Abdias, Intérprete do Brasil
Abdias: Intérprete do Brasil, compiled by Túlio Custódio, was published by Editora Todavia. The text deals with “Brasilian race and culture from the 1940s to 1990s”. For the book design, we used VTC Bayard by Vocal together with Elza Narrow by Blackletra.
According to Vocal Type, Bayard is a distinctive sans-serif typeface inspired by the signage produced for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963, and named after Bayard Rustin, a close advisor to Martin Luther King Jr.
We chose to incorporate Bayard into this project dedicated to Abdias Nascimento because advances in racial equality in Brazil are due, to a significant extent, to his ideas and his struggle. According to Olabiyi Yai, Permanent Delegate of Benin to UNESCO, “Abdias harmoniously combines a bit of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., and Nelson Mandela, in the specific context of Brazil.”
