Harald Geisler

Harald Geisler is an artist known for his typographic projects about the role of writing in society. He was born 1980 in Frankfurt am Main, Germany and graduated in 2009 at the University of Art and Design Offenbach am Main. In 2009 Geisler started creating typefaces and since then released 28 typefaces. With an emphasis on handwriting he developed a method to design fonts that focuses on movement rather than outlines. In 2013 while drawing a font based on Sigmund Freud's manuscripts he started to store multiple versions of each letter in the font instead of fixed ligatures, and created a technique called polyalphabetic substitution that would alter between multiple versions of each letter based on the surrounding letters. This means that when a typist types, the ligatures in each word change so that they are not overused, giving the writing a more realistic look. The technique was based on the rotating barrels of an Enigma encryption machine. His work is controversially discussed among designers and aims to engage a wider audience in a discourse about typography. His projects are often financed through crowdfunding.


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