American artist, designer, and writer Barbara Stauffacher Solomon (1928–2024) was the first to fuse Swiss Modernism with the West Coast aesthetic.
Barbara Stauffacher Solomon, 1955.
The result is formal but fun, modern architecture reshaped by color and form. In the 1960s, Barbara created Supergraphics mural at the Sea Ranch community in California, featuring huge stripes, arrows, and letterforms that fly across the room, becoming art that people can walk into. “I was a Californian. I went back to San Francisco and I broke all the rules. My designs were bigger and bolder than my Swiss classmates' solutions had been. Give me a big white wall and I covered it with big red stripes,” Barbara sums up her philosophy.
Sea Ranch ram's head logo designed by Barbara Stauffacher Solomon.
Stauffacher Solomon’s first major job as a designer was to develop the corporate style of the Sea Ranch—a community in California devised in 1964 by a group of young architects from the University of Berkeley and often referred to as “California’s modernist utopia”. In the late sixties, Stauffacher Solomon shook up the architectural world with her groundbreaking Supergraphics—an abstract mural blending Swiss style, wooden architecture, and bright colors.
Barbara Stauffacher Solomon, Moonraker Athletic Center interior supergraphics, 2018.
Graphic designer Jacqueline Casey (1927–1992) is best known for the posters she created for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Jacqueline Casey. © 2019 MIT Museum.
Strongly influenced by Swiss designers Karl Gerstner and Josef Müller-Brockmann, Casey was the foremost practitioner of the International Style in the US. She often created striking elemental imagery, using letterforms to turn her works into messages. “My job is to stop anyone I can with an arresting or puzzling image, and entice the viewer to read the message in small type and above all to attend the exhibition,” she said.
Six Artists poster, 1970. Design: Jacqueline Casey. © 2019 MIT Museum.
As a child, Casey wanted to become an artist. Her parents, however, did not support this desire. When Casey went to high school, they urged her to enrol in a bookkeeping and administration program. After graduation, Casey struggled to find a design job. For a while, she worked in a department store at the cash register, but later resigned and travelled to Europe. After returning, she felt ready to get back into the arts and focus on design. In 1955, Casey was recruited by Muriel Cooper to work in the Office of Publications at MIT. In 1972, Casey headed the Office of Publications at MIT.
Miscellaneous Motions of Kinetic Sculpture exhibition poster, 1967. Design: Jacqueline Casey. © MIT Committee of the Visual Arts.
Women in Science and Engineering poster, 1964. Design: Jacqueline Casey. © 2019 MIT Museum.