Typoésien – Heinz Waibl, Siegfried Höllrigl

Typoésie, a portmanteau word of poetry and typography, relates to the practice of the designing of typefaces, which is a matter of accuracy, balance, harmony, aesthetic viewpoints and something more besides. #heinzwaibl (1931 - 2020) and #siegfriedhollrigl (1943), both well-versed in this practice, were also friends and closely connected to Meran/o.

Kunst Meran #meranoarte is dedicating a double exhibition to them in 2023, the first posthumous retrospective for #heinzwaibl and the most comprehensive to date for #siegfriedhollrigl, who celebrates his 80^th birthday in August 2023.

Continuing its extensive 2019 research work into Alpine product #design (Design from the Alps, Kunst Meran Merano Arte), the focus of this project for 2023 is on print #design.

Originally from Meran/o, graphic designer #heinzwaibl is regarded as one of the 20^th century’s most important representatives of visual communication. His professional career centred on Milan, Chicago and Johannesburg: Meran/o, his family home, was a place of longing and refuge throughout his life. During the Second World War, #heinzwaibl lived in Tirolo and Bressanone, and later in Misurina and Reischach. In 1950, Waibl’s knowledge of German allowed him to work for Sigfried Giedon on the #design of the Italian edition (published by Hoepli) of Space, Time and Architecture, published in 1941 by Harvard University Press. Waibl then dropped out of his architecture studies at the Politecnico and decided to become a graphic designer. He gained key experience in the Milan studio of Swiss graphic designer Max Huber and produced designs and finishes for La Standa, La Rinascente and Borsalino. In 1956 Waibl received an award in recognition of his work for La Rinascente with Scafaletto Jolly (manufactured by Artform) at the renowned Compasso d’Oro #design competition. In 2014, the m.a.x. museo in Chiasso (CH), a museum specialising in graphic #design, dedicated an extensive personal exhibition to him: yet #heinzwaibl remains largely unknown in South Tyrol. In collaboration with m.a.x. museo, which now holds Waibl’s estate, and the Waibl family, the exhibition at Kunst Meran #meranoarte will #show major designs and projects, as well as unpublished works from the years 1950 to 2020. As part of the preparations for the exhibition, Heinz Waibl’s wife Laura and his daughter Martha have decided to give away Heinz Waibl’s magazine archive to interested visitors during the event, thus bringing part of his estate to Meran/o.

Heinz Waibl’s logos for South Tyrolean companies, such as for Schweitzer Project in Naturno or Lichtstudio Eisenkeil in Marlengo, have also become part of local business history. In 1960, Leo Schweitzer commissioned the corporate #design for the Schweitzer company and, in 1961, Arthur Eisenkeil contracted the #design for his Eisenkeil lighting studio. As the lamps of the-then still new label Flos, subsequently to attain international popularity, had been developed by Eisenkeil together with the designers Achille and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni in Marlengo in the late 1950s, Waibl was also commissioned with their #design. Pirelli, Bticino, teleMike, Gasparotto, Gavina and American Airlines were just some of the other companies for whom Waibl developed visual images. He held a chair in visual #design at the Milan Scuola Politecnica di Design from 1971 to 2004, influencing numerous students over this period. In 1974 Waibl became a member of the AGI, the Alliance Graphique Internationale, serving from 1994 to 2003 as president of the Italian section and, as such, organising the international congress of the AGI in Amalfi in 1995.

Unlike #heinzwaibl, #siegfriedhollrigl may not be at home in the big wide world; he has nevertheless succeeded in incorporating the world into his craft in literary and artistic ways. A trained typesetter, later working as a machine typesetter and proof-reader in Bolzano, in 1985 he founded his Werkstatt für Literatur, Typographie und Graphik (Workshop for Literature, Typography And Graphics), moving it from a Bolzano cellar to his parents’ house in the Steinach district of Meran/o in 1987 and, supported by Brigitte M. Widner, in 1993 opened it as a full-time operation under the name Offizin S. The same year saw the holding of the Meran/o Poetry Prize for the first time: not least because of this, Offizin S. made a name for itself far and wide with broadsheets, brochures for bibliophiles and books. From 2006 to 2013, 23 editions of verse were produced by Offizin S. with graphic supplements. Since 2016, the focus has been on the 101 Gedichtplakaten (poetry posters), most of which have been completed.

The list of names from the fields of literature and the plastic arts is long and includes authors such as Roberta Dapunt, Kurt Drawert, Sabine Gruber, Peter Handke, Ulla Hahn, Elfriede Jelinek, Sarah Kirsch, Michael Krüger, Friederike Mayröcker, Cees Nooteboom, Ilma Rakusa and Joseph Zoderer, as well as artists such as Peter Fellin, Paul Flora, Annemarie Laner, Gabriele Rothemann, Reiner Schiestl, Josua Reichert, Abi Shek and Markus Vallazza.