Here is information about the Type Design Competition 2019.

Kanji Category

Kanji Category Osamu Torinoumi

Osamu Torinoumi

Type Designer

Message/Profile

The usage scope of typefaces has diversified and become more multifaceted. I feel that we are in an era that one typeface does not cover everything. From now on, we are required to have a clear concept and produce the most appropriate typeface for a specific purpose. Where to use, for what it will be used, what words, in what kind of context would you speak. There are a variety of methods to reach this. It can be an emotional process or a clear design concept. But keep it in mind that the important factor is that a character is a trajectory of the human hand. I expect fantastic works that I would never get tired of looking at.

Profile

Born in 1955 in Yamagata, Torinoumi joined Sha-Ken Co. Ltd. in 1979 upon his graduation from the Graphic Design department at Tama Art University. Torinoumi is the president and type designer of JIYUKOBO Ltd., which he established in 1989 with Tsutomu Suzuki and Keiichi Katada. He designed the Hiragino series and Koburina Gothic for Dainippon Screen Mfg. Co. Ltd., and has developed more than 100 typefaces for his company brand, focusing on basic typefaces such as Yu Mincho and Gothic of the Yu typeface library. Torinoumi is the recipient of the first Keinosuke Sato Typography Award in 2002, Good Design Award for the Hiragino series in 2005, and Tokyo TDC Type Design Award in 2008. He also teaches at Kyoto Seika University. He published A work creating characters (Shobunsha) and this book won Japan Essayist Club Award.

Kanji Category Ryoko Nishizuka

Ryoko Nishizuka

Adobe Systems Co., Ltd.,

Typekit, Japanese typography, Chief Typeface Designer.

Message/Profile

We are in an era where digital fonts are created and do not deteriorate unlike type. Therefore, it is important to figure out which aspect of the design should be valued. We no longer engrave lead and we rub ink less and less. It is crucial to find the same level of effort and value as the hard work designers and craftsmen in the past experienced rather than simply thinking fonts can be created as easily as they are now. Depending on your idea, you may exceed it, and there is not just one aspect to value. The more you concentrate on the frame around the letter, the deeper and wider you will wander. The possibilities are limitless. If you are in that situation, it is a good sign that fine work is being produced! Please try again and again through trial and error. The time and effort made will definitely be expressed in the final design. I am looking forward to provocative works.

Profile

Born in Fukushima in 1972, Nishizuka graduated from Muashino Art University, Visual Communication Design. In 1997, she joined Adobe Systems Co., Ltd., and has been involved in the development of Kozuka Mincho and Kozuka Gothic typefaces designed by Masahiko Kozuka. Then, released the Adobe’s original kana typefaces Ryo and Ryo Gothic family, the full proportional Kana typefaces Karazuki, Source Han Sans/Noto Sans CJK, Source Han Serif/Noto Serif CJK and Ten Mincho. Won the Morisawa Awards International Typeface Design Competition, the NY TDC Jury Award, etc.

Kanji Category Masaaki Hiromura

Masaaki Hiromura

Graphic Designer

Message/Profile

Today we are used to looking at and using digital fonts. I feel a bit sense of exhilaration when I encounter something printed by letter press. It may be related to the origin and creation of the type, but it would recall a feeling which is not only a visual experience. I think the sense of metal touching the paper and fluffing the edge as well as the sense of trailing one’s fingers on the edge inspires other senses such as hearing and taste.
Among many high-quality fonts, it will be nice to look for the potential forms that would induce senses other than the visual in new typefaces. I am looking forward to encountering typefaces with fresh senses.

Profile

Born in Aichi. In 1977, Hiromura entered Tanaka Ikko Design Office and in 1988, he established Hiromura Design Office. He has done extensive work on signage systems, CI and VI for commercial facilities and museums. Major awards: Mainichi Design Awards, KU/KAN Award, SDA Awards (Grand Prize), Good Design Award (Gold Prize). Recent Publication: From Design To Design.

www.hiromuradesign.com

Kanji Category Issay Kitagawa

Issay Kitagawa

GRAPH representative director.

Message/Profile

My favorite typefaces follow two paths.
One appears to be a seemingly normal typeface. It feels simple, however, upon closer inspection one finds new details and twists as if the God is in it. Despite this simplicity, it has a form that I would never tire of looking at and is easy to read.
The other would astonish me and lead me to wonder how the creator’s came up with this idea. But it is avant-garde and has a challenging creativity with a glimpse of extremely advanced and intelligent conception at the base of production.
Both typefaces have a different appearance, however I guess both would be produced with the following two points of views in common.
First, the ability to see the history from a deeper perspective. Second, the ability to lead on to think “there are things I do not know”, which leads on to scientific thinking.

