Charlotte & Peter Fiell: 'Contemporary Graphic Design'

Representing more than 100 graphic designers, Contemporary Graphic Design is Taschen's lush encyclopaedia of the current movers and shakers in the world of graphic communications, with several pages worth of their adverts, album art, posters and corporate identity artwork alongside biographical info and short texts from the designers themselves.

From Helvetica to the complex ornamentation of software-aided design, to the post-modern phraseology of modern communications and its fashionable anti-capitalist leanings, this is intended to be a directory of cutting-edge look and feel, with its strong cross-over between art and brief-led design.

Included are Jurg Lehni - who has created code that puts much better effects on stuff than your average Photoshop filters, The Designers Republic - whose credits include everyone from Deutsche Bank to Warp Records, Jonathan Barnbrook - whose socially aware messages jar with the fact that on every other page in here is a strikingly beautiful ad for the likes of Nike, Farrow - whose Kylie CD cover you'll instantly recognise, and David Foldvari - who believes purely digital imaging is yesterday's news and traditional methods are the only way forward.

Foldvari has a point - while this compendium may give a great snapshot of what cuts the mustard for the pages of Dazed And Confused now, it will only be useful as a sourcebook for a while before graphic design takes a new turn. If you're going to spot design trends of the future anywhere though, this is a good place to look.

Published 31st August 2007 by Taschen.