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The Strength of a Tiger

By Dorte Fogh

To a Dane the quintessence of a battery was for many years an energetic tiger crouching for a spring. We saw the striped tiger coming in from the right on top of the Hellesen name. In 1937, with this logo graphic artist Gunnar Biilmann Petersen (1897-1968) established the company’s product and name with such effectiveness that we have never forgotten it.

His special interest in typography appeared clearly from the design of the logo. Biilmann kept the letters of the name Hellesen, which his famours predecessor Knud V. Engelhardt had previously connected in an elegant face of type. He made them, however, sufficiently solid to form a base for the striped tiger. At the same time arch like the predator. Moreover, he made them more dynamic in a bright yellow colour. All in all they clearly emphasized the overall message of the logo.

Biilmann Petersen’s commercial art was evidently inspired by the works of the best graphic artists of the 20th century: Thorvald Bindesbøll and Engelhardt. Eventually, his own contribution would form the basis of the works of young Danish graphic artists as he held a professorship at the department of industrial art at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts.


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