Who drew this logo?

August 21, 2010 12:22 PM

Trying to figure out who designed logo for the RAF. I really dig the design. It mentions that Baader paid a designer to draw it, but I can't find a single mention of his name. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I find the drawing of the mp5 extremely evocative and clean. I want to see other work that the designer as done, but am at a loss.

posted by thsmchnekllsfascists to Media & Arts (2 answers total)

Best answer: This link says that they designed it themselves, but at some point Baader asked a designer (Holm von Czettritz) to redesign/relaunch it to make it a bit nicer. He declined, saying it had a "rough authenticity" he wouldn't want to change because it works so well.
Source seems reliable to me.
posted by The Toad at 2:40 PM on August 21, 2010 [1 favorite]

According to art historian Christine Mehring, there have long been rumors that West German pop artist Thomas Bayrle either drew or was at least involved in developing the original Red Army Faction logo:

Bayrle's engagement with Communist motifs was so pervasive in the '60s and early '70s, in fact, that a rumor persists that he designed the RAF's legendary logo--a red star featuring a Heckler & Koch MP-5 submachine gun. It must be noted that one of the nightly regulars at The Makers of Display was Helmut Pohl, cofounder of Draier Verlag and effectively Bayrle's first art dealer, but better known as a member of Baader-Meinhof. Bayrle's estimation of this iconography is informative in its irony: He merely quips with provocatively market-oriented language that the logo was "branding at its best," a "collective product" that is "much too intelligent to have been invented by one person."

posted by scody at 6:59 PM on August 21, 2010