Last Sunday I was in the protestant church and I noticed this amazing big wooden cross created from square kufi pattern.

A Lebanese Christian Arabic calligrapher named “Istfén” created the square kufi pattern in 1995.

I did not have my camera with me. So I took some pics with my mobile cam. I will try to take some better pictures and post them instead of these.

"bonjour" word created by Michel Issa

Hang-up of some of the words created during the workshop.
The words from Left to right: "amanda" by Amanda El Kaddissi, "Karen" by Karen Toutounji, "Zeina" by Zeina Baaklini, "Sabaho" by Celine Doumit, " Maria" by Mariam Der Mosessian, "Pamela Ego" by pamela Ego, "Joanna" by Joanna Assouad, "Rana" by Rana El Maddad, "Jad Eid" by Jad Eid.

sketch book of Stephanie Eid. The words from top to bottom are: Pascal, Leban and Elie.

"Zeina" created by Zeina Aoun.

Sketches of Jad Eid

"Joanna" created by Joanna

"Pascal" created by Stephanie on her sketchbook

Dissecting letter-forms into basic components and finding glyphs that share similar based components in their construction:

Sketches of Celine Doumit

Sketches of Joanna Assouad

Al Rouiya is an elegant and sturdy Arabic typeface based on the Naskh style with a medium contrast, condensed letterforms, strong baseline, large Loop/Tooth heights and short Ascender/Descender heights. Traditional pen stoke are preserved but drawn in a modern feel. This characteristic can be clearly seen in the “heh”, “waw”, “lam” and other glyphs. The letterforms are balanced with the heavy baseline unlike old styled headlines fonts where the baseline is too thick and the letterforms are so weak and light.

A pdf of the main page of the newspaper with the type in use.

Alef Caps is a pixel font inspired from the arabesque “Msharabiyé” eight-star shape. It is a Mono-spaced (all the letters have the same width) with seven pixels in width and eight pixels in height. Three fonts are present in the type-family. 1.Alef Caps A, the pixel letters are reserved out on an eight-star shape serving as a background for the letters, 2. Alef Caps B, the letters are created from the eight-star pixel matrix and 3. Alef Caps C, same as "Alef Caps B" but the negative space is filled with the inner circle of the eight-star pixel. All three fonts are based on the same concept, but each gives a slightly different feel when typeset. The font is intended for use as a Drop Initial Caps and not for Titling, though some words with specific letter combination look nice when typeset with Alef Caps.

You can download the font for free from my website. Enjoy ;)

Alef Caps A:

Alef Caps B:

Alef Caps C:

The Pixel Type concept was proposed to the client alongside two other concepts. The first concept was a Latin type inspired from Floral Kufi with ornaments around the letters, and the second concept was a Latin type inspired from the Square Kufi patterns and Arabesques.

Here is some outlined and sketched letters that i worked on for the presentation:

Latin type inspired from Floral Kufi

Latin type inspired from the Square Kufi

The two typefaces: 1. Arabic "Al Rouiya Headlines" and 2. Latin "Alif Arabesque Pixel" are my latest projects that i am working on at the moment. I will write more about the new typefaces when they are published.

Happy New Year and may 2008 be a fruitful and successful year to all.

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Khatt Fonts: Matchmaking Beirut – Amsterdam (Art Lounge)

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29letters Lecture (AUB)

I have recently bought Arabic and Latin movable metal type. They were for an old Arabic printing press in the Shouf area in Mount Lebanon. The owner of the movable letters wanted to sale them as trash, and I was lucky to find out about them and save the valuable metal letters from being melted done or simply trashed.

9 Arabic fonts and 6 Latin fonts was what I got. Along with one Composing Stick.
What is amazing is that the Arabic mattress is twice as big as the Latin one.

For the Arabic, I got one Arabic Naskh typeface in 8pt, 12pt, 24pt Regular and Bold.
For the Latin I have Helvetica Italic in 48 pts, one Serif type named Romine and one Sans Serif type named Europe. Each of Romine and Europe are in 12 pt and 18pt.

I made a wooden closet for the Latin mattresses based on the traditional closet shape for the drawers...
 As for the Arabic mattresses, I am still thinking what is the best way to store or display them. I am thinking of a metallic shelves system to put the Arabic huge mattresses in since the wood will not be strong enough the hold them.

I am now in the process of cleaning them from dust, so this is taking me hell of a time. Whenever I have some time off or need to take a brake from work, I clean some letters.

My next step is to find and buy the traditional printing press, but this will take more time for me to put aside the price amount of it…


Then maybe open a small press for educational use where students can come and typeset type. And for sure I can use I to make some prints with it…

I would also like to know the names of the Arabic fonts and know their origins. When and where they were casted? Where were they before they got to the Shouf press?...

Snap shot of two spread from my section in the magazine.

The questioned asked where about my own Arabic type design work and my view on the Arabic type industry and market at the present moment. i will post the interview on my blog after a while.

Imarat Headlines
Imarat Headlines is a young, strong and bold Arabic typeface based on the Neo-Naskh style (Naskh Mastari). It is a crispy type with a medium contrast (neither high nor low in contrast; in-between) and condensed letters to make long headline sentences fit on the tabloid. The stroke weight is balanced in the letters and not like other headline typefaces where the baseline is so thick and the letters are week and appear like small upper and lower strokes. Imarat Headlines has a strong baseline and the letters sit strongly on it without making the baseline thicker then the letters by themselves. What also gives Imarat Headlines the sturdy look is the very large Loop and tooth heights and short ascender and descender heights.

Imarat text
Imarat text is still in development and is intended for use in newspaper copy text. It is a condensed flowing Naskh style typeface with short ascenders and descenders in order to be set with a small inter-linear space.

The main idea is to deal with Arabic and Latin script in public space. Don asked me for contacts of Arabic Calligraphers and Arabic graffiti artist. I have already put him in contact with my arabic calligraphy friends, but for sure he needs more contacts.
If any Arabic calligrapher or Graffiti artist (or if someone knows a good Arabic calligrapher or Graffiti artists) is interested in this project, then please write a comment on this post or contact me directly via email.

Design of the White Scarf by Kj using Sada Bold. The text on it is the lyrics or the song "YA Maré' 3al Taya7een" for Fairuz.

