not reading enough. Now we're still complaining that people don't read enough.

4:42But already in the 15th century they did. So he thought, let's make a cheap book, which is very efficient on a sheet of paper in an octavo, and then we can mass produce. Mass produce was in that time, instead of 300 copies, you would print 3 ,000 copies. I'm not sure if it helped, but it was an attempt. And you also said italic. And the italic is used already in printed matter, I think, very early on. But he used italic typeface because it's also a very efficient typeface. And italic is Italian, so italic. So it's based on the country's name. How do you say that? you could produce a lot of words on a page.

5:28And so the book was also not too thick. There was a political end to that too, because at the time the government in Venice saw a value in an educated population. And so to get books out to people and to get information out to people was a really critical aspect of it. And we look at these books now for their beauty and for the carefulness of his typography. But there was really a mass communication form and a mass education form. And I think that for hundreds of years, the book was the primary form of educating people, of creating a central reference that people could go back to. And the great theorist, Benneke Anderson, would say that the book created nationality even because you had a standardized German, you had a standardized French, and you could decide, am I this or am I that?

6:10And so typography itself had this way of kind of creating nations out of the population. And so I think that why it's a really interesting period now to talk about the book is that the job of educating the masses or of getting information out, It's now internet. It's the internet and it's become a much broader way. It's a very efficient, fast way to do it. And so that's forced the book into being something else. Yeah, what I really think is the advantage of the book that it's unchangeable. Basically, it was in the 90s, the last century, it was a disadvantage because you couldn't change anything.

6:43Because then everybody was thinking of internet, everything is flux and changes. But I think one of the great qualities of bookmaking is the static or the frozen information. Because that's why if you make a book and it's printed basically black and white, you can always revert to that what people have said in the 15th century. And I think that is an enormous important asset of bookmaking, that some thoughts, you can find them in their original form. And if you compare it to internet where we have the flux and the chain, You can never revert to an internet page because it changes all the time.

7:22So it's not a big, huge reference. And to make books still now, it remains the same quality because as basically a bookmaker, the books I'm making now, hopefully they will have good quality and remain for another 100 or 500 or 1 ,000 years. You can always go back to that certain moment. It captures, it's a capture of time. And I think that that's an interesting asset. I think one of the points that you're making with the permanence of the book and also that central form of knowledge that can be reverted to is under a real pressure right now. And I think that not only has the internet obviously made everything faster and broader, but now with this idea of content that can be produced mechanically, but books can be produced one-off now.

8:14One of the great values of the book was it was a mass publication. You had a thousand of them that they were all exactly the same. But now we're entering a period where a book can be made, one book for one person. You mean printing on demand? But also content on demand. So you have basically a large language model which can produce a text. It can go to a printer that can produce a single book and that can be delivered to a single person. So it's almost like a medieval way of thinking about the book where the breakdown of the central aspect of the book, which was the multiplication of ideas. And I think what for me a book is the representation and the multiplication.

8:51And I think what is a bitter problem now that the book also becomes a status symbol. Of course, it was also in those days. But now it gives status to their being, to their... Their aura. Yeah, exactly. And I think if I feel that, then I'm not doing it. I think making a book costs a lot of energy and time and paper and time of many people. So it's always a collaborative process. There's a printer and a binder and a writer's author. But I think that's a really important transition that's happening because you're getting those kind of requests. And I think that comes from the fact that the book as a form of just like basic communication and learning is under pressure from all these other sources.

9:34And McLuhan's famous idea that things don't become obsolete. they move toward obsolescence in the sense that they become something different. It's not like books go away, but they become different because you have this new media. And oftentimes his point is that they come back as luxury or they come back as art. Yeah, when it's this luxury thing, I really don't think it works. But that's what so many books are now, right? Which is that they're luxurious objects that cost$100 or$200 or$500. And they're not really about communicating information or about educating the masters. It's showcasing something.

10:07And it's only just to put on the table. That's why I really hate the word coffee table book because it's not a book to use. It's just a book to show off. And I think that's not why we, at least why I'm making books. It's something else. It's sharing information. I think that is a sort of essential and crucial thing what remains also for the future because the book is the most stable medium ever, I think, because we can still look at even the manuscripts. And so to make books which has a certain sequence, it's all about the sequence and telling a story and content, image and text. So the moment you have the book in your hand, and I think that's for me the trigger, the paper, the materialization, you want to keep it, you want to have it, and you want to see the work.

10:56So in a way you're describing a designer as a seducer. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think it is seduction. Oh, absolutely, absolutely. And I think maybe it's an interesting thing to talk about, which is like, what is a designer? You know, what is our role in this thing? You know, and I think seduction isn't, we can't discount seduction as being one of those things. And I think that... Seduction sounds very negative, but it's from the heart. It's not from any commercial thing. But I think that there is, as a designer, you know, a way that you want to communicate an idea which is on top of the thing, the information itself, you know.

