DC AIGA

Furniture of the mind: Eric Ku

2012-01-29T16:35:00.000-06:00

Eric Ku, Chair/Chair, 2009, in the Walker Art Center’s Graphic Design: Now in Production. The exhibition documentation label adjacent to the piece states:

Eric Ku’s Chair is made from pieces that when taken apart, spell out the word “chair.” Ku was inspired by a famous work by conceptual artist Joseph Kosuth. One and Three Chairs (1965). Kosuth placed a real chair in the gallery next to a photograph of the same chair (photographed in that gallery) and a definition from a dictionary.

Regarding his conceptual artwork, Joseph Kosuth has said:

Fundamental to this idea of art is the understanding of the linguistic nature of all art propositions, be they past or present, and regardless of the elements used in their construction.

Michiel Schuurman’s posters—near-sighted legibility and far-sighted readability

2012-01-25T20:41:00.000-06:00

The highly ambitious exhibition, “Graphic Design: Now in Production” recently completed its run (1.22.12) at Walker Art Center. Included in the show was an intriguing triptych set of posters by Dutch graphic designer, Michiel Schuurman. The pieces were designed over a two-year period from 2007–08 for “HorseMoveProjectSpace” in Amsterdam.

Schuurman’s poster designs cleverly synthesize and magnetize the graphics so that the viewer is able to read the information through accessibility of the text.As an analogy—Schuurman’s posters are characterized by near-sighted legibility and far-sighted readability. The poster series promote the “Horse Move Project”, which was an art collaborative project implemented in 2007-08.

The Mediamatic website states this about the project:

The “HorseMoveProjectSpace” is an initiative of three young artists who organized and developed collaborative art projects and exhibitions. They have utilized an abandoned space next to the Post CS building in a, site-sensitive, site-specific way. The project space is correlated with the Stedelijk Museum, W139, and Mediamatic.

For the next three months artists will be invited (the invitedartist invites the next artist) in an ongoing exhibition named The Horse Move Project. The project outcome is an additive process, which creates an amalgamation from the exhibited artwork(s) left by the previous artists.

Schuurman’s website interestingly conveys a summary of his work:

[Michiel] is a Dutch graphic designer working in Amsterdam.Schuurman’s personal work specializes in typography and poster design, which often boasts a rather maximalistic approach. His practice of combining bright colors, warped glyphs, harsh perspectives, and acidic patterns creates some awfully intriguing eye-candy, which he often screen prints himself.

Interrelations between writing and typography

2012-01-20T18:22:00.000-06:00

cover design—Gerrit Noordzij, The Stroke: Theory of Writing

The beauty of letters, whether handwritten or typographic, is that they constitute the black shape and white space of both letter-making forms. The counter form or inner parts of letters and the surrounding white or negative space are integral to the positive black shapes of the letter and word.

Dutch typographer, Gerrit Noordzij writes admirably about this interrelation of positive and negative letter forms in his book, The Stroke: Theory of Writing (2006) (translated by Peter Enneson):

Current studies of writing do not attend to the white of the word, but to the black of the letter. Consequently considerations of writing exhaust themselves in the exploration of superficial differences. The universal vantage point that renders handwriting and typographic letters comparable is not to be found in the black of the letter. The black of a typographic letter is so different from the black of a handwritten letter that as strict comparatives they appear incommensurate. Wherever typography concerns itself only with the black shapes of the prefabricated letters printable on paper, the academic study of writing is coerced into separating the consideration of handwriting from a history of type. (p.17)

Both writing and typography utilize the relationship in two-dimensional design of the figure and ground design elements. This means that the contrast of negative forms is of equal value to the positive shapes. In letter and word construction the contrast of the black encircled by the white surface or visa versa are enriched with tension.

Gerrit Noordzij: having a good time when you’re teaching

2012-01-15T16:32:00.001-06:00

Above is a Vimeo frame still of Gerrit Noordzij as he’s sketching and explaining the design of letterforms during his talk at TypeMedia on 25 March 2010. Erik van Blokland posted the video.

Noordzij is the renowned graphic designer and teacher at the Dutch Royal Academy of Art, The Hague. A great little book titled, The Stroke: Theory of Writing (1985) was written by Gerrit Noordzij and translated fairly recently by Peter Enneson (thank you, Peter). The publisher, Hyphen Press, states, “The Stroke stands out as the most concise and complete summary of Noordzij’s theories on type.”

