"This book is relevant to our times"
Interview with Michèle Ganser on Walter Benjamin’s “One-Way Street”
Walter Benjamin—the author best known for his thoughts on the aura of works of art—published the book *Einbahnstraße* in 1928, a collection of short literary and philosophical texts. The “Stuffed Birds” master’s program in Communication Design took on this work, analyzed it, and developed design concepts to present Benjamin’s ideas in a new light. In collaboration with the Büchergilde Gutenberg, the concept by Michèle Ganser was ultimately brought to life, and her work was published as a book by the Büchergilde in the fall of 2020.
Mareike Knevels asked Michèle Ganser how the publication came about. In the interview, the young designer discusses how she conveyed Benjamin’s complex perspectives in her illustrations, as well as the contemporary relevance of his texts.
Michèle, how relevant do you think Benjamin’s *Einbahnstraße* is today?
I find certain passages in this book more relevant than ever. The two chapters “Kaiserpanorama XIV” and “Zum Planetarium” are particularly apt for our times. Both texts deal with humanity’s exploitation of nature. Here, Benjamin critiques the society of his time: Unlike ancient peoples, this society is obsessed with greed and profit and can only “receive nature’s gifts by plundering them.” He writes quite aptly, “Since it plucks the fruits unripe in order to sell them cheaply on the market and must empty every bowl just to satisfy its hunger, its soil will become impoverished and the land will yield poor harvests.”
Especially today—at a time when climate change is becoming increasingly prevalent and we should be engaging more consciously with our planet—Benjamin’s ideas are just as relevant as they were some 100 years ago.
Benjamin is known for his philosophical, essayistic style. Some of his ideas are difficult to grasp. How were you introduced to Walter Benjamin’s text?
Before we delved into the book *Einbahnstraße*, Dr. Karen Knoll gave us a detailed overview of Benjamin’s life, the historical context, and further information about the book. This helped us students immensely in gaining a better understanding of Benjamin’s texts.
We then each read the book on our own, though it was a real challenge to understand the language, the ideas, and Benjamin’s intentions. Often, we read the texts over and over again and analyzed them sentence by sentence, word by word, until we began to grasp them to some extent.
Discussions with our fellow students were also a great help. In addition, our instructors—Prof. Charlotte Schröner, Prof. Monika Aichele, Eberhard Kirchhoff, and Karen Knoll—were always available to answer our questions. Thanks to the weekly guidance from the instructors, we were able to discuss our work with regard to various key areas—such as concept, ideas, design, and illustrations—and receive feedback and suggestions. We then implemented these tips the following week and discussed them again. There were also several interim presentations in the plenary session, which added some variety to the project discussions and helped the process along.
Did you have specific guidelines for the book design—a framework you were supposed to follow? Such as a set format, specific colors, or a medium like illustration or photography?
The only guideline concerned the book’s format, which was not to exceed DIN A4. Otherwise, we had complete freedom in the design. This is also evident in the diverse and varied final results: The range of illustrations spans from photographs, collages, or photomontages—such as those by Sandra Britz, which resemble small abstract works of art—to analog and digital illustrations.
The concepts underlying the individual projects could not have been more different. For Telmo Joao, Walter Benjamin’s descriptions of dreams served as the central starting point for his concept. Alexander Bihn, another fellow student, explored Walter Benjamin’s passion for theater and stage associations in *One-Way Street*. Each student found their own personal approach and unique interpretation, resulting in fantastic and diverse design concepts.
What did you take away from Benjamin’s “One-Way Street”?
Benjamin’s text taught me that unique qualities are often hidden deep within small, unassuming things. At first glance, the text is very convoluted and difficult to understand, but it explores fascinating and important themes.
Above all, what I took away from “Einbahnstraße” is that perseverance is important and pays off. The best moment is when, in the course of reading and hours of analysis, it finally “clicks”—you get a little closer to Benjamin’s way of thinking and can follow his train of thought.
“No one sees further than the back of the person in front of them.”
That sounds really beautiful—despite the effort. Is there a specific passage from the text that particularly influenced you in your work?
Yes, the statement “No one sees farther than the back of the person in front of them” from the chapter “Germans Drink German Beer.” This quote from Benjamin served as the starting point for the concept of my book.
