No subject was so distressing that it could not be reduced to a simple and elegant graphic -- such as this summary of birth and death rates in Germany at various times, to show the cataclysmic impact of the First World War on the population. Note the extraordinarily elegant placement of the line:
Life-cycle diagrams were everywhere, as were comparators which seemed to mix the two styles:
It was only years later that I discovered the influence behind (and often the source of) these graphics was the Isotype Institute:
An institution founded by a single genius information designer, Otto Neurath, seen here having fun pretending to hold the stage in an ancient Greek theatre:
It was Neurath's Isotype Institute that pioneered work like this, which, today, seems utterly familiar:
Coming from where he did, it is perhaps unsurprising that a great deal of emphasis was placed on distinguishing between different racial groups:
But Isotype's work was so obviously powerful that it spawned numerous copycats (although not all of them perhaps had the same ability to simplify the data down):
Neurath's main tool was what is known as the "small multiple", where the basic icon (in this next spread it's the outline shape of the city of Coventry) is used to show difference, or (as in some of the other graphics in this post) to show volume:
Let's finish with this: apparently some sort of information graphic displayed on ceramic tiling.
Neurath is an undercelebrated genius whose vision has helped shape the way many of us see the world.
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