In an excerpt from an interview with Robin Kinross, Noordzij describes how he teaches his “binary system” to students — Noordzij prefaces:

… any writing of any civilization begins with the stroke, and the stroke is made with the tool [brush or pen], and if you have a stiff tool, then the shape of the tool dominates the character of your writing, and with a soft tool the impulse of your hand dominates the writing.

Noordzij continues to explain:

I always found it very nice to ask my students “is it this? or is it that?”… It’s a nice method. It’s the binary tree.…My system is good for finding your way in design.…

The journalist Margaret Richardson once asked me what my main objective was in teaching. I said, to have a good time. She thought that I was not serious. But I said I was serious. And why did I want to have a good time? As a teacher you can only have a good time when your students are sure that they have a good time. I tried to find things that the students found interesting. Thought-provoking things are always the best; they like that.

I wanted to ask my students to study the book Printing Types by [D.B.] Updike. Then after three weeks I would ask them about it. In my classes we didn’t have what is called a ‘discipline’. Imagine that you go to your students, show them these impressive thick volumes, and say that you will ask them about the book in three weeks’ time. What do they say? “Oh, that's too much! We have so many things to do!” I just took a paragraph from the book and read it aloud. They started laughing. I said: “how do you think that this man could be so famous and yet say such stupid things?” The next day they were crowding around me with quotations and arguments. Just ask a student to find the faults in Updike or in Morison or in me, and they will bring you arguments.

It is just as with a child playing a game. I think that many students have the feeling, often unconsciously, that playing this game could be important for everything else in their lives. It may not really go to the heart of the matter, nevertheless it’s a good problem for a school. It’s a problem that can be a metaphor for your real problems, and because it's just a metaphor you can play with it. Then the only thing that you have to do as a teacher is watch, and show that you are present. So that when people are doing dangerous things, they can afford the risk, because you are there. When you are at the back of the class, sometimes you see somebody look to see if you are still there. That keeps you alive, or at least it gives you a good time.

Oded Ezer: “Biotypography”—imaginative discovery rather than pragmatism

2012-01-12T08:28:00.000-06:00

The pieces shown above (top) Tipografya poster, 2003 and Helvetica Live! poster, 2008 were designed by Oded Ezer of Israel. Currently, the posters are included in an exhibition titled, Graphic Design: Now in Production, which is on display until 22 January 2012 at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. Here’s an observation of the Walker exhibition catalog by Rick Poynor.

The “Tipografya” poster showcases the Frankrhulia type design, which is motivated by the adaptation of the classic Berthold’s “Frank Ruehl” Hebrew font. Ezer’s poster features the logotype for the Hebrew word for typography. Oded’s letter designs carry on the very fine Hebraic typography tradition. Traditional Pentateuch Hebrew typography fully appreciates the design elements of the letter, the word, and the book. Perhaps the essence of Hebrew type design is artistry that concentrates, like the Psalmist, “the inner soul of the poet and musician.” [1]

Oded has coined the term Biotypography in reference to the organic nature and “bio”-diversity of his typographic work. Paola Antonelli writes about this synthesis of art and science:

Ezer thinks that since, very often, a type designer chooses a typeface for its ability to embody and render the feeling of a project, the step from object to creature is direct and typefaces should really become living, biological beings. As he explains it, “The term Biotypography refers to any application that uses biological systems, living organisms, or derivatives thereof to create [to make] or modify typographical phenomena.” [2]

Ezer’s beautifully eccentric typographic designs are mainly about the impact of visual form and expression. The compelling detail in his work are the accentuated appendages that simulate moving legs and antennae. These posters also allude to the mutual feature of ubiquity suggested by the “Frank Ruehl” Hebrew text font style and the font Helvetica. Both are still widely used today. Although unintentional, it’s fascinating how one’s reflection faintly merges with the framed glass of the pieces that are in the Walker exhibition.

Antonelli, Paola. “The Typographer’s Guide to the Galaxy.” Design Observer: Observatory. Ed. Michael Bierut, William Drenttel, Jessica Helfand, Julie Lasky, and Nancy Levinson. The Design Observer Group, 16 June 2008. Web. 11 Jan. 2012. Here’s the link.
Ibid.

Dordt’s Campus Center Art Gallery features Canadian-inspired landscapes—Chris Stoffel Overvoorde: “The Alberta Drawings”

2012-01-11T09:32:00.001-06:00

Above image: Looking North From Highway 3, Near Fort Mcleod, Alberta, 1993.
Twenty-five pieces from The Alberta Drawings collection are on loan from the Grand Rapids Art Museum (GRAM). Image: © Chris Stoffel Overvoorde / GRAM

This is from a Dordt College News Release:

“I was called to be a Christian, and the best way I know how to be a Christian is to be an artist,” said Chris Stoffel Overvoorde of his work.

