Birmingham’s iconic figure, John Baskerville, to be celebrated at the Hello Digital festival

‘Baskerville, the animated film’ will be put on by Birmingham City University and will explore the life and work of one of Birmingham’s greatest historical figures. The exhibition will also involve a communication wall which will be used to show the difference in text based communication over the last 250 years, from Baskerville’s typeface to modern day emailing and texting.

11 contributors were filmed, creating their characters in Fry's Baskerville, in Birmingham City University's MILO suite at Arts and Design Faculty in Gosta Green. The video documentation from the day is being developed into a series of 11 animated films, which form the basis of a large scale HD multi-screen installation at Millenium Point for the Hello Digital Festival.

The artwork is devised for a multi-screen installation of 11 iMacs on plinths arranged in a circle. Each iMac will be showcasing a short animated film, drawing/carving/constructing only one Baskerville letterform, created by a range of leading typographers/illustrators/lettering artists from the uk and beyond.

Collectively the installation will spell out BASKERVILLE simultaneously in the round.