It is difficult to place oneself in the position of the pioneers of graphic art shown at the Estorick Collection: their extraordinary leaps of the imagination have become the standard vocabulary; the shift from old to new they represent now distant history.
Born in the 19th century when 90 per cent of human understanding came through the naked eye, as adults they were confronted with a reality which was becoming the invisible reverse. Means of communication and commerce had been transformed beyond the scope of normal looking and common intelligence.
Nothing was more spectacular in its effect than electricity, as some of these designs proclaim. This new engine of industry and mass communication turned night into day and transformed and consolidated urbanisation. Gaslight may have calmed neighbourhood nerves, but electric light brought the whole city to throbbing life.
Yet how was this new dynamism, this mind-blowing complexity, to be visually conveyed? That was the artistic challenge and graphic art was the answer — a logical extension of avant-garde activity into mass communication.
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