thoughts

Made the requisite visit to the Corning Museum of Glass last week while visiting my hometown. Was blown away by the ethereal beauty of this DALE CHIHULY piece in the entry-way.

I was reminded of my trip to the Czech Repulic (for some genealogic wandering) about 10 years ago, and the history of glass art there. During the days of the Iron Curtain, artists were closely monitored for anti-state messaging, and abstract art was largely not allowed for fear of covert subversive themes. Glass art was overlooked, however, and not considered a potentially subversive medium. Artists of other disciplines converted to the medium in order to express themselves more fully. The result is a robust contemporary glass movement in the Czech Republic. The Corning Museum of Glass featured a wonderful exhibit a few years back: GLASS BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN.

photo: Corning Museum of Glass — Object by Rene Roubick (Czech, b.1922).

One of my favorite memoires of Prague was a breathtaking exhibit of the work of BOREK SIPEK. His works were nestled like brilliant gems in cold alcoves of meandering castle walkways, which opened on an underground room filled with a forest of glass.

Last week I had the pleasure of attending an AIGA lecture in Denver by PAPRIKA'S Louis Gagnon. Paprika is a Montreal-based graphic design and strategic marketing firm which has won over 400 national and international design awards. They continually push the limits of graphic design, and seek local and international clients who aim to think globally.

Louis was humble and sweet in his presentation style, as English is his second language (French being first). The French influence was obvious in his studio's work, which was simple, elegant, innovative, memorable, and subtle. At the core of every project was a clever concept. The execution was never heavy-handed.

One of my favorite pieces was a holiday window installation — an ice tree for the store, Domison.

Louis' advise to young designers: 

1. Stop reading designer blogs & magazines

A designer should develop one's own style, and not be too influenced by the work of others.

2. Entertain Curiosity

Don't limit one's creative interest to graphic design. Allow the influence of other fields into one's orbit: fashion, architecture, and other cultural forces.

3. Cultivate Passion

Louis is always working. Especially on long walks in the countryside on the weekends. Seek potential solutions in the woods.

How much is good design worth?

Apple knows. So does Coke, Target, and an increasing number of everyday brands that realize the value of strong product and identity design.

With its focus on intuitive, elegant, and simple design, Apple has continuously experienced explosive growth and become arguably one of the greatest success stories in business history. Coca-Cola has demonstrated their investment by hiring a vice president of global design (David Butler). His sole job is to CREATE VALUE THROUGH DESIGN for this billion-dollar brand.

There's a difference between design and good design.

The professional designer offers a level of strategic thinking, conceptual, and rendering skills that your brother-in-law who knows the software simply can't. Good design is at the core about communication. A skilled designer knows how to ask the right questions about your product or service and customers, and can translate your business goals into clear and compelling messages. Whether via logo, website or printed brochure, the elements of design (layout, color, type choice, texture, etc) are used skillfully in service of that message. A good designer is a problem solver, not simply a style creator.

Is this value measurable?

When people think of logos, most often, an icon first comes to mind. For example, the logo for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver received much initial criticism from indigenous cultures over the choice of an INUKSHUK as the symbol. An often overlooked but equally important component of a memorable brand is the choice of typeface.

THIS ARTICLE does a fantastic job articulating the importance of typographic choice in creating a brand language (and in particular that of the 2010 Olympics).  In addition to being a workhorse for communication (a typeface must be legible in a variety of situations, from headlines to long blocks of text), the typeface must be distinctive, and communicate the essence of a brand via its design.

For the Vancouver Olympics, the branding committee chose NEO SANS, designed by Sebastian Lester. It is a contemporary sans serif with many weights, which makes it more flexible. To make the typeface more distinctive, a custom version was created. According to Ali Gardiner, VP of brand and creative services for the committee, "We thought that a unicase font (one that had several lowercase characters designed to the height and proportions of the capitals) could be used for display text in a way that felt both warm and friendly as well as contemporary and cool, which was how we wanted to represent Canada to the world. It also had the potential to become a unique, recognizable typeface for Vancover 2010, which was important as we established our own look and feel and brand identity leading up to the Games."

It's fashion week, and like everyone else, I'm thinking about Alexander McQueen. As I peruse images from his oeuvre, I'm struck by how much his work reminds me of the costumes designed by the artist Matthew Barney for his CREMASTER SERIES films. Besides their obvious stylistic and thematic similarities, they both push the creative imagination to an edge — sometimes calling forth outrage and disgust as well as acclaim. 

In THIS ARTICLE in the NYTimes, Trebay ponders that, "what occassionally read in Mr. McQueen as spoiled indulgence may in fact have been a defiant insistence on safeguarding spielraum, the artist's right to experiment, to toy with ideas." The same could be said about Barney.

I think that's what appeals to me most about them both — that they've been willing to venture into uncharted territory, at whatever risk. Sadly, McQueen paid the ultimate price for his experiment.

[photo: nytimes]