Cultuur in Gent
When living and working in Gent, Belgium, my partner Catherine Dal and I ran a tiny studio called Dorp & Dal (Village & Valley). Having started out as an art gallery, the studio remained firmly with one leg in the cultural realm, making brochures, books and leaflets for theater and art events, a gallery, and the Arts Department of the City of Gent (English spelling: Ghent).
Around the turn of the century we did about five issues of the Arts Department’s yearly newspaper and listings. On a visit to Prague during that time we had discovered the work by Czech type designer and virtuoso wood engraver František Štorm of Storm Type Foundry, and loved it. Štorm is a type history buff, but also displays a very personal view on letterforms. He produces work that is thorough, yet baroque and often theatrical.
The leading face on the 2000–2001 front page is Štorm’s slab-serif Farao, a whimsical variation on the theme of modern face-meets-Scotch-Roman. The supporting role went to Serapion, probably his wackiest and most personal variation on the Renaissance oldstyle. Text face is Ole Schäfer’s FF Fago.