I found it incredibly fascinating that Walter Benjamin was very critical of the “one-way street” of society in his time and described people, for example, as a “blind mass” (Kaiserpanorama, II.). According to Benjamin, the “blind masses” care only about their own interests and needs and remain oblivious to the meaningful things in life. It was important to me to use this message—which is still very relevant today—and to sensitize readers to the hidden elements and important themes in the book.
I imagine that wasn’t exactly easy to pull off: How did you approach the design? What inspired you? Can you tell us a bit about the creative process? As the idea for my concept and design began to take shape, the first things that came to mind were “hidden object” pictures and illustrated children’s books, in which content is often hidden in a similar way for children to discover. Since Benjamin’s texts are difficult to understand, I wanted to use my illustrations to help readers and encourage them to approach the texts in a playful way. However, the challenge was to avoid drifting into an overly childish illustration style and instead create images appropriate to the level of the texts. The sections of text that struck me as most interesting—and for which I already had a rough mental image—became the subject of my illustrations. I created compositional collages from individual elements that I had planned out beforehand. This allowed me to form an initial visual impression relatively quickly. The illustrations were then created using a black fineliner with a 0.05 mm line width. This line width allowed me to depict certain elements in great detail. The finished illustrations were then scanned at high resolution, cleaned of lint and dust particles in Photoshop, and colored blue. Finally, I placed my illustrations on the light blue background in the layout. Since, as you also mention, Benjamin’s texts are often very convoluted and can only be understood bit by bit—how did you come up with the motifs for your illustrations? Did the ideas come to you right away? Or did some motifs only emerge after reading the text several times? The rough concept came together pretty quickly. I wanted to experiment with two layers in my drawings, where the first layer—the general visual layer—is comparable to Benjamin’s descriptive texts. The second layer in my illustrations was meant to contain the hidden elements that symbolize the intention of the texts. I then went through a process leading up to the final illustrations: In my initial conceptual implementation, I took a different approach. Here, I experimented with two drawings that I layered on top of each other. One drawing was rendered in a dark, dominant tone, and I colored the other in a lighter tone. The drawing in the lighter tone thus became the “hidden layer.” With the help of a transparency, the reader was then supposed to see the hidden lighter elements more clearly than the darker ones when viewing the drawing. After consulting with the instructors, however, it quickly became clear that this more complicated addition of the transparency wasn’t necessary and that the design could be presented more simply. This led to my final illustrations.
Why did you choose the color blue for your book design? Is there a special connection to Benjamin? The colors I chose have no direct connection to Benjamin in terms of content. However, it was important to me to create a certain modernity in the layout and illustrations to provide a contrast to the content, which at first glance can sometimes seem rather “antiquated.” That’s why I opted for the dark shade of blue. This is complemented by the light shade of blue, which further highlights the blue areas in the illustrations. The stronger contrast allows readers to immerse themselves more deeply in the illustrations. The result is a beautiful book published by the Büchergilde Gutenberg. What was the collaboration with the Büchergilde like? In the “Stuffed Birds” seminar for our master’s program, we worked very closely with the Büchergilde Gutenberg. In mid-January 2020, we presented our concepts at a review session not only to the instructors but also to Cosima Schneider and Silvio Mohr-Schaaff. Cosima Schneider is the production manager at the Büchergilde, and Silvio Mohr-Schaaff is responsible for sales and marketing. Both of them took a lot of time to give each of us feedback on how to optimize our concepts and to offer helpful tips. After I learned that the Büchergilde had chosen my book, I continued to work closely with them for several more weeks. My primary point of contact was Cosima Schneider, who oversaw the book’s production; she took a great deal of time for me and was always there to assist with any questions I had. I learned a lot during this process as well: there are many aspects of book production to consider that I hadn’t even been aware of before. I was also very pleased when the Büchergilde offered me the opportunity to explain the concept and ideas behind “Einbahnstraße” to an audience at a bookstore in Zurich. I am very grateful for this experience, which allowed me to gain a great deal and learn a lot.
The “Stuffed Birds” master’s program in Communication Design was led by Prof. Monika Aichele, Prof. Charlotte Schröner, Eberhard Kirchhoff, and Dr. Karen Knoll.
