Peter Maybury

“It can be disconcerting to realise that much of what you admire doesn’t resemble much of what you make. A good thing. Inevitably, even if you set out to emulate, the process takes its own path.
Many of my favourite record covers emanate from an alien visual world. But how can you separate the emotional charge of the cover from the recordings?
I’m drawn most fondly to that which appears undesigned, untrained or even unprofessional. Of course these are largely false impressions: the work is no doubt produced as it was intended, however it has an ease to it, a lack of anxiety. There’s another kind of thinking at work.
The same can be said of musicians – often the best of them appear to have the least conventional mastery. But this too is an exacting decision and a balance I’m always searching for. Similarly I’m drawn to the syntax of graphic language, but I also fear it as a tyranny.
Sometimes type is best when it just seems like writing (or even fancy writing). Of course this too can be read as just another affectation.
Selecting a typeface is now a widespread everyday choice. The everyday experience poster and newspaper cover ISBN: 978-0-956-72495-3 act this out in seven different fonts, with the decision deferred in repetition. How does the character of each iteration affect the meaning? Hard to say, but we must have choice.”