Are posters still surfaces that catch the eye? Can they tell a continuous story, a “Poster Novel,” as the original design working title was called? Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences looks back on a diverse and lively tradition of posters. Starting in 1968 with Uwe Loesch’s corrugated cardboard posters, through the outstanding typographic poster formats by Helfried Hagenberg, Fons Hickmann, and Andreas Uebele, to contemporary works by talented students, sometimes extending into digital space and augmented reality.

Some of the posters shown in this book have continued their lives beyond the university: they are part of collections such as the MoMA in New York, or the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich. Recognized for their exemplary design, many have received numerous awards.

Now these posters have been brought together: Das Plakat isst eine Fläche. (a German wordplay for “The poster eats/is a surface”). Like in a galley proof, texts and images are set on a continuous strip, to be later cut and bound into a book—a poster novel.

This book contains posters from Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences since 1968. Featuring works by Inga Albers, Heribert Birnbach, Dieter Fuder, Wolf Erlbruch, Hilde Gahlen, Tino Graß, Fons Hickmann, Holger Jacobs, Wilfried Korfmacher, Anika Kunst, Laurent Lacour, Uwe Loesch, Alexander Mainusch, Jens Müller, Stephanie Passul, Charlotte Rohde, Lilo Schäfer, Thomas Spallek, Philipp Teufel, Andreas Uebele, Piotr Zapasnik, and many more.