A Letter to the Athens Design Forum. November 2026.

→KATERINA PAPANAGIOTOU.

I collect art magazines dating from the 1950s through to the 1980s. Within this period, I see a relationship between form, art, and visual communication that I feel is worth revisiting.

This was a time when graphic design had not yet been differentiated from artistic practice or fenced off from the broader artistic scene.

A magazine is a composite form in which the image, text, typography, and blank space all give rhythm to the reading experience. This approach somehow remains both contemporary and timeless.

Technical production constraints and printing limitations played a key role in shaping the final look of these publications. The high cost of the four-color process led to black-and-white letterpress printed magazines, often left unbound. In these same magazines, artworks were included as four-color inserts printed on different paper stock, sometimes of various sizes. In this way, each publication was transformed into a work of art that was singular and collectable.

In practice, what we ultimately hold in our hands today are objects that manifest materiality in a multitude of ways – ways resulting from different printing processes, papers, physical formats, and inserts. More than anything, these publications feel handcrafted. Techniques such as silkscreen and letterpress printing, unusual bindings, and experimentation with materials keep the compositions alive. They do not refute the digital age but rather investigate materiality. This serves as a reminder that design is, first and foremost, a conceptual and creative act.

In these magazines, one encounters a primal need for creation; artists transferring knowledge – drawn from painting and their engagement with materials, from printmaking and their understanding of the image as a means of cultural expression – into graphic design.

Storyboarding is a kind of notation employed before an image is set in motion. This process is a work of graphic design created by the artist – a space for thinking things through before the overarching work is brought to completion. These illustrations take on a value of their own, giving us an insight into the artist’s design perspectives while also providing us with alternative readings of their work.

Through graphic design, we can uncover the history of societies in search of their contemporary identities, and we can observe typography, photography, illustration, and compositional arrangement functioning together as one unified visual language.

But it was the content of these magazines that served as their true essence and raison d’être. During the time in question, artists formed part of broader efforts seeking to forge new political and cultural scenes. The magazines of this period – particularly up until 1980 – served as forums in which artists, intellectuals, and political ideas all crossed paths. They were an active arena for the construction of novel social realities, thus turning the magazine format into a space for public intervention. Before artistic autonomy carved out a space of its own, artists were actively engaged citizens, contributing to magazines and cultural movements, public discourse, and collective action.

Looking back on the archives of past decades is always fascinating. It is not just the aesthetic and formal choices that appeal – I am also drawn to the singular ways of thinking that spring from each specific political and cultural moment. Throughout the years I have spent working in arts and culture, I always felt a shift was needed in design – from a process focused on the exploration of form to one driven by narrative and research; that is, towards design as a cultural standpoint. Each time I return to an archive, it is as if I discover it anew. It helps me redefine an understanding of design and to remember its roots, but also to recognise a quality that arises from its close connection to the fine arts: compositional freedom. Investigations of form driven by deeper cultural intent.