11:28And I think that it's not an egotistical thing, but it's in a way what our authorship is, is the way that we shape content. And the last book I did with Germano, the book for the New York's 1963 and 64 show, we started it when Germano was still alive. He died right in the beginning of it. And I really felt like carrying that book forward for an idea that we had together. But it was really also about doing an art catalog that was almost all text and photographs, not of the art. So because we were really building the story around a historical moment, 62 to 64 in New York was this amazing moment.

12:00And it was the way that all of these different historical events were happening, things were happening in the art world, and that there was a complete relationship between them. And so the book could do that in a way the show couldn't. And so in a way, the exhibition of the art was an important thing, but the book almost carried the idea further to a way. I must say, many times I think a book is better than the exhibition because it's more comprehensive. And basically a book is space. A book is an exhibition. It was Stiegelaupp who said, catalog as exhibition, exhibition as catalog. I think that's what he exactly said.

12:35And that's true because a book is a space. Only, of course, it's more linear. It's turning the pages, which I think is a fantastic thing of a book that you have to do something. You have to take action actually to get a hold of the content. Yeah, so I think even if I see the shows here in Venice, then I think, well, maybe if they make a good book, it's more comprehensive to see what the artist means because you can read the text in a more quiet way and the book is also more slow and you can sit at home or you can sit wherever you are. So I think the book has all these assets. But Michael, how would you describe the role of a designer?

13:15Well, I think for me the designer is always a kind of mediator, that you're negotiating between all these different forces and you're trying to take your knowledge of the world, your knowledge of economics, your knowledge of people, your knowledge of technology and bring them together to make something. So you have lots of pieces and you have lots of flows and somehow the designer is the person who puts them all in some direction and to some end. And when it works, it's amazing. When it doesn't, it's just chaos. Emma, I think we met 32 years ago now and we were both teaching at the Yale School of Art at the time and the world has obviously changed really radically and design has changed really radically.

13:52And I've been thinking a lot about how different the world that we work in is than when we started, you know, both in the technologies we use in the politics of the work that we do and knowing that the world will transform even more radically in the next 30 years. And you're still teaching and talking to students and so am I. And I'm really thinking about like, what is it that's important as a designer to know for the next 30 years? Like what should they carry with them into of the future because I think a lot about the fact that my students are going to end their career in like 2080 or something like that.

14:23In some ways my theory is that because we don't have any idea how to predict technology or what it's going to do, all we can do is revert to things we think are more solid, to go back to things we think are unchangeable and what are those things. Because I think that if we try to say what you should know about is this kind of technology, we know that it's going to be completely obsolete in five years. Yeah, but I think what I would tell students also is to create space. And I think you have to create space for yourself to create and then freedom. And it gives you also responsibility. I think you should also be responsible for what you're doing.

15:01And especially when you are making a book because it will last for a long time. Because what is interesting, if you make a book or if you make a building or if you have to make fashion, it's all about the idea. You have to create an idea, a certain way of thinking. But this is, I think, what I'm getting at, which is like, can you get at that way of thinking as the thing that you have to carry with you into the future? Like sequence, narrative, space, those are things that are unchanging in a way, regardless of the technology. Exactly. But the concept of thinking, I think that is interesting and create space within limits because bookmaking is very limited.

15:40And I think if you create limits, you can accelerate, or how do you say that in good English? You can be far more creative than when anything is possible. Anything is possible is the most non-creative asset, I think. Maybe I can mention the book I did for Chanel, for me the ultimate book, because there is no ink in the book. It's totally embossed. The whole story about how Chanel 5 came to a being is told via text and image but embossed. So that book doesn't exist as a PDF, which for me, of course, is extremely interesting. The PDF is a white, so it doesn't show anything. It only exists in the physical form.

16:26There is no digital form of that book. And I think that's so interesting. But I think if you look at that book in, because, of course, both of us now, having worked long enough, have a big enough body to work where you start to see certain kinds of ideas that flow through it. And I think that one thing that if you're not a designer, you don't always understand that we're often not at all in control of the subjects of our work. It comes from all different sources. Someone asks us to do about a car engine and then this and then that. And so what makes your work your work is something which is perceptible after you do a lot of it.

17:02You start to see these clues of yourself in it somehow. And so the idea of the book that exists purely as an embossing or the book that exists because of the roughness of it or something like that, those are ideas that have origins in early pieces and you see them come back again. And that way a designer's work really exists in its treatment because we're not creating the text. And timing, time and technique, it's all crucial. And I think that's what's really interesting when you see a body of somebody's work over a long period of time. It's not that it all looks the same, but somehow there's some spirit in it that you can really tell.

