I’ve been caught up with too many things so I’m a bit late with posting this, and in completing my reporting of my TDC workshop… Winsoft, the company that gives us the Middle East versions of Adobe products, has announced an Arabic Typography Contest and have graciously invited me to be one of 3(edit) 5 judges to pick the winning works.
I’m looking forward to seeing the submissions!! As far as I know, there hasn’t been such a contest on an international scale like this. At Linotype we organized the first international Arabic Type Design Contest but that was calling for typeface entries and so was quite different in scope. We need more and more support for this domain and I think it’s a wonderful idea to give a platform for designers to experiment with type and to find their own modes of visual expression. Arabic typography is still in its infancy and it is important that its first steps are stable and sure-footed, and this is why I am so glad to have more and more companies and foundries getting interested in Arabic. This is good news for everyone who loves the Arabic script :)
So, best of luck for all the participants!