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Posts Tagged ‘legendary designer’
Michael Bierut : No Fancy Moleskins
3/26/2009 7:04 AM By Sharon PotschDesign Observer features a great post by Michael Bierut on his love of "ordinary" office composition books for his musings. As a writer, I am fastidious about notebook selection. A fun afternoon for me is browsing office supply stores for just the right pen or spiral-bound notebook. I came across this great posting while browsing a fantastic blog on the design of numbers by Therese Cox. Check it out. You'll never look at addresses the same again.
Design Legends: Joseph Binder
3/23/2009 9:15 AM By Catherine TJoseph Binder was born in Austria in 1898. He started his career early, working as a lithographer before studying at the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts in 1922. His student work was inspired, and he created an award-winning poster design for the American Red Cross. Two years later, Binder started his own design studio and developed a following as a poster designer and ad artist. In 1927, Binder helped found Design Austria, but he wasn't destined to stay in Europe. Instead he moved to New York, where his career moved forward by light years. When he relocated to America in 1936, Binder began applying Cubist ideas to his work, and created designs for The United Nations, the American Red Cross, Fortune Magazine and many other high profile clients. Binder was named Art Director and Designer for the United States Navy in 1948.
Part of the secret to Binder's work was his interest in the psychological impact of color choice and application. He made great use of contrasting color and attempted to reduce the use of geometric shapes in his presentations. Eventually, Binder moved from commercial art and into fine art with abstract, non-representational work. Starting in 1960, Binder devoted himself to painting, and exhibited in the Museum of Modern Art, and in his home country in Vienna's Museum of Applied Art. He died in 1972.
Design Legends: Tibor Kalman
3/16/2009 9:11 AM By Catherine TThe late Tibor Kalman was a major figure in the design scene; in the 1980s he was known almost as well outside design circles as from within. Kalman had a passion for presenting art and commerce side-by-side, but he was also known for his activist take on design. He spent a great deal of time doing cause-based work and encouraging his fellow designers to take a closer look at issues such as poverty, homelessness and sweatshop labor. Like other legendary designers, Tibor Kalman wanted to move design out of the service category. Changing the perception of design as a service to something closer to art and in some cases, activism, was one of his major contributions to the industry.
One example of this comes from Kalman's stint as editor-in-chief of the Benetton magazine, Colors. Benetton was famous for its socially aware take on advertising, and to this day many still identify the company with the United Colors of Benetton campagn. As the head of Colors, Kalman stubbornly ignored fashion stereotypes in favor of breaking new ground and offering progressive ideas. Some of the ideas worked quite well, while others required more thinking time than some believe a mass market can withstand in the context of an ad campaign or magazine edition. Kalman's design philosophy included the notion that graphic design can–and should–be used as form of mass communication to promote social ideals and awareness. Kalman died in 1999, but his legacy is such that some believe only two names in design mattered in the 1980s; Macintosh (the computer) and Tibor Kalman.
Design Legends: Kit Hinrichs
3/2/2009 8:55 AM By Catherine TKit Hinrichs graduated from the Art Center College of Design in California in 1963. Instead of trying his hand at illustration and design work in California, he decided to go straight to the source, relocating to New York. Three years later his portfolio included material for Designers 3 and the Reba Sochis design office, and Hinrichs decided it was time to launch his own consulting firm with Anthony Russell. 1972 saw the formation of Hinrichs Design Associates, which specialized in annual reports.
Four years later in 1976, Hinrichs went back to California and took his business to a new level, forming Jonson, Pedersen, Hinrichs & Shakery in San Francisco. Annual report design continued to be a mainstay, with a client list including important names such as TransAmerica and Potlatch. The key to all this success was due in part to dispensing with tradition and taking a different approach in creating annual reports; Hinrichs chose to focus on storytelling and trying to impart the company's personality rather than letting facts and figures to do all the talking. In 1986, a merger with Pentagram Design brought a fresh set of challenges. In addition to a large volume of annual reports designed for Potlatch and other projects, Hinirchs co-founded @Issue: The Journal of Business and Design.
Georg Olden
2/23/2009 9:27 AM By Catherine TThe late Georg Olden's design work broke new ground in 1945. As the chief of the CBS division of on-air promotions, Olden was helping to invent an entire field of graphic design; broadcast graphics. In the same way that early 90s websites were in desperate need of visual identities and art direction, television in the mid 40s was a similar blank canvas. Georg Olden took that canvas and painted incredible things. He guided the visual identities of programs that became part of the national fabric. Who could forget the heart logo of I Love Lucy? The look of Gunsmoke? Georg Olden was at the helm for these projects, plus the production of the first televised election returns in a presidential race in 1952.
Some design historians prefer to concentrate on Georg Olden's contribution to equal opportunity in broadcasting; Olden was the grandson of a slave and later known as the first African-American to design a postage stamp. But Olden's accomplishments, without the milestones, are worthy of recognition for their own sake. By 1970 Olden had won seven Clio awards. This is notable on its own, but it is worth pointing out that Olden himself designed the Clio statuette. His name is synonymous with the Golden Age of television, and when you look at today's graphic design on channels like CNN, MSNBC and CBS, it's easy to wonder what today's small screen experience would be like without the influence of Georg Olden. His design work helped shape more than six decades of television that followed.