Wael, Kj, Maria, Ray, Abi (the 5 young Arabic graphic designers) and I were invited by Mediamatic to come to Amsterdam for 6 weeks before the opening of the EL HEMA exhibition to work on the making of this exhibition. The aim of the exhibition was the put the 5 new Arabic typefaces of the TTM project (Fedra Arabic, Sada, Fresco Arabic, BigVesta Arabic and TheMix Arabic) to applications (items and products) that are going to be sold in the EL HEMA exhibition; and to create a culture awareness and exchange between the Arabic and Dutch cultures. Some of the products produced were Chocolate letters, Chocolate bars, Chocolate sprinkles, Wine bottles, Coffee bags, T-shirts, Socks, Underwear, Scarves, Djalabas, Condoms and other stuff.

The shelves of red wine bottles designed by Abi using Sada.

I was the design director and manager of the Arabic design team. It was a great experience to manage a big project like this and gain experience from the collaboration of the Arabic team with the Mediamatic team. Beside our team we had a fashion designer “Maika”, photographer “Marieke”, interior designer, exhibition organizer “Vari” and journalist “Joann” (and for sure not to forget the Directors of Mediamatic “Willem” and “Jans” and all the volunteers how helped). All of us collaborated to make the EL HEMA exhibition come true.

The Chocolate bars designed by KJ using TheMix Arabic and Sada.

Design of the Chocolate letters pack designed by Wael using Fedra Arabic.

Design of the coffee pack designed by kj using BigVista Arabic.

Design of Condoms pack by Abi using TheMix Arabic.

Design of the Djalaba pack by Raya using TheMix Arabic.

Design of a women's underwear designed by Wael using Sada.

What was also interesting that besides doing the design work, we also modeled for the photo shoots and the fashion show. That was fun.

During the development of the El HEMA exhibition, the press took a great interest in the project and almost everyday we had journalists from Newspapers, television stations and radio stations come to mediamatic and interview us and have a look on what we are doing. Below is a list of some of the articles and interviews written about the EL HEMA on the following links:

Newspapers:
De Pres
Trouw
NRC Handelsblad
Amsterdam Weekly

Photo of the article in DePers newspaper.

Photo of several Newspapers with articles about El HEMA.

Televison:
Channel 3
Channel At5
Zoomin tv

Wael speaking about the white scarf with Fairuz song "Ya Mari' 3al tawahin" on it designed by Kj using Sada Bold.

Kj speaking about the Chocolate bars that he has designed using Fedra Arabic and Sada.

The opening of the El HEMA exhibition was a great success. Most of the products were sold out by Sunday (which is only two days from the opening). The Dutch people and tourists of Amsterdam just loved the Arabic adaptation of the HEMA products to Arabic and were interested with the new Arabic typefaces displayed in the environmental design of the exhibition and the Design of the products by themselves. A queue line was building up all day long on the entry of the exhibition. That was great. ☺

Opening day. Huge success.

Me wearing the white scarf with Sada on it. :)

The El Hema t-shirts.

As for the Arabic fonts that i was involved with:
1. I designed SADA as a companion type of Seria which is designed by Martin Majoor.
2. I finalized the design of TheMix Arabic Bold after Lucas de Groot and developed the TheMixArab Regular.

For more info and links about the EL HEMA exhibition, please have a look on the following links:
EL HEMA on ThePlace website
El Hema grand opening a success
El HEMA first days: huge success
El Hema late nite
El Hema – Exhibition / Store
Arabising El Hemame

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All the pictures in this post were taken by Wael & KJ.

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1. Arabic Calligraphy:

Traditional Arabic Calligraphy schools base their teachings on three writing systems created by the Arabic calligrapher “Ibn Muqlah” in the ninth century. The three systems are: 1.Nizam Al-Dairah, 2.Nizam Al-Nuqat and 3.Nizam Al-Tashabuh.

Nizam Al-Dairah:

Nizam Al-Nuqat:

In brief, Nizam Al Dairah (system of the circle) bases all the letterforms on a circle. The diameter of the circle is determent from the height of the letter “Alef”. Nizam Al-Nuqat (system of the dots) bases the proportions of the letters on dot counts. The rhombic dot is determent from the thickness of the calligraphic pen used, whereas the dot count of each letter is dependent on the Arabic calligraphic style chosen. Refer to the picture below.

Nizam Al-Nuqat with respect to the "alif" of each Calligraphic Style:

The Thuluth style has the longest “alef” while the Ruqâa and Persian styles have the shortest “alef”. Both Nizam Al-Dairah and Nizam Al-Nuqat initiate from the height of the “alef” and the Arabic calligraphic style, then all the other letters and drawn accordingly.

Nizam Al-Nuqat in the Thuluth Style:

The third system, Nizam Al-Tashabuh (system of similarity), is based on similar pen strokes used in several letters. For example, the “seen.final” and “sad.final” share the same ending stroke, the “waw.isol” and “qaf.isol” share the same starting loop or eye, the “ain.isol” and “hah.isol” share the same ending stroke and so forth for all the letters

Nizam Al-Tashabuh:

Usually Nizam Al-Nuqat is the most referred to writing system. Arabic Calligraphy students write several calligraphic exercises based on the Nizam Al-Nuqat for the most common Arabic calligraphic styles (1.Kufi, 2.Naskh, 3.Thuluth, 4.Diwani, 5.Persan, 6.Riqâa, 7.Maghrébi) before they become good Arabic calligraphers. Below is an example of an exercise.

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2. Arabic Type Design:

When it comes to type designing the three calligraphic writing systems are transformed into guidelines and components. Upon starting an Arabic typeface design, the first step to do is to choose a calligraphic style to refer to while drawing the letters. The choice of calligraphic style is directly depended on the purpose and use of the typeface. For example, most text Arabic typeface are based on the “Naskh” style, while most display Arabic typefaces are based on “Kufi” or “Diwani”. Whether the drawn typeface is modern or traditional; it must always refer to a certain calligraphic style if it needs to be professionally done. After choosing the calligraphic style, the guidelines fo the typefaces need to be determent. The guidelines are: 1.baseline stroke thickness (which is also linked to the overall stroke thickness), 2. the loop height/s, 3. the tooth height/s, 4. the ascender height/s and the descender height/s. There is no x-height since there is no “x” in the Arabic alphabet. Instead of one x-height in Latin typefaces, there is loop and tooth height/s in Arabic typefaces. The Arabic letters do not all have the same heights as Latin letters. Below is two examples of new Arabic typefaces that are part of the “Typographic Matchmaking 01“ project.

