William Morris saw the art world through the idealistic lens of socialism. He and the like-minded designers who clustered around him wanted nothing less than to redefine art by restoring "craft" to a place of value. True art for them was based in time-honored, populist traditions; the sometimes raw b

Arts & crafts furniture, Decorative, Egalitarian, Organic, Political, Subtle, Surface

Goudy started out as a bookkeeper who just wasn't very satisfied with accounting. He milled around South Dakota and then Minnesota aimlessly bookkeeping. Finally, when he found work in a small bookstore in Chicago, something clicked. These books weren't filled with dull numbers but with marbled pages

Classical, Clean, Elegant, Minimal, Subtle, Typography

The laughter he brought to the lives of others equaled the sufferings he experienced in his own. Born in the eternally gray London of 1889, Charlie Chaplin started out bleakly. He was to endure some very tough years of childhood before his sweetly infectious stage persona and razor-sharp characteriza

Chance, Charming, Event, Quirky, Subtle, Witty

In contrast to the political poetry that epitomized so much of the 1970s, Martin Espada's work kicks aside the pulpit and abandons the megaphone. Espada calls his readers to action in a more indirect fashion -- he envisions a free world without idealizing and describes social horrors without repriman

Political, Power, Sincere, Subtle, Tense