Autumn 2023
The cryptic legacy of Paulo de Cantos
A Cantos Compendium – Paulo de Cantos (1892-1979) A designer of pedagogical theories
Edited by António Silveira Gomes and Cláudia Castelo; Texts by António Silveira Gomes, Sébastien Dégeilh, Éloïsa Pérez and Mário Moura.Published and designed by Barbara says...,€25, £25
Paulo de Cantos was a teacher and an editor. Between times he created textbooks with his students. He was an artbook trader and a librarian as well, and he started an informal university as a side hustle. Oh, and he also created his own language. He was rich. He was a maverick. Alongside this, he found a bit of spare time to design his own books. Which Paulo de Cantos shall we talk about?
Lisbon-born Cantos’s first endeavour as a book-artist was a ‘small collection of aphoristic pocket books full of flirtatious puns, popular sayings, quotations by scientists and excerpts from futuristic publications’. These first humorous books are indicative of the subsequent breadth and bizarreness of his work …
Map of Porto and the north from the book Portugal, 1938.
Top. Cover of A Cantos Compendium, designed by editors and publishers Cláudia Castelo and António Silveira Gomes (Barbara says…).
Isabel Duarte, designer, writer, Porto, Portugal
Read the full version in Eye no. 105 vol. 27, 2023
Eye is the world’s most beautiful and collectable graphic design journal, published for professional designers, students and anyone interested in critical, informed writing about graphic design and visual culture. It is available from all good design bookshops and online at the Eye shop, where you can buy subscriptions and single issues.