Sada Guidlines:

TheMixArab Guidlines:

The first is SADA and the second is TheMixArab. Sada is based on the Naskh style while TheMixArab is based on the Kufi Style. Notice the guidelines in each typeface. Since Sada is based on the Naskh style, the letters are more flowing and they do not all have the same heights. In Sada there is two tooth heights, two loop heights, one ascender height and two descender heights. On the contrary, TheMixArab has one guideline used for loop height and tooth height, one descender and one ascender. Since the Kufi style is more geometric, TheMixArab does not need as much guidelines as Sada. The Naskh based typeface is more calligraphic then a Kufi based typeface and hence needs more guidelines to make all the letterforms harmonious. So depending on the Arabic typeface designed and the purpose of its design, the guidelines will be decided on by the type designer. There isn't one rule that fits all Arabic typefaces as in the Latin typefaces. The guidelines in Arabic type designing replace both “Nizam Al Dairah” and “Nizam Al-Nuqat” in calligraphy. The third writing system “Nizam Al-Tashabuh” is replaced by components. Components in type designing are pen strokes that are used to create several letters. Examples of letters that use components are the same as the ones listed in “Nizam Al-Tashabuh” previously. In the Arabic alphabet there is 17 basic pen strokes that build up the whole alphabet. Take a look of the Fontlab file bellow.

All the pink colored glyphs are drawn and become components for all the other glyphs that are white. All the white glyphs are composed from components.

The balance and harmony of the whole typeface start from the mentioned main three points.
1. Choice of an Arabic calligraphic style, 2. Creating the guidlines and 3. drawing the basic components for the whole typeface.

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3. Testing words and sentences to achieve proportionality:
Testing words and sentences are drawn at the beginning of an Arabic type design project. The testing words are used to achieve proportionally in the glyphs drawn before embarking on all the glyphs of the typeface. It is wise to spend some time at the launch of an Arabic type design project on test words then to move fast on drawing the entire letters and then notice that the proportionality between them is not working. Testing words are like the corner stone for a typeface. Once it is well drawn, the creation of the remaining glyphs moves smoothly. Below is two examples of Arabic testing sentences written with Sada and then with TheMixArab.

The first test sentence I made with my typography students at AUB. It is “ houm wa tarabishahunna raqasou al-dabka”. The second is taken from Huda AbiFarès book “Arabic Typography”. It is “hiya qatou’ al mash’aladan”. Unlike Latin, there are no standard testing words or pangrams for the Arabic script. A pangram is a testing sentence that contains all the letters of the alphabet. For the Latin we have “handgloves” & “hambourgefontsiv” as testing words. “The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog” is the most famous English pangram. Since Latin is detached, it is easy to create pangrams for it, but when it comes to the Arabic script, it is more difficult and actually impossible to have all the Arabic letters and there different shapes according to their position in the words in one sentence. That is why there is no standard testing words or pangrams for Arabic. Each Arabic type designers creates his/her own words and sentences according to the type project. What is important in all the testing words is that they should have letters with ascenders ("alef", "kaf","tah"), descenders ("reh" "noon", "hah", "ain"), eyes ("waw"), loops ("feh") and teeth ("seen", "teh") for the Arabic script; ascender ("h","d"), descender ("p","g"), and several main letters for the x-heigth ("n", "a", "e", "o" and others) for the Latin script.

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Pascal Zoghbi 17 August, 2007.

1.1 The origin of the Arabic script goes back to the first alphabets which were created by the Phoenicians. The Phoenicians were living on the costal area of Lebanon, Palestine and Syria. Since the Phoenicians were business traders sailing the Mediterranean, the alphabet influenced all the Mediterranean nations. The location of the middle-east being in the center of the ancient world (between the east and the west) also played a part in the spreading of the alphabet. So that is why the Phoenician alphabet is the mother of the Latin as well as the Arabic script.

In 1300 BC, the early Phoenician alphabet (consisting of 22 consonants without capitals written from right to left) was born in the city of Byblos on the coastal side of Lebanon. In 1000 BC, the Aramaic alphabet originated from the Phoenician in Aram (Syria and Mesopotamia) which represented the language of the Arameans. In 100 BC, the Nabatean script was born in the city of Petra north of the Red Sea (present day Jordan) and spread all over the middle-east. In 100 AD, the Syriac alphabet (22 letters) was created in Mesopotamia developing also from the Aramaic. Mid of the first century, the early Arabic alphabet was created in Kufa (Iraq). The old kufi (Archaic Kufi) contisted of around 17 lettersforms without diacritic dots or accents. Afterwards the diacritic dots and accents were added in order to help pronunciation and the set of Arabic letters rose to 29 (including the Hamza). With the birth of Islam, the Quran became the reason to reform all the Arabic scripts found in Arabia. One unified well structured Arabic script with 29 letters was developed for the writing of the holy scripts of the Quran in the 7th century AD. Primarily the Quran was written with the Quranic kufi script and later it was written with the Quranic Naskh style. From its creation in the Arabian Peninsula, the Arabic alphabet spread to all of the middle-east, northern Africa and even reached Spain due to Islamic conquests. Since Arabic was the language of the Quran hence of God, all the occupied nations were forced to use the Arabic language.

1.2 Several Arabic calligraphic styles developed from different Arabian cities, different writing techniques and different writing tools. The most known Arabic calligraphic styles are: 1-Kufi (Old Kufi & Ornamented geometric Kufi), 2-Thuluth, 3-Diwani & Diwani Djeli, 4-Naskh, 5-Persian, 6-Ruqaa and 7-Maghrébi.

The name of the Kufi originated from the city Kufa in Iraq. The Naskh and Diwani originated during the Ottoman empire, the Naskh is named after the ‘naskh’ action when the scribes copy Arabic text, while the Diwan name is originated from the political documents named in Arabic ‘Diwan’. The Thuluth name originated from the names of several bamboo sticks that were used as tools for writing. The Ruqaa name originated from the leather paper ‘Ruqaa’ that it was written on. While the Persian style originated its name from the Persian language. Today, most of the text typefaces available are based on the Naskh or the Thuluth Style. The other styles like the Kufi, Diwani and Maghrébi are found in display typefaces.