Profile

GRAPH representative director. Born in 1965 in Hyogo. Kitagawa graduated from the University of Tsukuba in 1987 and is the member of AGI (Alliance Graphique Internationale). He was the judge at NY ADC and D&AD Awards. He won many awards such as TDC prize and JAGDA rookie of the year prize. With pursuit of the technology aiming “printed materials that cannot be thrown out” and the proposal of “Design as a management resource” from managements and designers’ perspective, he got widespread supports from clients ranging from regoinal SMEs to prominent overseas luxury brands. In the winter of 2016, “the Strange Hotel” which he did naming and branding was recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as “the first robot staffed hotel in the world”. He appeared on TV TOKYO, NHK and many other TV programs. (Photo: Kenshu Shintsubo)

Latin Category

Latin Category Cyrus Highsmith

Cyrus Highsmith

Type Designer

Message/Profile

I regret that I never entered this competition myself. I remember hearing about it when I was a student. I was too intimidated to send anything in though.
I’m still confident that my student work never would have won a prize. However, entering might have pushed me to work a bit harder, try something more daring, or start something new. Who knows? It was an opportunity that I didn’t take.
I know from experience that the judges take the time to look at every entry. Plus, this year we are new group with fresh energy, diverse experience, and lots of strong opinions. When we meet in Osaka for the judging, it will be an exciting and spirited few days of typographic exultation.
Whether you are student or a professional, don’t make the mistake I made. Enter the Morisawa Type Design Competition! I will look forward to seeing your typefaces—conventional or experimental, serif or sans, text or display, giant families or single styles—everything is welcome.

Profile

Cyrus Highsmith is a letter drawer, teacher, author, and graphic artist. His type foundry, Occupant Fonts, includes dozens of his original typefaces. He teaches type design at Rhode Island School of Design. He wrote and illustrated the acclaimed primer, Inside Paragraphs: Typographic Fundamentals. In 2015, he received the Gerrit Noordzij Prize for extraordinary contributions to the fields of type design, typography, and type education. In 2017, he became Creative Director for Latin Type Development at Morisawa USA.

Latin Category Ilya Ruderman

Ilya Ruderman

Type Designer

Message/Profile

Type design is a very specific area; in fact, it is magical to some extent. 
I remember the sheer delight I felt at seeing how large-scale forms and contours transformed into letters of my text in just one click and could be brought to life by pressing the keys on the keyboard. I still experience this somewhat childish feeling sometimes.  
Over the last few years, I have met plenty of young designers who are passionate about type design. The type industry is growing and getting younger, which is great. This is why such events as the Morisawa Type Design Competition are momentous, even compulsory.  
The Morisawa Type Design Competition is a unique industry event that offers an opportunity to see your true potential in a tough competition and a serious chance to move on to the professional level. Make sure you don’t miss it!

Profile

Ilya Ruderman, a type and graphic designer and teacher, lives and works in Moscow. In 202, he graduated from the Moscow State University of the Printing Arts (2002), where his graduation project was done under the supervision of Alexander Tarbeev. He has a MA degree in type design from the Type & Media program at the Royal Academy of Art in the Hague in 2005. After completing the program, he returned to Moscow, where he has collaborated for a number of media: Kommersant, Afisha, Moskovskiye Novosti, Bolshoi Gorod and Men’s Health Russia. In 2005-2007 he was art director for Afisha’s city guidebooks, following which he was art director for RIA-Novosti, a news agency, for several years. Since 2007, he has also supervised the curriculum in type and typography at the British Higher School of Art and Design in Moscow. He has been very active as a consultant on Cyrillic since 2008. In 2014 he founded CSTM Fonts with Yury Ostromentsky.

Typefaces by Ilya Ruderman: BigCity Grotesque Pro, Kazimir, Permian (a typeface-brand for the city of Perm) and Cyrillic versions of: Austin, Dala Floda, Graphik, Marlene, MoMA Sans, Typonine Sans, Thema.

Latin Category Indra Kupferschmid

Indra Kupferschmid

Typographer

Message/Profile

For many years I have been following Morisawa’s typeface design competition – maybe the most prestigious award in the field. In the 1990s it was my introduction to contemporary type design and where I learned the names of designers I want to remember and keep an eye on. Taking part in the competition can act as catalyst for your career and a big motivational milestone. It can be the testing ground for daring new designs as well as interesting historical pursuits, and I am looking very much forward to see your submissions.