Overvoorde is an artist and professor emeritus who has brought his artistic vision to the campus of Dordt College. On display in the Campus Center Art Gallery through January 27. The artwork on display is from his collection titled The Alberta Drawings. All of the pieces in this series were created in a square format on paper, which presented a unique challenge because of the natural horizontal format of the landscape itself. The contrast illustrates the unnatural ways that man has superimposed himself on nature.

Inspired by the wide-open spaces of the Canadian prairie, Overvoorde made several trips to Alberta while creating his oil sketches, watercolors, and drawings. “When you stand in a field of grain, and you see nothing else for miles but a faint distant horizon, you get a new perspective on who you are in relation to nature and how you are related to God,” he said.

Overvoorde studied at Kendall College of Art and Design and at the University of Michigan. He has studied printmaking and painting with such well-known artists as Harry Brorby, Frank Cassara, Emil Weddige, and Bill Lewis. He has received more than 40 awards and has had over 50 solo exhibits in the United States, Canada, and The Netherlands. In addition to his work as artist, Overvoorde has worked as an art professor at Calvin College and as artist-in-residence in collaboration with the University of Lethbridge in Alberta.

Dordt College’s art faculty is especially pleased to welcome Overvoorde. “Both Jake Van Wyk and I had Chris Overvoorde as a teacher at Calvin College when we were undergraduates there,” said David Versluis, professor of art at Dordt College. “Chris was a very important mentor for both of us.”

In addition to The Alberta Drawings, four pieces from the “Prophet, Priest, and King” series from the Dordt College Permanent Collection will be displayed just outside the gallery.

Maureen Mooren: “The Walker Art Center’s Graphic Design: Now in Production”

2012-01-03T15:59:00.000-06:00

On exhibit at the Walker Art Center in Minneopolis is the Marres Identity System designed by Maureen Mooren. Marres is the name of the Centre for Contemporary Culture in Maastricht, the Netherlands. Also included in the Walker installation are Mooren’s 2008 poster designs for “Marres in Between: This is Not a Damien Hirst.”

It’s interesting how the dexterity of graphic identity systems has changed over the last 60 years to become more agile and flexible, particularly in the digital age. For many years graphic identity in the form of standard and consistent logo use followed the adage, “repetition makes reputation.” Obviously, the Marres identity is for a cultural organization; cultural institutions at times can be less stiff compared to “big brand” graphic identities.

In the Graphic Design: Now in Production exhibition, catalog co-curator Ellen Lupton writes: “Graphic designer Maureen Mooren designed an identity for Marres, … that consists of multiple renditions of the center’s name. Presented in black and white most of the logo variants employ drawn or constructed letterforms rather than existing typefaces. Mooren aimed to express the open curatorial program of Marres, countering the fixed institutional voice.” [1]

“This is Not a Damien Hirst” promotional posters indicate the Marres identity in promotional pieces. The Marres’ posters advertise the event, which focused on the work “For the Love of God” by Damien Hirst that was presented simultaneously at both the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and Maastrict. The event highlighted the devotional objects and art from the collection of the St-Servaes Church in Maastricht.

Blauvelt, Andrew, and Ellen Lupton, eds. Graphic Design: Now in Production. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2011. 201. Print.

Vintage circular barns—design of the elegant curiosity

2011-12-30T10:58:00.000-06:00

Above is a photograph of a circular or round barn. This one was built in Michigan around 1900. Specifically, this small barn is a: “very ‘architectural’ [structure] in which the maximum storage of hay has been made possible by its mansard roof…. In this barn we see that narrow clapboards can be bent around and applied to the structural frame. Its color is red, complementary to the green grass.” [1] It’s interesting that some free-spirited farmers “ignored tradition to embark on a structure involving elaborate setup” [2] for the functional design and economical space in the circle. Photograph by versluis, 2011.

Note the minimal pattern of windows and how the design alludes to the modern metal grain storage bin.

Arthur, Eric, and Dudley Witney. The Barn: A Vanishing Landmark in North America. Toronto: M. F. Feheley Arts Company Ltd., 1972. 149. Print.
Ibid. 147.

Frank Lloyd Wright: A Language of Pattern

2011-12-28T14:59:00.000-06:00

These are photographs of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Meyer May House in Grand Rapids, Michigan, which was built in 1908 and reflects Wright’s mature Prairie Style. The pictures were recently taken, just a few days past the Winter Solstice when the low angle of the sun at midday creates very strong shadows on the exterior elevation. This photographic study indicates how Wright utilized natural daylight in order to emphasize the horizontal and vertical compositional stability of his buildings—Wright had a profound sense of order. Photographs by versluis, 2011.

