One of the most fun things to see artists post on instagram are custom lettering and typographic artwork. Typography is one of those things that really sets a designer apart from the pack. But it's not easy to do, and unfortunately due to the fact that everyone uses text on a daily basis, it is a very misunderstood form of design. In fact, for a long time there was serious concern that the entire practice would die out. True enough, there are very few master typographers out there today and it is not something that design students are clamoring to master. With that being said, social media is helping to reward the designers who DO create beautiful type art.
I've previously written that too many designers identify with a progressive ideology. Too many fall in love with simplistic leftwing slogans and ultimately some of the best type designers help promote those messages with the subtle art of beautiful lettering. One great example of that happening was when Herb Lubalin agreed to be the Art Director and artist behind the radical Fact magazine. Lubalin had his hand in everything about the design of the magazine, including the lettering art for its masthead. This was the magazine that falsley claimed that thousands of psychologists believed Barry Goldwater was mentally unfit to be president. Goldwater sued them out of business in response and Ralph Ginzburg also landed himself in jail for mailing erotic material as part of another publication he started called Eros.
The fact that so many type designers are progressive gives the left a distinct advantage in the publishing world. They are virtually guaranteed to package horrible ideas into a user-friendly, beautifully styled presentation. It doesn't matter if those ideas say, promote perverted notions of sex and gender, as was the case of Ginzburg. Actually, Ginzburg was ahead of his time when it came to being a progressive fascinated by the sexually-perverse, now a common theme of the left. People like that should never be taken seriously on the public stage. However, I'm convinced that just as Herb Lubalin's art direction allowed Fact, which was essentially a self-published Zine to be taken seriously as a publication worth reading, modern day typographers are giving terrible messages a public stage by placing them in beautiful writing. Good typographers need to be conscientious because they can give dead messages new life.
Fortunately there are plenty of Conservative Designers bringing renewed attention to pro-American messages with their typographic art. They are breaking the stuffy conservative stereotype by using vibrant colors, avant garde treatments, and wild letterforms. All of this shows the inherently universal nature of conservative beliefs. Yes, you can love freedom and family along side utlra-mod condensed monoline fonts. Yes, you can be pro self-suffiency rather than welfare as well as a fan of graffiti letters. Let's take a look at a few of these designers that I've noticed entering the scene.
@TruthOverNarrative
This account came on the scene with their first post on October 26, 2020 right before the election and sports an awesome variety of type treatments. They'll post everything from blackletter, to handbrushed letters, thick condensed fonts, and even some script. Several posts are even animated. However, what I like best is the color treatments. So many of these combinations shouldn't work due to visual fry, but @TruthOverNarrative hits a perfect balance. Also, I'm a huge fan of their overlapping type designs.
Ana Marroquin is a graphic designer and illustrator out of Guatemala with a strong religious message to her lettering art. Her style is predominantly brush-lettering with a lighthearted flare. She also demonstrates some more formal lettering design in a handful of chalk-art posts. One of the things that I think distinguishes her account is an overwhelmingly friendly attitude, and fewer overtly-political posts.
Let me just point out that Kathy Kong is a damn good lettering artist. Her account is another one showcasing a lot of styles and a great sense of color that helps her lettering pop right off the screen. While her lettering all retains a distinctly hand-drawn aspect, she's able to range from ultra-geometric letters all the way to monoline. Many of her letters also have a ribbonlike quality. Definitely, my favorite thing that she does is create neighborhood guides out of large square text lockups that showcase a ton of styles in one design. She even does them in Chinese characters, which is really interesting to see because it's not everyday that you see typography outside of the phonetic alphabet.
These are three designers whose typographic work has caught my eye and exceeded the threshold where they can't be ignored or written off for their views. But there are tons of conservative accounts out there right now bringing lettering chops to the fore. It's a great trend, and the little-appreciated special sauce that's going to let conservative creators compete in the culture war.