The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) will change the font design of the new UAH 2000 banknote after criticism from designers. The noteʼs style is attributed to a font adaptation made by a Russian designer.
This was reported by the NBU Chairman Andriy Pyshny on Facebook.
Previously, font designer and developer Bohdan Hdal wrote on social media that the new banknote featured the Bickham Script font with pirated Cyrillicization by Russian Alexandra Hoffman. According to him, a similar situation occurred in 2019 with the UAH 1000 banknote.
Pyshny noted that legally everything is in order with this situation, however, according to him, there should be "no shadow of association with the Russian Federation" on the banknote with the poet and dissident Vasyl Stus, who was killed by Russia.
NBU added that the graphic image of the letters of the inscription will be created in full accordance with the appearance of the letters in the official Cyrillic version of the Bickham Script font, without copyright variations. Since the banknote has not yet been put into production, the changes in the design will not affect the timing of its introduction into circulation — September 4.
They also rejected accusations of using a font of Russian origin. NBU explained that the NBU artists manually draw the graphic elements of the inscription and use elements of licensed fonts. The design of banknotes is created in a special protected software environment where it is impossible to install a third-party font.
- The UAH 2000 banknote was introduced on July 10. The back of the note depicts the building of the Philology Faculty of Donetsk National University, where the poet studied. The previous largest banknote by denomination — UAH 1000 — was introduced by the NBU in 2019.
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