The photographic detail above shows the elaborate symmetrical structural frames and wide moldings that unify and extend the window openings up to the clerestory and onto the ceiling skylights. The effect functions to screen for privacy the open interior living room space. But, metaphorically, as Julie Sloan writes: “In this way, Wright now not only brought the garden inside, but the sky and the sun as well.” [1] 93.

Apparently the casement windows were sized according to the floor-plan grid system. According to Sloan, “there existed a symbiosis between window and plan…” and one of Wright’s Oak Park apprentices, Charles White, remembered in 1904, “All his plans are composed of units grouped in a symmetrical and systematic way. The unit usually employed is the casement window unit…” [2] 96.

Sloan, Julie L. Light Screens: The Leaded Glass of Frank Lloyd Wright. New York: Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., 2001. 92-96. Print.

Green Patriot Posters at the Walker Arts Center

2011-12-22T20:57:00.000-06:00

Above is a picture of the installation wall of Green Patriot Posters at the exhibition: Graphic Design: Now in Production at the Walker Arts Center (Minneapolis, MN) through January 22, 2012 and the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum (New York, NY) in the summer of 2012.

Exhibition co-curator, Andrew Blauvelt writes in the accompanying exhibition catalog:

[Started in 2009] “… the ongoing Green Patriot Poster project is conceived to explore the potential ways the third and fourth wave environmentalism might be represented or depicted, the project solicits ideas in the form of posters that are crowdsourced through a website where new entries can be uploaded, existing designs rated and commentary appended, or designs downloaded for use.”

The poster series is a very interesting example of the democratization of the design, production and distribution of topical posters for public consciousness and responsiveness.

“… but I became a graphic designer instead”

2011-12-19T12:30:00.000-06:00

Above is the image of a satirical and paradoxical ad published in Adbusters, 2001—the “Design Anarchy” issue, which became famous (or infamous) depending on one’s perspective. The ad proclaims that the next major movement in design is Design Anarchy. Interestingly, it seems that the ad is a reminder of the nature of graphic design today where some of the best designers have been able to merge art with design and design becomes integral with art. As the acclaimed graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister wrote in 2005 “… and a new generation [of designers] who manage to work with one foot in the art world and the other in the design world, like the young Swiss group Benzin and the American designers involved in the ‘Beautiful Losers’ exhibition, including Ryan McGinness and Shepard Fairey.” [1]

Whether it’s art and design, the common word for both is integrity. British designer Neville Brody has wise insight for designers these days: “If you have integrity, you say no to things. You must say no to things that are morally wrong. I wouldn’t work for a tobacco company, for example. But I also believe in trying to work closely with clients. Microsoft dominates ninety per cent of the computer market—but by working for them, I’m saying the war is over. I want to try and get them to humanize their process.”[2]

Sagmeister, Stefan. Foreword. How to be a Graphic Designer Without Losing Your Soul. Author, Adrian Shaughnessy. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2005. 7. Print.
Ibid. Shaughnessy, Adrian. 29.

The ad copy reads:

I wanted to be an artist but I became a graphic designer instead*

Movements in Design: Arts & Crafts Movement, 1890s; Art Nouveau, 1890-1910; Futurism, 1909; Plakatstil, 1917; De Stijl, 1917; The Bauhaus, 1919; Art Deco, 1920s; Constructivism, 1920s; Swiss Design, 1940; New York School, 1940s-50s; Push Pin Style, 1960s; Postmodern Design, 1980s; New Wave Typography, 1990s; Design Anarchy, 2000s; *set in 40 pt. Helvetica

Typographic current events—“The Font Wall” from the exhibition, “Graphic Design: Now in Production”

2011-12-12T15:13:00.003-06:00

The Font Wall from the installation Graphic Design: Now in Production at The Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. Photograph by versluis, 2011.

