Can a typeface change your mind?
Sarah Palin has cultivated her reputation to be the opposite of all that Barack Obama stands for, but she is not beneath borrowing one part of his image. Experts in typography have noticed that she has adopted Gotham, the font credited by some with adding a winning finesse to his campaign.
Although only the most fanatical typographers would believe that a font could be decisive in an election campaign, Mr Obama’s adoption of Gotham throughout the 2008 presidential race was praised by graphic designers as lending freshness and authority that John McCain’s choice of Optima lacked.
The former Governor of Alaska, right, who has not yet declared whether she will compete for the Republican presidential nomination, has begun using Gotham in her publicity material, raising the prospect of a Gotham versus Gotham presidential race in 2012. Simon Garfield, who was speaking at the Hay Festival yesterday to promote his book Just My Type, said that the authority implied by Gotham’s bold lines subliminally helped voters to overcome any fears they might have had for voting Democrat. “I think you can make a strong argument to say it was a great help to Obama. Obviously, he was elected because he is who he is, but the whole campaign was such a fantastically clear, consistent one that the typeface did its job. You had the message: ‘Change. Hope. Yes, we can’. The font did not change from when he announced his candidacy all the way through his primaries, on television, online and in all the print advertisements.
“I think the fact that Sarah Palin is using Gotham a lot shows how influential the font has been.”
The typeface, which was invented by the American designer Tobias FrereJones in 2000, was briefly used by The Times in 2007. It has also become the font of choice for Hollywood studios marketing films that they believe could win an Oscar, including Invictus (two nominations), A Single Man (one) and The Lovely Bones (one).
Mr Frere-Jones, a keen Democrat, has not commented on whether he is happy about his font being used by Mrs Palin, but Mr Garfield said that he would not object. “He would be flattered that it was being considered as a way of turning around her fortunes. I don’t think it would make him warm to her cause.”
British politicians have not yet followed Mr Obama’s lead. In last year’s general election Labour went for Neo Sans Pro, a sans-serif font, on the front of its manifesto. The Conservatives chose a variety of heavy old-style fonts and the Liberal Democrats selected Helvetica, invented in the 1950s.
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