During the industrial revolution in Europe and the invention of the movable type, several Arabic typefaces were made in France, Italy, England, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands between the 16th century until the 18th century. The first Turkish press using Arabic printing types was found in 1727 in Istanbul and the first Middle-eastern Arabic printing press existed in a Christian monastery in Mount-Lebanon in 1733 where the first Arabic book was published in 1735.

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2. BRIEF ASPECTS OF ARABIC TYPE.
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2.1 The Arabic Alphabet consists of 29 consonants and 11 vocalization marks in the shape of accents. The basic structure of the alphabet can be found in only 19 basic shapes. But since the letters change their shape according to their position in the word (initial, medial, final or isolated) then the set of glyphs will add up to 106 (since 23 letters have 4 alternative shapes and 7 letters have 2 alternative shapes). If we add the 2 indispensable ligatures of Lam Alef then the number will be 108. Finally, since the Arabic alphabet is also used in some non-Arab languages, more alterations to the letter were made to represent all the added non-Arabic phonetics which leaves the number of glyphs at 130. Moreover, the number of glyphs can increase even more if we also count all kinds of combinations within the letters if the typeface need to fully mimic the calligraphic hand written Arabic script. So according to each typeface, the number of glyphs can start with 130 and end in hundreds.

2.2 The following image shows the 4 developing layers of the Arabic script. The first line shows only the basic shapes of the letters. The second line illustrates the added diacritic dots on some letters which require it. The third line adds the vocalization marks for better pronunciation. The final line shows a decorated sentence where some decorative elements were added to the script to make it more elegant or holy. Usually in the everyday text only the diacritic dots and some vocalization marks will be added to the script. The decorative elements will only be added to display words or sentences.

The four typographic elements of the Arabic script are: 1. Basic letterforms, 2. Diacritic Dots, 3. Vocalization marks 4. Decorative elements (without mentioning the numerals, punctuation marks and symbols).

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3. THE MODERN HISTORY OF ARABIC TYPE FROM THE 30’S TILL PRESENT.
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In 1936 and 1938, the Academy of the Arabic Language in Cairo held a conference for the purpose of the standardization of non-Arabic phonemes due to translation from English, French or other languages. The solution was to add some diacritic dots on some letters and give it the proper phoneme. In 1945, the Academy launched a worldwide competition to reform and simplify Arabic to make it easier to learn (both to read and to write it). Between 1947 and 1958 many proposals were submitted to the academy but none of them was accepted. In between 1955 and 1959, the academy assessed the last batch of submitted projects and also rejected all of them. The committee then decided to limit the changes or simplification to basic three typographic rules: 1- Standardization of additional Arabic letters that represent non-Arabic sounds. 2- Vocalization marks were made obligatory for educational books. 3- The Arabic character set was reduced from 300 to 169 letters, which only consists of the basic variation forms of the letter and some indispensable ligatures and letter connections.
It was the period after World War II and most of the Arab nations were getting their independence from the European colonial powers and building their own infrastructure. The competition of the Academy of the Arabic Language reflects the educational, social and technological development in the Arab nations and the need for a new simplified Arabic script that fits with the new type techniques then (i.e. the typewriter and the typesetting machine with movable type).
The projects were categorized into three groups: 1- Projects that broke all the characteristics of the Arabic script and used the Latin letters. 2- Projects that converted the vocalization forms of the vowels into extra letters. 3- Projects that proposed a single letterform per letter and making the Arabic detached.

The following projects are the most interesting proposals:

3.1 The Unified Arabic typeface by Nasri Khatar (1911-1998) from Lebanon was proposed in 1947. Architect, Type Designer, Inventor, Painter, Sculptor, Poet. A dual American-Lebanese national, Mr. Khattar was an Arabic consultant to IBM in the fifties, and architect, Arabic calligrapher, and Arabist to Arab-American Oil Company (Aramco) in New York City, 1950-1957. During this time, he made innumerable calligraphic works for both Aramco and the Arabs. He received a Ford Foundation grant for the years 1958-1961 to promote his ‘Unified Arabic, UA’ system. Unified Arabic is Mr. Khattar’s Arabic type system that simplifies the printing and teaching of Arabic, Urdu, Farsi, and other languages utilizing the Arabic alphabet.
As he continued to work on his Unified Arabic, Mr. Khattar designed new Arabic typefaces, practiced architecture, and lectured at the American University of Beirut.
In 1986, Reverend Dennis Hilgendorg and Dr. Ben Wood, Director of Educational Research at Columbia University, nominated Mr. Khattar for the Nobel Peace Prize for his life’s visionary achievements and their vast implications for the fields of linguistics, literacy, printing, computers, and telecommunications.

Four characteristics summarize this unique project:
1. A single glyph per letter and detached set type.
2. Each letter is uniquely different from the other and at the same time retaining the Arabic traditional form.
3. The counter forms are wide and open for higher legibility especially in small sizes.
4. The type was designed with a large loop- height (x-height) and low ascenders and descenders.

3.2 The Latinizing Arabic by Yahya Bouteméne in 1952. The project consisted of constructing the Arabic letter from the Latin alphabet. This project use also suggested that the type will be detached with Latin typographic structures like x-height, ascenders, descenders and spacing and kerning to mention but a few. But this proposal broke all the traditions of the Arabic type and was purely latinized which can never be accepted.

3.3 The Vocalization Marks as extra letters by Ali Al Gharim in 1952. The project suggested that each vocalization mark be drawn as additional letters to the Arabic script and be added within the writing.

3.4 Yakout type by Nahib Jaroudi from Linotype in 1956.Yakout was designed in a similar manner to Arabic typewriter fonts created during this period: used a limited range of letterforms to represent the full Arabic character set. The resultant style of type design became known as 'Simplified Arabic'.

The initial and medial glyphs of each letter were replaced with one glyph, and the final and isolated glyphs of each letter were replaced or merged into one glyph (except for few letters like the “Ain” where all initial, medial, final and isolated forms were kept since they are differently drawn). This enabled the character set to be reduced and made it more compatible with the Arabic type setting machines back then and the typewriters. The font was produced for hot-metal typesetting, being specifically intended to function as a newspaper text. With the dual intention of fitting the Arabic script onto a Linotype line-casting machine for setting type for rotary printing, and of maximizing keying speeds in creating copy for daily newspapers, much effort was concentrated on reducing the normal Arabic character set of over 100 characters.