Identified top left to right:Base 900: Zuzana Licko, 2010; Akkurat: Laurenz Brunner, 2005; Fayon: Peter Mohr, 2010; Sentinel: Jonathon Hoefler and Tobias Frere-Jones, 2010; Reimin: Morisawa, 2011; LL Brown: Aurèle Sack, 2011; Replica: Norm, 2008.A2FM: Hennik Kubel, 2010; Router: Jeremy Mickel/Village, 2008; Adelle: José Scaglione and Veronika Burian, 2009; Aktiv Grotesk: Fablo Haag and Ron Carpenter, 2010; Mommie: Hubert Jackson, 2007; Buffalo: Ed Benguiat, 2011; Underware: Liza, 2009.Van Lanen: Matthew Carter, 2011; Trilogy: Jeremy Tankard, 2009; Aperçu: The Entente, 2010; History: Peter Bilàk, 2009.Charlie: Ross Milne, 2010; Anchor: Eric Olson, 2010; Questa: Jos Buivenga and Martin Majoor, 2012; Kohinoor: Satya Rajpurohit, 2011; Rumba: Laura Meseguer, 2006; Fugue: Radim Pesko, 2008–2010; Unity: Yomar Augusto, 2010. [1]

Pentagram’s Michael Bierut once compared the design and proliferation of type fonts to that of the endless variety of songs and lyrics that people continue to produce. Bierut’s analogy seems apropos and supports the need for more font designs in order for many people to fulfill their desire for articulacy.

Thirst’s Rick Valicenti recently reflected a similar sentiment about type design in the December issue of Wired magazine that commemorates the legacy of Steve Jobs. In an article commenting on Jobs’ contribution toward font design, Valicenti writes:

“The intuitive operating systems Jobs created have democratized font design. Right now there’s an avalanche of incredibly beautiful typefaces from all over the world that could only be designed on a Mac. Typography, like music, is an art form that embodies a time and place and culture. When type designers plot points on the Mac, they record our moment in time—all in the contour of a letterform.” [2]

I especially appreciate and enjoy Rick’s passage, which is a very lyrical analogy.

Lupton, Ellen. “The Making of Typographic Man.” Graphic Design: Now in Production. Ed. Andrew Blauvelt and Ellen Lupton. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2011. 112-29. Print.
Valicenti, Rick. “The Revolution According to Steve Jobs: Fonts, The Typographer’s Dream.” Wired Dec. 2011: 239. Print.

Typography and the metaphor of resistance

2011-12-08T13:36:00.023-06:00

The above pieces are from the Walker Art Center Card Catalogue Collection. Each informational brochure coincides with exhibitions at the museum. In other words, each brochure or program is available at a particular show and you can conveniently collect and catalog them if you have the two-ring binder (like the Pantone® books).

For the 2010 exhibition titled Abstract Resistance, the Walker Art Center assembled seminal works by four generations of contemporary artists that relate to disturbing post-World War II historical events. As a starting point for the exhibition, curator Yasmil Raymond writes in the overview, “‘Michel Foucault’s assertion that where there is power, there is resistance,’ it [the exhibition] explores art made since World War II that has been shaped by traumatic events in complex ways.” The exhibition was gutsy and intended to upset the viewer’s comfort level.

The graphic designer for the Abstract Resistance exhibition informational piece utilizes an interesting type choice for the covers. The lowercase font design is Faricy Stencil Bold, which was designed by Chris Dickinson. However, the font is essentially Milton Glaser’s all upper case Stencil (the numerals are Glaser’s Stencil) from the late 60s; by comparison Dickinson’s font version has nuanced differences in addition to a lower-case design. Like Glaser’s Stencil letterforms, the “cutouts” in “Faricy Stencil Bold” seem rebelliously irreverent, from the frontlines, and suggesting resistance to indifference.

Julia Born: referencing the design practice/process

2011-12-03T13:19:00.013-06:00

Here’s a selection from Graphic Design: Now in Production exhibition at The Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.

Above: Title of the Show catalog spread. “Einszweidrei” 2000, Publication, 22 x 33 cm, Offset print. Below: This piece is a mimetic semblance from an exhibition, Title of the Show (2009) by Julia Born and Laurenz Brunner. Cleverly appropriate for the Walker installation is the gallery wall display of a Title of the Show catalog spread in the form of “supersized” book pages. The Title of the Show exhibition received recognition for displaying devised, large-scale replicas of Julia Born’s graphic design projects. photograph by versluis 2011.

Providing background for this piece Andrew Blauvelt, co-organizer of the exhibition, Graphic Design: Now in Production writes:

“An exhibition and a catalogue by Julia Born and Laurenz Brunner, Title of the Show conflates the spaces of both productions while exploring the re-contextualization of design in a gallery setting. Created for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Leipzig, Title of the Show includes selections taken from Born’s projects—books, posters, postage stamps—enlarged and presented on the gallery walls. Absent the actual artifacts, the show relies instead on strategies of graphic design to represent itself. Photographed by Johannes Schwartz and transposed in scale, these displays become the pages of the accompanying catalogue, creating a mise en abyme of representations.” [1]

Blauvelt, Andrew, and Ellen Lupton, eds. Graphic Design: Now in Production. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2011. 63. Print.

