In the middle of the 20th century, the world of design and cinema was introduced to one of the most influential visual artists to-date: Saul Bass. Starting out as a boy from the Bronx, NY, Bass took night classes at Brooklyn College to pursue his design dreams. He married his first wife, Ruth Cooper, in 1938 and had two children before moving to Hollywood in the late 1940s. Bass’s career began with his producing advertisements for movies in the print medium, eventually gaining the attention of certain directors who took a chance on the young man from New York—a chance that paid off. Over his lifetime, Saul Bass was famous for creating movie title sequences, posters, and logos for over 40 years in Hollywood. His work has become an iconic part of his era and has made a large impact on the design world as a whole.
Bass’s first big break came after he had produced three print ads for the same director: Otto Preminger. Preminger drafted Bass to work on the poster for his newest film, Carmen Jones, and was astounded by his work. Bass was quickly asked to take part in the design of the title sequence of the film, which led to him creating something that no one had really done before: a title sequence which included the style of the film and quickly immersed the viewer. This was the first of many title sequences Bass would go on to create. His fresh perspective would eventually revolutionize the film industry by taking something people would largely ignore, a title sequence, and turning it into a unique design element that not only excited the viewer, but pushed the boundaries of design in and around the film.
In 1955, Bass’s prospering Los Angeles studio gained a new employee: Elaine Makatura, an artist with a background in fashion and music. She became Bass’s assistant, and proved her worth while working alongside him on Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus. They married shortly after Bass’s divorce in 1960, having two children together, and became an influential design crafting team for print advertisements, film posters, and title sequences alike. Bass is famously quoted in an interview for the 1977 film Bass on Titles, saying “I had felt for some time that audience involvement with a film should begin with its first frame.” It was this mentality, and the creative cloud surrounding him, that powered Bass into his golden ages of creation. His modernist design aspects became a famous part of many Alfred Hitchcock films and posters such as Vertigo, Psycho, The Shining, and North by Northwest, as well as several Martin Scorsese films, including Goodfellas and Cape Fear.
In the work of Bass spanning print, cinematic, and logo design, certain elements and principles of design are readily apparent. Most notably seen are principles such as rhythm, in which the basic elements of a piece are distributed in a way to create a feeling of movement. Bass also used emphasis to draw the viewer’s attention to a certain component, and make elements contrast in other areas. A good example of these two principles being used in Bass’s work is Vertigo (pictured above, left). In the Vertigo poster, Bass uses spiraling white lines to lead the viewer’s eyes to the center of the poster where the action is taking place. Many of his works use similar styles, such as the poster for The Man With The Golden Arm (pictured above, right), in which strong black blocks frame the arm and title of the film in the center of the poster. Principles and style choices such as these are what made his work so iconic, and his use of modern styles in an era that was just beginning to depart from tradition inevitably led to his fame skyrocketing.
The field of design was impacted by Bass’s work in three main ways. First, he kick-started a dramatic push towards a new style of title sequences which impressed the viewer with their content instead of just sharing it with them. Second, he used type in a way that was active and fluid, coining his own term “kinetic type” in the process. It moved and jumped across the screen in ways that had never been seen before and would lead to many replications by designers since. Third, Bass showed that designs in a modernist and abstract way could still be timeless and unique. His take on logos created branding for companies with some still being used today, such as the Girl Scout logo, with the exception of light tweaks taking place in 2010. Bass showed the design world that logos did not have to be imitations of their brand, but could be abstract and symbolic in ways that translated across all mediums. In addition to his impact on the field of design, Bass also impacted the world of film. In addition to his title sequences, he directed creating storyboards for films such as Grand Prix, West Side Story, and most famously influenced the famous shower murder scene in Psycho.
There is no question that Saul Bass was a master of his craft. His career stretched from the field of printed visual design to vivid cinematic sequences and spanned more than 40 years. Even though Bass passed away in 1996, his impact remains; for example, the multi-million dollar company Pixar famously mimicked his style in their opening sequence of Monster’s Inc. His vision and ability to create something that stood out while drawing the viewer in is what makes him and his work so special. Bass’s work will live on, and the design world will forever be marked by his creations and unforgettable style as his influence continues to flow through the ever-changing landscape of popular culture.