The provenance can be seen from an interesting on-line article by Fiona Ross entitled "Non-Latin Type Design at Linotype".

3.5 The ASV-CODAR (Arabe Standard Voyellé – Codage Arabe) by Lakhdar Ghazal from Morocco in 1958. This project met the same fate as all other proposals and was rejected by the Academy in Cairo. However, this was the only project that underwent development and production because it was adopted by the Maroccan government which encouraged the establishment of the Institut d’Etude et de Recherches pour l’Arabisation in 1960. The aim of the typeface was to make the Arabic type usable in an easy way in all modern media. Nowadays, this font is the only digitized typeface from all of the ones submitted to the Academy thanks to Dr. Ghazal and the Moroccan government.

The reason why ASV-Codar was developed is that, unlike the previously mentioned proposals, it solved the technical problem of simplifying the script and at the same time respected the spirit of the Arabic script. Consequently, this project was a social and technological achievement.

The Characteristics of ASV-Codar are:
1. One drawn shape per basic letter set but which can at the same time accommodate a connecting or ending shape according to its position in the word. This solution saved the type from being detached by making the number of glyphs drawn to the basic regular letters.
2. Three kinds of ending tails that fit all of the letters. These ending tails are added to letters that needed them if they are positioned at the end of the word.
3. The Vocalization marks are placed on the connecting glyph (Kashida) between the letters and not on, above or below the letterforms. This solution was conceived in order not to draw each letter several times with different vocalization marks with it.

3.6 The Lebanese Type by Saïd Akl in Lebanon in the 60s. Saïd Akl is a proud Lebanese linguist, poet and philosopher. He is a true Lebanese person. He loves Lebanon and knows its history well. He considers the Lebanese the ancestors of the Phoenicians and that we must use the Latin alphabet since it is a direct descendant of the Phoenician alphabet and not the Arabic script which is full of problems and complicated. His idea was applied in the creation of the Lebanese Type that can be a universal type for all the languages of the world and not only Arabic. Since Saïd Akl was not a type designer, he just took the typeface ‘Times’ (whish is the most comman Latin Serif on all computer platfonms) and constructed his alphabet. Saïd Akl expressed his political and social thoughts about Lebanon with a new way of writing Lebanese. In this period of his life he was a very famous poet and philosopher in all of the Arab world. He wanted to express that Lebanon is a nation that speaks the Arabic language but it is not an Arab nation. That is why he made his new type based on the Latin script and not the Arabic although both scripts descended from the Phoenician Alphabet. He wanted a Lebanon with less connection to the Arab Islamic world. He wanted a unique type and language for Lebanon.

You can also read an article about the topic on NOW Lebanon website.The Lebanese Type, Saïd Akl.

3.6.1 The Theory of the Lebanese Type:
True creation is by no means the fruit of chance, but rather the child of purpose. That is what Akl was unknowingly set to prove with a brand new revolutionary concept, the ‘Lebanese Type.’ The idea originated in his youth when he wondered about the point of having such a complicated Arabic alphabet. It was first put into practice in the early 1930s. However, it was not until 1961 that it took its final shape.
Saïd Akl found it hard to choose a specific source of inspiration since he was changing the very concept of the alphabet. Its basis was that each letter had one and only one form and pronunciation, that is, each phoneme had only one physical representation. The ultimate aim was to simplify the multiple forms relating to a sound. Therefore, not only was he driven by the phonetic need, but also by sheer logic: to render the representation easier without altering the phoneme, and the ‘Lebanese Type’ would be accessible to all. After all, doesn’t it all root back to our ancestors, the Phoenicians and their prosperous city Byblos? It watched Cadmus’ alphabet set sail from its shores to the whole world. Hence, almost all the alphabets today are derived from the Phoenician except the Chinese and Japanese which still rely on cryptograms. Thus, we begin to get a rough answer to the question: How come that the Latin alphabet is the ancestor of the ‘Lebanese Type,’ not the Phoenician? Is it not some kind of reason against its homeland? ‘Absolutely not,’ said Akl, ‘for it is all about logic and simplicity of forms.’ Moreover, Latin is not the exclusive source, he was also inspired by the Arabic alphabet and created some more characters from sheer reason to accommodate all the known phonemes.

3.6.2 Characteristics of the Lebanese Type:
1. Avoidance of diacritic dots: The little dots under or above 12 Arabic letters were considered as defying all principles of logic and aesthetics, especially when compared to the Latin. Saïd Akl considered each character as the holder of a self-value that needs no additional shaping or refinement.
2. Avoidance of accents: Accents are far worse than the previous mentioned, for if some letters managed to break the bond of dots, they can never be set free from these indications that determine the grammatical function of Arabic words. Hence, doesn’t switching from accents to their graphic representation constitute a more suitable solution for Arabic.
3. Uniformity in the size of the letters: In Arabic, letters start above, on or below any given horizontal line. Furthermore, the width of each letter varies slightly, which leads to great difficulties in writing. Hence, the ‘Lebanese Type’ found an elegant solution, which consists of only two closely shaped representations (upper and lowercase) for each letter.
4. Separated or detached letters: Letter representation in Arabic differs given their position in the word. The new type separated them, thus giving each character its own personality and value. Uniqueness in the relation between shape and character seems absolutely necessary in order to avoid the chaos of too many forms of one letter.
5. One letter for each vowel and phoneme: It is obvious that, in the ‘Lebanese Type,’ there is no such thing as the double vowels sounds of Latin since its basic principles is based on the uniqueness of each character representing only one phoneme. That is, one and only one character for each phoneme.
6. Letters spirit as the Latin: As mentioned earlier, Saïd Akl’s main source of inspiration was the Latin Alphabet. Thus, it stands to reason that most of the typeface looks Latin even in the letters that Saïd invented as it turned out that their shapes were the most obedient to the rule of harmony.

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During the 60s until the late 80s, the transition from analogous to digital, due to the computer’s limitations at that time the Arabic script was constantly faced with problems like the connections of the letters, the limited character set and the right to left direction of writing. It was not the concept of the emerging computer programming technology as such that caused the problems. Certainly there were technical limitations, mainly related to the display and more acutely to printing technology. But the real problem was - and is - the lack of knowledge of, curiosity about and to some extent even love for the Arabic writing system in the western industry and among western-trained Arabs – according to Thomas Milo of DecoType.

