By identifying the object of the discipline of graphic design as the graphic space of reading and its more specific condition in the experience of making words and ideas visible, we recognize from the point of view of the reader, that all forms derived from the use of the Drawing and writing acquire meaning in that space, as a consequence of the universal power of their connections. From this, we identify that the object of this research is the process of transfer of graphic knowledge that occurs during the second half of the 15th century in the context of the implementation of the printing press. This involves considering how typographers and engravers make the transition from the tradition of the illuminated Manuscript of the Middle Ages to the advent of the printing press. This thesis is focused on the field of abstraction of colors that leads to understand the structural character that acquires the gray scale in the graphic space, as a consequence of the consensus regarding the lack of use of colors in the printed book. Thus, the aim of this research is to show the relevance of the luminosity in graphic space, considering especially the comparison between the achromatic character of the engraving and the unfinished aspect of the literary text referred to the act of reading. The observation of the geometric, chromatic and calligraphic aspects in this context, allow us to attribute the particularity of that abstraction to a cultural understanding of correspondence between the gray scale and the luminosity of the colors. All this in the joint invention of engraving and typography.