A new book release from Bobolink Books: “Ship Shape: A Dazzle Camouflage Sourcebook”

2011-11-29T14:00:00.028-06:00

Cover image is courtesy of Bobolink Books

The subject of camouflage is multifaceted and holds a fascination for many people. For nearly thirty years Roy R. Behrens, writer, scholar, graphic designer and professor at the University of Northern Iowa, has become a leading authority on the relationship (the confluence) of art and camouflage. Professor Behrens’s newest publication, titled Ship Shape, is about World War I dazzle ship camouflage. The book is a compelling anthology of vintage essays, illustrations, and anecdotes discussing the theory of dazzle ship camouflage as a military strategy for optical confusion techniques and its correlation to art, graphic design, physics, and the natural sciences. When you looked at a dazzle camouflaged ship through the periscope of a menacing submarine you saw visual (figure & ground) ambiguity and uncertainty. Behrens is the editor and graphic designer of the book, published by Bobolink Books, Dysart, Iowa.

With this publication Behrens cleverly draws back the curtain to show readers some of the primary sources that he has referenced in his numerous public presentations and acclaimed publications on ship camouflage. This publication is the most comprehensive sourcebook about dazzle camouflage while the bibliography for further reading is impressively extensive. As Roy writes in the preface, “My own way of managing all this [material] is to pretend that I am witnessing in the pages — one could say, historically eavesdropping on — the ‘chatter’ of an era when ship camouflage was the subject of fervently heated exchanges — along with cubism, jazz, women’s suffrage, prohibition, costume parties, and baseball.” Ship Shape is specifically about dazzle ship camouflage with selections written during the World War I era. The exception to this is a delightful chapter on camouflage miscellany titled “Jazz, baseball, booze, and dazzle balls,” which is a collection, a “medley” as Behrens calls them of camouflage and popular culture. These written bits and pieces are also from the World War I period.

Obviously, when reading material from an earlier era the writing style can often highlight certain idioms and mannerisms, which now seem interestingly amusing. However, it becomes apparent in reading Ship Shape that the early pioneers of dazzle camouflage were highly motivated through their research and convictions that applying dazzle camouflage to cargo and troop ships in wartime could unquestionably help save human lives and cargo from sly enemy submarine torpedoes. Perhaps an analogy might be that the World War I camoufleurs were like the biblical character Noah who built an enormous “life boat” as a place of safety from impending doom.

As with all of Behrens’s books, Ship Shape is instructive and entertaining. As you read the essays, the editor’s comments, and look at the illustrations you will always find a new perspective. This book can be characterized by it’s many salient features. For instance, the photographs highlighting British painter Edward Wadsworth are stunning and alone are worth the cost of the book.

Philippe Apeloig, “understanding the art and design of letters”

2011-11-23T10:01:00.023-06:00

Photographs from the Graphic Design: Now in Production show at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis (note viewer and environmental interior reflections in the frame glass).
Top: Philippe Apeloig, designer. FIAF: French Institute/Alliance Française de New York, Crossing the Line – FIAF Fall Festival, Affiche, 100 × 150 cm, 2010. Directly above: Philippe Apeloig, [Motion] Typographie (on screen): La Lorraine, 2005.

Currently on display is a major exhibition at the Walker called Graphic Design: Now in Production — the show runs until 22 January 2012. In the exhibition catalog Ellen Lupton writes, as one of the featured essayists, a piece entitled, “The Making of Typographic Man.” Lupton’s essay correlates to the Typography area in the show, which features, among several others, the work of French graphic designer, Philippe Apeloig. As Ms. Lupton states:

Custom lettering is a powerful current in contemporary design. Designers today combine physical and digital processes to create letterforms that grow, copulate, and fall apart. Vocabularies range from the lush organicism of Marian Bantjes and Antoine et Manual to the geometric constructions of Philippe Apeloig, whose bitmapped forms suggest an animated process of assembly and dissolution. [1]

However, Apeloig’s compelling typography also seems to move beyond the geometric constructions, using the motion of countless pixilated points of light that coalesce and disperse to suggest the impact of human culture in flux and crossing boundaries. Interestingly, Lupton ends her essay with these words, which contextualizes the work of Apeloig:

Unfurling today across the networked horizon, text is now mutable (changing), interactive, and iterative, no longer melded to a solid medium… an essential “natural resource” (an essential medium of text exchange in our times). [2]

Indeed Apeloig’s typographic design is an image of a flourishing estuary—the ebb and flow of multifaceted cultural diversities.