That is why the Arabic was – and is – always mainly discussed in terms of the need for simplification. Paradoxically, after the mid 90s till our present day, computer technology has evolved in a way to find solutions for all of the problems. There is the extended Arabic character set of Unicode and the invention of smart font technology like OpenType Font supporting Arabic type on all major computer platforms (Mac OSX, Windows NT and later) that handles most of the problems.

Unicode extends the coverage of Arabic to include Persian, Urdu - in fact theoretically all other Arabic-based languages. A great advantage of Unicode is that it blends Arabic seamlessly into texts typeset in any other script – Latin, Russian, Chinese, you name it.

However, Unicode only defines abstract, nominal letters – no more. It does not define typographic technology, let alone solve typographic problems. Therefore, OpenType technology was developed to deal with the typographical tsunami caused by Unicode and global computing in general. Improved facilities for Arabic were a by-product, not a design goal.

3.7 DecoType (DT), Thomas Milo, The Netherlands in 1985. Before the invention of OpenType, some companies pioneered solutions for Arabic in the context of global computing and Unicode. The company DecoType (DT) represented by Thomas Milo is an example: he and his team (including Peter Somers and Mirjam Somers) invented the Arabic Calligraphic Engine ACE (around 1985). In fact, ACE controlled the first Smart Font, based on the traditional ruqah style.

While the early Windows font technology was too primitive in the early ‘90’s to deal with Arabic typesetting, an interim solution was found. At the request of Microsoft a much simplified and compromised Naskh and Thuluth were developed for use with its fixed font tables, since MS could not - yet - cope with complex Arabic. These fonts were NOT driven by ACE. The P in DTP was a pun to mark this low-quality, non-ACE derivative. DTP Naskh and Thuluth were made around 1992-3.

Almost simultaneously Microsoft Middle East Product Development Department (MEPD) asked DecoType to create ACE-based OLE-servers for DT Ruqah and DT Naskh. This all happened well before the now ubiquitous OpenType was even conceived (Microsoft as a company wasn’t yet connected to the internet in these days!). DecoType's ACE technology became the de facto proof of concept for smart font technology, paving the way for what was to become OpenType.

Real ACE fonts were marketed as DT OLE-servers (now Tasmeem fonts), NON-ACE fonts by DecoType are marketed as DTP fonts (PostScript, TrueType, OpenType). ACE was developed to mimic existing high-end Arabic typography – which in turn is, of course, deeply rooted in the calligraphic tradition.

Thomas Milo served as an Arabic speaking Officer in a Dutch army unit detached to UNIFIL in Southern Lebanon. His background is in Slavic and Turkic linguistics, plus Arabic in a supporting role. Before and after Lebanon he travelled extensively in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

For some impressions of his stint with UNIFIL, here’s an interview and literature:
Thomas Milo on UNIFIL
Vredesmacht in Libanon

After his return from the Lebanon he discovered the technical problems in producing accurate Arabic typography. As a linguistic scholar, he decided to build his own technology for his Arabic typesetting. He wanted to create the Arabic that he loved and not the badly digitized Arabic that is found in the market. Gradually it dawned on him that only a solid understanding of Arabic calligraphy provides the key to the solution. After an initial failure with naskh script that he found too dazzling and complex, he analysed ruqah instead. Work on naskh started 10 years later and took another 10 years to complete.

With hindsight one can conclude that the project of his team was the first and for a long time the only one to try and document the reality of Arabic as it has functioned over the centuries.

The illustration shows the structural difference between ACE-driven (Tasmeem) and OT Table-driven DTP Naskh. The Tasmeem examples follow the traditional structure, the DTP examples are low-grade hybrids – neither traditional nor innovative.

In 2007 DecoType with association with Winsoft launched Tasmeem.

According to the WinSoft-DecoType sales brochures, the Tasmeem concept is a dream come true. It integrates traditional calligraphy with modern typefaces, giving everybody the freedom they want. It makes Adobe InDesign Middle Eastern Version the most comprehensive Arabic design tool in the industry. Tasmeem provides designers and publishers of Arabic books the indispensable high-quality typesetting for literary and academic productions. Tasmeem offers professional tools to shape prose, poetry, traditional and educational texts…

Continue reading at the Winsoft website or at the "Calligraphy written by hand or set on the computer" post on my blog. I addition, this month's cover story in Saudi Aramco World magazine is dedicated to Tasmeem.

3.8 The Simplified Arabic Type by Mourad Boutros in The United Kingdom in 1993. Boutros also focused on the idea that Arabic must embark on the process of becoming detached like the journey the Latin script took hundreds of years before. He made a font based on the Naskh structure with two phases. The first phase will be used firstly in the Arab nations for several years until the people are familiar with it, and afterwards they will start using phase two where the letters are completely detached. Phase one is also based on one shape per letter but the letters touch each other on the baseline with close tracking. Phase two is simply making the tracking wider, hence the letters will be detached.

What is interesting about Mourad’s proposal is that it took into account a transitional phase. So he was truly trying to solve a social problem without ignoring the technical aspect (to make the Arabic easier to handle by the computer and the software which are initially built only for the Latin script). He wanted to make the Arabic detached and simple but at the same time he planned the acceptance of the type by the people.

3.9 The Mutamathil Type by Saad Abulhab in The United States of America in 1999. Saad is the latest person to try to develop detached Arabic type in recent years. He also focused on the idea that the type must be detached but what he newly introduced is a bi-directional type suggesting that Arabic can be written from right to left as usual and (if necessary) can be also written and read from left to right as the Latin alphabet. So his approach will not only solve the problem of connected letters and changing letterforms according to their position, but also the problem of having special Arabic software or plug-in that enables the writing from right to left. The questions remain as to the limit of simplification and if the Arabic people would accept the font and are able to read it. The questions remain as to the limit of simplification and if the Arabic people would accept the font and are able to read it. The letters in the bi-directional “Mutamathil Mutlaq” type are symmetrical and geometric with shapes that are mirrored in the middle of the letter, which makes the letters look so stiff and rigid with respect to the flowing cursive aspect of the Arabic script.

