Ulm Artist: Otl Aicher
Otl Aicher was an artist most well-known for designing the pictograms for the 1972 Munich Olympics, used to represent each sport, which he carefully designed to be as easy as possible for both athletes and spectators to understand. Along with the pictograms Aicher also designed the mascot for the Olympics, a blue dachshund and 36 posters using pictures of the athletes. Aicher used the same grid to develop all 180 of the pictograms for the Olympic sports.
During his younger years he made the very cool decision to not join the Hitler youth or fight in the Second World War, despite both being mandatory. After the war ended he married Igne Scholl, whose house he hid in to avoid going to war, and they opened the Ulm school of art together with their friend Max Bill in 1953. The school wanted to provide a diverse education embracing both the established ways of design methodology and the new industrial ideas. An example of embracing new industrial ideas was Aicher’s involvement with the German airline company called Lufthansa in 1962. He developed a comprehensive corporate identity for them with a logo and fonts to make them more recognisable and also taught this in his lessons.
By developing a colourful identity inspired by the Bavarian environment as well as focusing heavily on the athletes, Aicher and his team hoped to make the 1972 games feel as far from the 1936 games as possible, as a way to avoid association with Hitler.
During his younger years he made the very cool decision to not join the Hitler youth or fight in the Second World War, despite both being mandatory. After the war ended he married Igne Scholl, whose house he hid in to avoid going to war, and they opened the Ulm school of art together with their friend Max Bill in 1953. The school wanted to provide a diverse education embracing both the established ways of design methodology and the new industrial ideas. An example of embracing new industrial ideas was Aicher’s involvement with the German airline company called Lufthansa in 1962. He developed a comprehensive corporate identity for them with a logo and fonts to make them more recognisable and also taught this in his lessons.
By developing a colourful identity inspired by the Bavarian environment as well as focusing heavily on the athletes, Aicher and his team hoped to make the 1972 games feel as far from the 1936 games as possible, as a way to avoid association with Hitler.