Typography Tuesday

Last weekend we showcased some psychedelia from Milwaukee’s radical underground newspaper of the 1960s and 1970s, Kaleidoscope. Today we display some letter forms from this groovy time. Some of us may want to forget this lettering style, while others might wish for a comeback. For the latter, be cheered that psychedelic letters didn’t die with the 1970, but continue to live on with a range of psychedelic fonts.

With its abstract, swirling patterns, and very loud colors, the vividness and intensity of these letter forms recall the hallucinations of those under the influence of psychedelic drugs. While these designs certainly derive from the drug culture of the 1950s and 1960s, graphic designers of this period were also influenced by traditional design trends, such as Art Nouveau, Dadaism, and Pop Art. Psychedelic letters and fonts share the common elements of distortion, extremely ornate lettering, strong contrasts, collage components, and weird iconography.

We hope you groove on some of these letters, and if you want to see more, you can hang out with our digitized version of the collection.

View more posts on Kaleidoscope.

View our other Typography Tuesday posts.

Psychedelic Saturday

We’re going a little psychedelic this weekend to bring you some of the more hallucinogenic pages from Milwaukee’s radical underground newspaper of the 1960s and 1970s, Kaleidoscope. The newspaper, which ran from 1967-1971, included dozens of psychedelic pages and page spreads, most of which we can’t show you because most include some element of nudity, which Tumblr has been scrupulously censoring of late, even if posts include images of classical sculpture, renaissance paintings, or illustrations by Beardsley. Still, if you’d like to get a better understanding of the graphic elements of this no-holds-barred newspaper, you can view our digitized version of the collection.

Kaleidoscope was a biweekly newspaper offering an alternative and radical-liberal perspective that addressed and critiqued the social, political, and cultural issues of its day, including American politics, police actions, civil rights, gender issues, sexuality, activist activities, and contemporary art, music, and literature. Attempts to censor the publication were a challenge from the very first issue. The editor and publisher John Kois was even convicted of obscenity and the case, Kois v. Wisconsin, eventually went to the Supreme Court of the United States in 1972 (after the newspaper had folded). However, the Court ruled in the newspaper’s favor stating that the challenged contents of the newspaper did not constitute obscenity. In a concurring statement Justice William O. Douglas wrote that “the vague umbrella of obscenity laws was used in an attempt to run a radical newspaper out of business … . If obscenity laws continue in this uneven and uncertain enforcement, then the vehicle has been found for the suppression of any unpopular tract.”

View more posts on Kaleidoscope.