Personally I think that the idea behind the font is intelligent, but the design of the letters is not good at all. The letters are constructed out of geometric shapes to such an extent that it made them lose all the Arabic characteristics.The problem is that Saad only solved the technical issue of the Arabic script but completely destroyed the historical and aesthetical value of the Arabic.

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4. WHAT IS THE FUTURE OF ARABIC TYPEFACES?
The following question was asked in the TypoGraphic Beirut 2005 conference that took place in April in the Lebanese American University.
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There are three main directions in the Arabic type design word nowadays. The first direction is represented by Arabic type designers and typographers who are working on simplifying the Arabic script and making it detached. The second direction is backed up by conservative traditional Arabic type designers who state that the Arabic does not need to be simplified any more since the technology is now well developed to accommodate all the needs/problems of an Arabic calligraphic typeface. The third direction is represented by several contemporary Arabic type designers who’s work deals with making modern Arabic typefaces which are legible and friendly to the everyday applications or to the need of their clients. An example of the first group is Saad Abulhab, the second group is Thomas Milo and the third group are several independent Arabic type designers (like Nadine Chahine, Titus Nemeth, Tim Holloway, Abbar Yassar, Ihsan Al-Hammouri, Mohamed Hacen, several others and surely myself) that are creating new modern Arabic typefaces. Names and links of know independent Arabic type designers and Arabic type foundries will be listed in the section that follows.

Whatever the direction or the intentions behind each new Arabic typeface, there is a big demand for new Arabic fonts. New Arabic fonts are need for: 1. everyday Arabic graphic design and typography projects, 2. corporate Arabic fonts for Arabic established companies or newspapers, and 3. Arabic companion fonts for existing Latin fonts.

Professional graphic designers and students are always asking for new Arabic fonts. Before the launch of Adobe InDesign ME versions and the development of the OpenType Arabic fonts, most of the Arabic typographer used Quark AXt and were limited to AXt Arabic fonts. Until now the AXt fonts are the most used even-though the users of Quark AXt is diminishing. The reason for that is there are not so may new OpenType Arabic fonts for them to use instead of the AXt fonts. Over the last few years, the awareness about Arabic type and the need for new fonts was translated in the rise of Arabic Type Foundries and young Contemporary independent Arabic Type Designers. From the past three years there was Nadine Chahine, Titus Nemeth and myself Pascal Zoghbi who have graduated with Masters in Type Design and are specialized in Arabic type. All three of us now are working and developing new Arabic fonts that are starting to appear in the Market.

The Khatt Foundation ‘Typographic Matchmaking’ project is an example about the need for Arabic type companions for existing Latin typefaces (you can read more about the Typographic Matchmaking project and the Khatt foundation in the ‘Typographic Matchmaking: Arabic type with a Dutch flavor.’ post on my blog or on the Khatt Foundation website). This is due to the fact that many publications in the Arabic nations are bi-lingual or tri-lingual (Arabic, English and french). Another reasons is that most of the international companies how are opening new branches in any of the Arab nations need an Arabic corporate font that will work with their own Latin corporate font.

Other important typographic events that contributed to the growing awareness of Arabic type and calligraphy are: Typo.Graphic.Beirut conference, The Kitabat conference, The Linotype’s First Arabic Type Competition and Khatt Kufi & Kaffiya symposium.

Corporate Arabic fonts are also in need for new Arabic companies how are building there new identity. Some examples will be Banks, Communication companies, Organizations and others. Furthermore, all of the Arabic newspapers at the present time are asking for corporate fonts. Old Arabic newspapers are renewing their layouts and asking for new modern Arabic fonts, and new rising Arabic newspapers are creating their young fresh identity with new contemporary corporate Arabic fonts.

At the present moment the Arabic type industry is having a big boom and it is going to stay like this for a while (at least several years). The awarness about Arabic type is growing in the Arab nations and the number of proffesional Arabic type designers is also growing.

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5. INDEPENDENT ARABIC TYPE DESIGNERS AND ARABIC TYPE FOUNDRIES.
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Traditional established Arabic type foundries:
Boutros (Mourad Boutros)
Sakkal (Mamoun Sakkal)
AvantType (Habib Khoury)
DecoType (Thomas Milo,Mirjam Somers & Peter Somers)
Layout (AXt Quark).

New Contampary Arabic Type Designers:
Abbar Yazzar (Syria)
Ihsan Al-Hammouri(Jordan)
Mohamed Hacen (Mauritania)
Nadine Chahine (Lebanon)
Pascal Zoghbi (Lebanon)
Titus Nemeth (Austria)

Non-Arab Arabic Type Designers & Type Foundries that have created Arabic fonts:
Tim Hollaway, Fiona Ross (UK) and John Hudson (Canada)
Kris Holmes(USA) & Chuck Bigelow.
Thomas Milo, Mirjam Somers & Peter Somers (The Netherlands)
Titus Nemeth (Austria)
ParaType (Russia)

International Type Foundries that also develop Arabic fonts beside Latin fonts:
Linotype
Monotype
Adobe
ParaType (Russia)

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Bibliography, References & Illustrations Credits:
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1. Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès, Arabic Typography, Saqi Books 2001.

2. Ghan Alani, Initiation Calligraphie Arabe, Aditions Fleurus 2001.

3. Abdelkebir Khatibi, Mohammed Sijelmassi, The Splendour of Islamic Calligraphy, Thames & Hudson 2001.

4. Hassan Massoudy, Calligraphie Arabe Vivante, Flammarion 1999.

5. Arabic Script and Typography, a brief historical overview, by Thomas Milo (in Language Culture Type, international type design in the age of Unicode, ed. John D. Berry, ATypI-Graphis 2002)John D.

6. Arabic for Designers, Mourad Boutros, Mark Batty Publisher 2006.

7. Saad AbulhabThe Mutamathil Type Style, Visible Language 38.3, 2004.

8. Paul Khera, Has Yassar Abbar developed the Arab world’s answer to Univers?, Eye Magazine 50, 2003.

9. Hans Jürg Hunziker, untitle booklet about his arabic type work in Morocco, Switzerland.

10. Rafic Rouhana, Revolution of the Letter with Saiid Akl, Lebanese university, Lebanon 1996.

11. Kamal Al-Baba, Rouh al-khatt al-arabi.

12. http://www.unifiedarabicalphabet.com/

13. http://www.arabetics.com/

14. http://www.decotype.com/

15. http://www.winsoft.eu/

16. http://www.arabicfonts.com/

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Pascal Zoghbi , May 2007.
This article is part of my dissertation that i have wrote during my Master of Design studies at Type]Media 05/06, KABK, The Netherlands.
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Nearly all of the graffiti in Lebanon over the past years were either 1. political words & sentences or 2. signage for shops or places. However, last week I was driving to Beirut and I have spotted a new graffiti that did not have either a political connotation to any political party or it was a signage for a shop. It is a pure social graffiti done by young Lebanese groups to express their feelings about Beirut.