Profile

Indra Kupferschmid is a freelance typographer and professor of typography and communication design at HBKsaar, University of Arts Saarbrücken, Germany. After studying visual communications at the Bauhaus-University Weimar and with Fred Smeijers in The Netherlands, she founded her own studio mainly focusing on book typography and bitmap fonts for consumer product interfaces.  As a designer and researcher she is preoccupied with type for more than 20 years and in all its incarnations: analog fonts, digital fonts, type and technology history, the classification of typefaces, terminology, DIN committees on legibility and type, wood engraving, and any combination of these. She is co-author of Helvetica Forever and other typographic reference books, contributes to various publications and websites, consults for the type and design industry and anyone who needs help choosing fonts. In 2015, she founded alphabettes.org bringing together experts in the field of type and community initiatives around the globe.

Latin Category Laura Meseguer

Laura Meseguer

Type Designer

Message/Profile

I encourage you to submit your typeface to the Morisawa Award, don’t miss the opportunity to show your talent to the world. It is highly challenging and rewarding work because is part of you. I hope yours will be the chosen among all the submissions because of its functionality, personality, and well-crafted design, all qualities required for a good typeface, able to communicate and emotion at the same time.

Profile

Laura Meseguer is a freelance graphic and type designer born in Barcelona. Her studio works for international and domestic clients but also in self-initiated projects. In 2003–2004, she took a year off from her regular work to study type design at the post-graduate course Type&Media at the Royal Academy of Arts in The Hague, the Netherlands. Through her own type foundry, Type-Ø-Tones, she publishes and promotes her type designs. Since then she has been teaching and giving talks and workshops around. 
As a typographer and type designer she is specialized in all sorts of projects involving custom lettering and type design, for branding and publishing design. For her personal practice she gets the inspiration from what is around and focuses in projects that mix that with her own vision of type and lettering, exploring the expressivity of letterforms. 
She is the author of TypoMag. Typography in Magazines, published by IndexBook and co-author of the book Cómo crear tipografías. Del boceto a la pantalla, published by Tipo e in Spanish and translated into Polish, Portuguese, English and Chinese. As part of the Typographic Matchmaking in the Maghrib project for the Khatt Foundation, she started the design of the multi script typeface family Qandus, a project developed with Kristyan Sarkis and Juan Luis Blanco that received the TDC 2017 Award.

www.laurameseguer.com

The Emeritus Jury

The Emeritus Jury Matthew Carter

Matthew Carter

Type Designer

Message/Profile

The last round of the Morisawa Type Design Competition, held in 2016, received twice the number of entries as the previous round. This excellent response produced winners in a diversity of styles that reflected the healthy state of contemporary type design. The jurors in the Latin Category were happy to find that a high proportion of entries came from students and recent graduates, evidence of the increased enthusiasm for the teaching of type design in schools. In the Kanji Category an equally encouraging trend has been a stronger emphasis on calligraphy.
During my own involvement with the Competition, dating back to 1992, I have seen it grow in international prestige as Morisawa has continued to further the state of the art by rewarding the best work of both established and emerging type designers. I’m sure that designers of all levels of experience will be inspired by the results of 2016 to enter this next Competition in even greater numbers.
From time to time over the history of the Competition the four-member jury in each category has changed to bring fresh points of view to the challenging task of selecting winners. This time three of the four members of each jury are newly appointed. I wish them the same happy satisfaction that my fellow jurors and I have always found in taking part in this special event.

Profile

Matthew Carter is a type designer with fifty yearsʼ experience of typographic technologies ranging from hand-cut punches to computer fonts. After a long association with the Linotype companies he was a co-founder in 1981 of Bitstream Inc., the digital typefoundry, where he worked for ten years. He is now a principal of Carter & Cone Type Inc., in Cambridge, Massachusetts, designers and producers of original typefaces.
His type designs include ITC Galliard, Snell Roundhand and Shelley scripts, Helvetica Compressed, Olympian (for newspaper text), Bell Centennial (for the US telephone directories), ITC Charter, and faces for Greek, Hebrew, Cyrillic and Devanagari. For Carter & Cone he has designed Mantinia, Sophia, Elephant, Big Caslon, Alisal and Miller.
In 2011 Monotype Imaging released his Carter Sans.
Carter & Cone have produced types on commission for Time, Newsweek, Wired, U.S. News & World Report, Sports Illustrated, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The New York Times, BusinessWeek, Le Monde, The Walker Art Center, the Museum of Modern Art, Yale University, and the Hamilton Wood Type Museum.
Starting in the mid-ʼ90s Carter has worked with Microsoft on a series of “screen fonts” designed to maximize the legibility of type on computer monitors. Of these, Verdana, Tahoma and Nina (a condensed face for hand-held devices) are sanserif types; Georgia is a seriffed design.
Carter is a Royal Designer for Industry, a member of the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame, and a Senior Critic on Yaleʼs Graphic Design faculty. He has received a Chrysler Award for Innovation in Design, the AIGA medal and the Type Directors Club medal, and a MacArthur Fellows Award. In 2011 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Design Awards, given by the Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum.