The Birth of Graphic Design

Around the turn of the century, the poster became an art form. Toulouse-Lautrec in Paris, the Beggarstaffs in London, and Lucian Bernhard in Berlin stripped advertising down to a flat image, a product, and a name — the Sachplakat, or object poster.

This is the moment graphic design becomes recognizable as a discipline: an image made to communicate quickly, to strangers, in public. Everything since has been a variation on that problem.