Design Legends: Louis Danziger
2/23/2009 9:24 AM By Catherine TLou Danziger retired from design more than 20 years ago, preferring to work as a consultant and educator. His legacy in teaching is just as profound and Danziger is considered at the top of his field in both design and teaching what he knows about it. Danziger's work in the 50s through the 70s took Modernist concepts to a new level, using minimalism in both presentation and the creation of the work itself. Danziger took Modernism farther, while maintaining what he said was a healthy "disrespect for design". Danziger's career got off to a humble start, designing posters while serving in the Armed Forces from 1943 to 1945. When he was discharged, Danziger used the GI Bill to attend art school.
While he studied at the Art Center School in California, he learned from Alvin Lustig, who taught graphic and industrial design there. Later, Danziger joined the Design Group, founded by disciples of Lustig with a disdain for the nostalgia they found in what they labelled as "mindless" commercial design. Danziger created work for Esquire, General Lighting, Steelbuilt and others, concentrating on communicating ideas with a single image. As others have pointed out, he stood on the shoulders of Modernism, but always strove to take it to a better place and disliked being yoked to any limitation including genre or design movements. As an educator in places such as CalArts, Harvard, and the Art Center College of Design, Danziger's mission includes the need to impart three simple directives, telling students to feel, think and above all, create. Conceptualizing and talking about design are nothing without the work. Design, according to Danziger, is a problem-solving activity.
LeRoy Winbush
2/2/2009 9:17 AM By Catherine TThe late LeRoy Winbrush became a graphic designer in 1936, shortly after graduating…high school. He started with an apprenticeship in a Chicago design shop, but quickly went from there to designing murals, signs, flyers and other materials for Chicago's Regal Theater, moving in the same circles as the legendary Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong. His love of the Chicago music community led to a few gigs designing album covers for Mercury Records. Winbrush also did work for Goldblatt's, eventually becoming art director for the entire Goldblatt's chain.
His work was incredibly diverse. LeRoy Winbrush had his hand in practically every medium a designer could find work in; he was responsible for the covers for Ebony and Jet magazines as the art director for Johnson Publishing; in 1964 Winbrush found himself doing design work for the New York World's Fair. He would later create a long-term exhibition on sickle cell anemia for Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry. In 1990 he became an exhibition consultant to the DuSable Museum of African-American History. LeRoy Winbrush died in 2007. A year later he was named as an AIGA medalist for his contributions to design and setting a unique standard of excellence. He left behind an incredible legacy of determination and design.
Design Legends: Clement Mok
1/19/2009 8:13 AM By Catherine TClement Mok's work in design is so far-reaching that millions of computer users touch his work every day. Mac computer users have Mok to thank in part for the ease of use and simplicity of design that's part of the Mac brand. Mok got his career off the ground as an art director for Apple Computer; and pioneered Mac's user-friendly approach. Starting with his work on the user manuals for the original Mac, Mok worked hard to change the perception of the computer from a complicated gizmo to accessible tool.
In 1984, Mok joined Apple Corporate, where he helped bring the Apple IIc to the public. His accomplishments included bringing Apple into the design world; Mok worked as an Apple evangelist, bringing computing power to industries traditionally tech-shy. Some believe his enthusiasm for computing is his greatest accomplishment; in light of how computers are currently used in design, that notion may well be correct. Clement Mok would serve as AIGA president from 2001 to 2003, bringing a mindset that fuses business savvy with the creative aspect of design. It was that approach that many believe has radically changed the industry; everything Mok invests himself in becomes part of a solution that combines dollars and sense with innovation designed to make the user experience friendly and fun.
Design Legends: Gail Anderson
1/13/2009 7:08 PM By Catherine TLike many design legends, Gail Anderson got strong early gigs and made the most of them. Among her early post-college gigs was a two-year stint at the Boston Globe from 1985 to 1987, working under art director Ronn Campisi. Those who don't know Gail Anderson's name will definitely recognize her work; from 1987 to 2002 she served Rolling Stone in a variety of capacities, ultimately becoming the stalwart music magazine's senior art director. Her efforts on the presentation of Rolling Stone included a variety of typographic approaches that, while eclectic, never fell into cliches. In fact, Anderson went so far to create uniqueness that she created letterforms from bits of trees and bottle caps. Over time, her work grew from attention-getting to often-imitated.
Anderson moved from Rolling Stone to become SpotCo where she designed posters for Broadway productions. Like her mentor Paula Scher, Gail Anderson's work has literally been plastered all over New York City. Anderson studied under Scher at the School of Visual Arts in New York. Her on and off-Broadway poster designs speak for themselves. She is described as a generous designer who puts a great deal of thought into the audience for her work; the client's approval is only part of her consideration for her creations.
Design Legends: James Cross
1/5/2009 6:51 PM By Catherine TWhen James Cross was attending UCLA's School of Fine Arts, he also worked part time in the System Development division of the RAND Corporation. Did Cross realize just where his career would lead him from that part-time gig? Probably not, but when he graduated in 1956, James Cross got his career off to a smashing start by taking over as RAND's Corporate Design Director. His work earned him the attentions of other high-profile companies including IBM and Northrop; Cross wound up working for Northrop in one capacity or another for a quarter of a century.
In 1963, Cross started his own studio; by the 80s there were branch offices in San Francisco, Los Angeles and elsewhere. While his clients would continue to include companies in the defense and aeronautics sectors, he would also take on soon-to-be major players in the computer industry, such as Western Digital. Cross Associates would continue under his leadership until 1994. From there Cross moved into consultancy and has since become a photographer and print maker. He's also put in plenty of time as the international president of the Alliance Graphique Internationale, as a member of the board of the Aspen Design Conference, AIGA, and Napa Valley organizations such as the Napa Valley Wine Library. If that weren't enough, he is also dedicated to teaching his craft, including work at Arizona State University and the Portland School of Art in Maine.
