The construction of the graphic identity of the public institutions of Galicia in the postmodern era (1979-1999): The reinterpretation of their own symbols based on place myths

Abstract

The advent of democracy in Spain led to the decentralization of the State and an opportunity to reconsider a complex identity whose various national sensibilities had been stifled and persecuted during the dictatorship. Design emerged as a cutting-edge tool, and the visual identity of new political entities such as ministries, autonomous regions, councils, municipalities, and other territorial entities underwent an urgent renewal with varied results. In Galicia, the first generation of designers with a conscious identity embarked on a quest for new identity symbols. Pursuing postmodern ideas, they reinterpreted tradition from the Atlantic perspective, contrasting with the dominant "Mediterranean" concept. They drew upon ancestral symbols like the pilgrim's scallop shell, the Santiago Cross, symbols of the Castro culture, or heraldic reinterpretations, politically supported by institutions seeking a distinctive identity. Design studios built upon the ideas of their predecessors, designers-artists who had pursued the almost utopian project of the 1960s and 1970s at the Galicia Laboratory of Forms. Graphic design in 1980s and 1990s Galicia oscillated between discovering the rigor of the modern project and embracing new postmodern principles. This article aims to analyze the specificities of institutional and territorial corporate design in postmodern Galicia through the reinterpretation of symbols as place myths, shaping a distinct graphic identity to this day.