Lupton, Ellen. “2011 The Making of Typograpic Man.” Graphic Design: Now in Production. Ed. Andrew Blauvelt and Ellen Lupton. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2011. 113. Print.
Ibid. 114.

Henk Krijger: designer of the Trinity Christian College Logo

2011-11-19T13:07:00.044-06:00

The Trinity Christian College Symbol was designed by Henk Krijger in ca.1970. Above left: Krijger’s two-color original logo for TCC (courtesy of Peter Enneson). Right: The TCC logo in subsequent years redrawn as a one-color “blue” version.

Today, 19 November, is the anniversary of the birth of Henk Krijger, a Dutch artist and graphic designer. He was born in 1914 and died in 1979 at age 65. [1]

Trinity Christian College is located in the south Chicago suburb of Palos Heights, IL. When Dayton Castleman, a current art professor, came to Trinity he was very enthusiastic about the art of the Trinity logo. The astute Castleman saw the correlation of Krijger’s design with that of minimalist modern art. In 2008, Castleman said this about Trinity’s mark:

Regarding the logo’s uniqueness among Christian colleges, there was a recent college president that apparently disliked the logo, and added a more traditional college seal to the school’s graphic representations, but the three-bar logo is the most common, and seems to be the most easily identifiable with the school… the artist of the logo is unknown… [2]

Here’s part of the story about the origin of the logo from a pretty good authority, Dr. Calvin Seerveld:

Yes, David. Trinity still uses it, and Henk Krijger designed it in 1970-71. There is probably a faculty minute on it. It was not the result of a ‘competition’ for a logo, since Krijger was our art prof (part-time) at the time. [There were efforts] to get others to produce designs (quite cluttered and old-fashioned), but failed to stop what Krijger produced at the faculty request. [3]

The three rectangles within a “classical” golden section square indicates an essence of form that is usually associated with a modernist graphic design 20th century international style. The square format contrasts with the geometric triangle, which is the traditional Trinitarian symbol — perhaps Krijger’s Trinity symbol of the three-in-one concept is more theologically accurate than the triangle configuration. When a logo design has to go through a group and variety of opinions in the selection process, not always is the best design chosen. The uniqueness of Trinity’s mark is the result of great trust in the work of Krijger and the apparent distinctiveness of Trinity’s faculty and students in 1970-71. The Trinity mark is still fresh and memorable even after over forty years of use. That’s remarkable.

de Bree, Jan, ed. Hommage à Senggih: A Retrospective of Henk Krijger in North America. Toronto: Patmos Gallery, the Henk Krijger Estate, 1988. 67. Print.
Castleman, Dayton. “Trinity Logo – Painter Edition.” Dayton is Not in Ohio. n.p., 3 July 2008. Web. 19 Nov. 2011.
Seerveld, Dr. Calvin. “Henk Krijger and the Trinity Christian College Logo,” Message to the author. 11 Nov. 2011. Web.

Simon Garfield’s “Just My Type”

2011-11-14T16:29:00.030-06:00

Top: Glaser's “Stencil”, c. 1967 – this current rendition is by Linotype. Below: “Baby Teeth” originally drawn by Milton Glaser, c. 1964. Here’s the image source.

The early to late-1980s issues and arguments about using personal computers for graphic design now seem passé, but stories about how some of the great graphic designers were reluctant to use computer technology when it first came out is still interesting and amusing.

In his book Just My Type, author Simon Garfield tells a story about the time Milton Glaser and Matthew Carter ‘debated’ the use of personal computers as a type designer’s medium and tool. As Garfield writes:

I asked Matthew Carter whether computers have made the life of a type designer any easier (Carter, if you’ll recall, began life as a punchcutter in the style of a latterday Gutenberg, and has worked with practically every typesetting method since; his greatest digital hits have been Verdana and Georgia). He replied, ‘Some aspects get easier. But if you’re doing a good job you should feel that it gets harder. If you think it’s getting easier, you ought to look out. I think it means you’re getting lazy.’

