Three Hundred Years of Civil Type

Watford, Hertfordshire, UK. October 22, 2005 — The Board of Directors of Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI) today announced its support to the initiative of a world-wide campaign in commemoration of the typographic reform of Czar Peter the Great.

The year 2008 marks three hundred years of the typographic reform of Czar Peter the Great of Russia. The reform had a profound, long-lasting effect on the development of Russian culture, science, education, politics, economy—practically, all walks of life. Its consequences for many non-Russian and non-Slavic cultures are hard to overestimate.

Peter the Great introduced a new style of printing type, featuring simplified letterforms. It was called Civil Type because it was designed for non-ecclesiastical publishing: official issuances, periodicals, technical literature, academic and educational print, fiction, poetry, etc. The use of the older style, poluustav, became limited, restricted to clerical print. Peter’s reform laid a foundation of modern Cyrillic typography as we know it—the style used to this day.

It is significant that the anniversary of Peter the Great’s reform comes at the time of the new beginning in the life of Russia, and against the background of the growing co-operation and integration of all European nations. Neither process is easy, nor was the challenge faced by Peter the Great in his efforts to open Russia’s “window to the West.” By design, it has a considerable international, cross-cultural dimension.

The tercentenary of Civil Type is expected to be widely celebrated across the academic, publishing and typographic communities, in Russia and world-wide. A global campaign is in the works, initiated and spearheaded by a group of font design professionals affiliated with ParaType, a Moscow-based digital type foundry. Major events are being planned as part of this campaign: conferences and seminars, exhibitions and competitions, presentations and publications, educational and research projects, etc.

The initiative has received an enthusiastic endorsement of the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI). ATypI is the worldwide organisation dedicated to the pursuit of activity relating to typefaces and typography. It provides the structure for communication, information, and action relating to all matters typographic for the international type community.

The Board of Directors of ATypI has appointed Maxim Zhukov its representative in the co-ordination of the events and projects-making part of the anniversary campaign.

More Info :

ATypI
W : http://www.atypi.org