17:34And I think that's what's the real sign of a body of real design work, that you can feel this kind of consistency or coherence of the work, even though it's about radically different subjects. It's about radically different things. It takes radically different forms. I think it's an attitude because if people revert to my work, they say, oh, you have to make this and this. It doesn't look the same. No. So it's true because the subjects are different. It's a different time. And it's basically an attitude. I think I have a certain attitude towards a project. And I think that's what you see. And it doesn't mean that there is a style or something.

18:09It's really, yeah, an attitude. That's why I refer to it as a kind of spirit, which is like, you know, it's something that is really not about style so much. It's not really about material or content. It really is something that's almost intangible. And I think that that's really magical about design, which is that you feel something in it. And you can immediately recognize it. If you're attuned to that, you can immediately recognize it. And you see sort of like, you kind of see the brain at work, right? Like how it plays out against this content. But for me also, artists who work like that, who do silkscreen or photography, somebody like Ellsworth Kelly or in the Netherlands, Dan van Goden, who I admire a lot, they use also different techniques.

18:53But you can always see it's that artist because of the eye of the artist. I think for me, that's super interesting that it's not about the style because some people or designers, they always do the same. But for me, not so interesting because everything always changes. You have to change with time, with the subject, and with who you are in 2024. I think that really makes a difference. And I think that goes back to that idea of to create that space for yourself, to find that in yourself, to find it. What is your take on this? What is your perspective? And that can be applied regardless of technology, regardless of material.

19:32You know, that it'll always be there because that's the human quality to the work. And somehow it's exuded through the work itself. And I think that that's the thing we have to hold on to. This thing which is like really essentially human at the heart of designing something, which is that you bring it to being by going and shepherding all these things together and make something out of that. Yeah. People say the book is dead or something. I think the book is more alive than ever. And the future for the book is, yeah, because it's such a stable medium. And also think that you don't make books for the past or present, but books are really made for the future.

20:09Well, I think that's a great segue into the kind of last question that we're asking in this series in general, which is like, what's exciting you about the future of design? And how do we think about that? You know, because by thinking forward, thinking about a book design for the future, but what do you think about the future of design? Yeah, so I have this terrible thing that I don't see myself as a designer. I really as a bookmaker, I make books. Okay, what is actually about the future of a bookmaker? No, no, but I think it's crucial because I see a book designer is more a job, is more something you do from nine to five, but making a book.

20:48So recently, since the last maybe 10 years, I'm also more writing and materialization can be very important because the book proved itself as such a stable medium. And I hope it will develop even more and maybe techniques like heat or cold can also influence what you see in the book. I don't know, but I think there's a lot to discover what we don't know yet. But I see, and I hope I become a little bit older, maybe 90 or something. So that means another 30 years. That I can make a different kind of book that I'm doing now. I don't know what it is because I cannot look in the future, but I guess there will be, because also the structure of the book changed over time because of the paragraph.

21:41And so I can imagine that we have found new structures of making books. So that'll keep you busy for the next 30 years. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, thanks, Irma. It's so great to see you and talk to you as always. And so I'm glad to be here with you. And thank you for inviting me. It was very nice. Thank you. Thanks.

22:02Thank you to Michael Rock and Irma Boom. Now we asked this year's Biennale guests, where's their favorite spot to watch the sunset in Venice? I personally have seen many a sunrise from the rooftop of the Daniele Hotel, sipping my first espresso of the day. San Giorgio Maggiore, I think, would be a beautiful place to watch the sun rise because you have such a beautiful view on the whole islands, like this standpoint that you can't get anywhere else because it gives you kind of overall view on the city. Not, you know, from Giudecca to Rousseau Douro to Punta della Dogana to the San Marco and the Giardini and everything.

22:43So I think it's one of the most beautiful views of the city. The rooftop of the Daniele never gets better. The way the sun falls over San Maggiore can't be beat. I like to watch the sunset when I'm near the Cerdini because usually I'm still filled with the art and, you know, all the good things that I saw. So then, yeah, looking out for the sun for something bigger than art. I really like any sort of incredible balcony overlooking the canal with an incredible drink in your hand, watching the boats, feeling like you're definitely only in Venice.

23:23Thank you so much to all of our contributors who joined us in Venice for the 60th edition of the Biennale. Thank you for listening to Chanel Connects, the Venice Biennale edition. Now, the number five is very important in the house of Chanel. So please consider giving us five stars on whatever platform you're listening to us. Please follow the show so you don't miss an episode. Next time, I get to sit down with Adriano Pedrosa, curator of the 60th Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale and artistic director of the Sao Paulo Museum of Art. We discuss his theme, Foreigners Everywhere, Stranieri Avunque, what it takes to pull such a monumental exhibition together, and of course, what matters most and what's coming next.

24:12Thank you for listening. Looking forward to seeing you next week. Thank you.