In this post I have placed at the beginning pictures of the new graffiti and then at the end the political and signage graffiti. The political and signage graffiti are only sprayed Arabic words without any artistic or design feel in them. Individuals who work or belong to a political party do most of the political graffiti. Hence they are not graffiti artists. As for the signage graffiti, they are sprayed written by shop owners. On the contrary, the new graffiti are done by young graffiti artists who do not belong to any political party or want to advertise their shops.

When I was still in The Netherlands, I was impressed by the beauty and amount of graffiti there. Especially while traveling by train where all the walls around the tracks are full of graffiti. And now whenever I travel to a new country or city, most of the pictures that I take will be graffiti from these places. When I came back to Lebanon after I finishing my studies at KABK, I noticed that in Lebanon we do not have any artistic graffiti. All the graffiti that you see are simple spray Arabic, English or French words.

I thought how come in a third world country like Lebanon, where plenty of empty walls and destroyed buildings from the war are present, there are no social artistic graffiti? Why aren’t the Lebanese people expressing their anger, ideas and feelings on the dirty walls? Why there is only political ugly graffiti? Why there are only names of political leaders or political parties sprayed on the walls?

To answer these questions we need to go deep in the sociology of the Lebanese people. The concept of how every political leader controls an area in Lebanon. How the Lebanese people make themselves belong to political parties as if it is their only way of living in Lebanon. The different sects and how the politics are directly linked to religion. Etc…

When I saw the new social artistic graffiti, I was so excited and glad that some of the new young Lebanese generation are looking at life in Lebanon in a different perspective. To make graffiti adhere to our social lives and against bad politics instead of advertise sectarian politics. To make graffiti about Lebanese people and not about the political messages of our corrupt politicians.

Graffiti can be read as sociological explanation for a nation. When I see these new graffiti I am more optimistic that some of the Lebanese people are thinking about their own personal social lives before the political issues. We need this in Lebanon. Lebanese people should wake up and understand that the politicians should do what the Lebanese people need and not visa versa. Most of the Lebanese people now follow a political party and live their lives accordingly. They do what they are asked to do without even asking or thinking about what they are saying or doing.

Back to the graffiti, I noticed that the group/s or the individual/s who did this graffiti are (Fish, Siska and Bug RGB). These are the signatures that I found on the wall beside or within the graffiti. Well I do not know whom these names belong to, but I would be very interested to meet the new Lebanese graffitists whom I consider as pioneers for the coming graffiti in Lebanon. If you read my post please add your own ideas and opinions about the graffiti done.

p.s: you can also have a look on other Arabic Graffiti outside of Lebanon: 1.BOKSMATI GRAPHIX & 2.AEROSOLARABIC.

Here are few pictures of the political and signage graffiti that i have mentioned before.

On the right is the first set of billboards and the left is the second set. Compare the two. Notice the difference between the Alef-Hamza, the Heart shape and the Arabic type used. And for sure you notice you added sprayed Arabic type and the rainbow logo.

The first set of billboards conveyed a non-political method using the slogan (or logotype) as “I Love Life” in all three languages Arabic, English and French. At first the Lebanese people thought it is a new organization promoting life over politics, but after a while it became clear that these slogans and designs are directly or indirectly linked to a political party in Lebanon. For more info about “I love life” visit their website at http://www.lebanon-ilovelife.com/.

p.s: At the present time in Lebanon, there is two main opposing political opinions. There is always been many political parties in Lebanon with different opinions but nowadays it is like two big political parties with each one containing several.

After two weeks from the first set of billboards, a second set started to appear with [approximately] the same design and slogans but with additional sprayed Arabic words on them. At first look we (the Lebanese people) thought that it is a continuing concept from the first set and it is done by the same organization. But after a second look on the new set we noticed that there is a new [hmm, maybe plagiarized] logo on the bottom left side of the billboards stating that the opposing Lebanese party has done these new set of billboards as a reply or response to the first set.

Four main topics emerges from this story:
1. Arabic type awareness. The design and advertising agencies companies in Lebanon are using more and more Arabic type not only for text but to express visual graphics.
2. Customized Arabic fonts. The Arabic type used in the first set of billboards is a customized or modified font from an existing Arabic type.
3. Plagiarism. The second set of “I love Life” logotype is a plagiarized copy from the original logotype. You can notice that from the type and the missing green leaves above the heart symbol in the logotype. Please refer to pics for clarification.
4.My Massira Type Family. When I saw the sprayed letters on the billboard a directly thought of my Massira Spray font. If my font was finalized and published, then maybe the design agency that designed the billboard could have used my Massira type family for the main Arabic words and the sprayed ones. I this encouraged me to finalize the font as soon as possible and start publishing it.

p.s.: I will post cleaner photos soon.

I was thinking for the last days what to make as an e-card for the New Year and send to my friends and colleagues. Due to the sad events lately in Lebanon, I could not get any nice ideas for the coming year. So I did this fast sketch expressing what I and most of the Lebanese people are feeling. We are hoping for a better year but at the same time we are worried that it is going to be even worth then 2006. That is why the sketch is fast illustration of Lebanese buildings bombed and black smoke developing above the cityscape. If you look Closely you notice that the black smoke is composed of Arabic letters reading "Happy New Year" in Arabic. That is "Aam Saaid". The sketch is done with black ink on a dark grey paper. After I finished the sketch I have added on it with white tip-ex a sentence hoping a white 2007 year on Lebanon and not black as the previous year.
Happy New Year.

I will be giving a lecture at Notre Dame University on the 20th of November about the recent history of Arabic type and the type design process.

The methods of Kufi structures where explored. Some of the students designed their logotypes with the purely geometric Kufi technique, while others created their name pattern using the modern Kufi letterforms.