When personal computers and typographic software were in their infancy, Carter became involved in a quarrel at a type conference with the designer Milton Glaser…. ‘He was very resistant,’ Carter remembers. ‘His point was that you can’t sketch with a computer, you can’t do a woolly line – everything that comes out of a computer is finished. I didn’t disagree with that, but on a computer there are other ways of sketching. All type design programs have these very crude tools that allow you to take a shape and flip and flop it and stick it here and there. And if I’m designing a typeface and I’ve drawn the lower-case b, there’s information there that I can use for the p and the q, so why not flip and flop it? It’s done in seconds, and gives me a chance to clean things up and resolve matters. And if I’ve done a lower-case n, I’ve got a lot of information about the m and the h and the u. Why wouldn’t use that? In the old days when I was drawing it, I would also use the information but it would be much more laborious. Computers are not the answer, but they’re a help.’[1]

Ironically, it seems when you study the drawn typefaces designed by Glaser his type styles look like they could be computer generated. Just My Type, by Simon Garfield, is very good reading; it contains interesting descriptions of typefaces along with anecdotes about type designers.

Garfield, Simon. Just My Type: A Book About Fonts. New York. Penguin Group/Gotham Books, 2010. 321-22. Print.

Dordt College Classroom Building Sculpture Proposal

2011-11-07T20:12:00.017-06:00

Photography and illustration by versluis © 2011

The illustration above shows the collaborative Dordt campus sculpture proposal for the exterior wall of the Ribbens Academic Complex Building (east elevation). The piece is tentatively called “Insignia” and it’s important that the work compliments both the architecture and the existing sculpture titled “The Gift” by Van Wyk. The collaboration consists of artwork by Jacob Van Wyk along with design and illustration by David Versluis. Proposed project materials and construction is a wall-mounted substrate of individually glazed stoneware tiles.

Interestingly, regarding collaborative process, architect Frank Gehry conveys this insight:

I collaborate with people on projects because it enriches the mix and gets you somewhere else that you wouldn’t have gotten to otherwise. When it’s really working, it is like holding hands and jumping off a cliff together.[1]

Isenberg, Barbara. Conversations with Frank Gehry. First ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2009. 155. Print.

M.C. Escher and the Keramiekmuseum Princessehof, Leeuwarden, The Netherlands

2011-11-03T14:20:00.027-05:00

Top photograph by versluis, 2004 — Credit for the close-up photograph below it is from SmitoniusAndSonata, all rights reserved.

Pictured above are ceramic tiles on the exterior wall of the Princessehof Ceramics Museum in Leeuwarden, The Netherlands. The design is based on M.C. Escher’s 1949 woodcut titled the “Regular Division of the Plane With Birds.” The piece commemorates the fact that M.C. (Maurits Cornelis) Escher (1898–1972) was born in Leeuwarden.

Escher felt that the regular division of the plane using contiguous shapes was one of the most interesting problems he dealt with. In an essay titled “Coloured Symmetry” Prof. H.S.M. Coxeter quotes Escher as saying:

“A plane, which should be considered limitless on all sides, can be filled with or divided into similar geometric figures that border each other on all sides without leaving any ‘empty spaces’. This can be carried on to infinity according to a limited number of systems.”[1]

Escher goes on to say this about his interest in the motifs of animal shapes:

“… My experience has taught me that the silhouettes of birds and fish are the most gratifying shapes of all for use in the game of dividing the plane. The silhouette of a flying bird has just the necessary angularity, while the bulges and indentations in the outline are neither too pronounced nor too subtle ….”[2]

Coxeter, H. S. M. “Coloured Symmetry.” M.C. Escher: Art and Science. Ed. H. S. M. Coxeter, M. Emmer, R. Penrose, and M. L. Teuber. 2nd ed. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., 1987. 15. Print.
Ibid. 16.

The “Charis: Boundary Crossings” Exhibition at Dordt College

2011-10-31T22:22:00.020-05:00

A photograph of the Charis Exhibition installation at Dordt College. Photograph by versluis © 2011.

The following article (used with permission) is by Adam McDonald editor for the Dordt Diamond, the student newspaper:

The newest addition to the Dordt College Art Gallery “Charis: Boundary Crossings — Neighbors, Strangers, Family, Friends” is a series comprised of various works between seven North American and seven Asian artists. “The gist of this was to form collaborations between American artists and those in Asia,” said Art Professor David Versluis. “They met in Indonesia for two weeks exploring art and Christianity on a global level.”

Charis is a Greek word that means “grace” but more literally, “good will”. The term has been used by many Asian Christian artists as they find themselves in pluralistic societies. The challenges of cross-cultural communication, the need for people of faith to address real world issues, social justice, peace and reconciliation, not to mention the effects of globalization make this a complex contemporary exhibition.

Paintings, sculpture, fiber constructions, installation and video projections are all a part of the medium of the show and shows a strong diversity in not only the kinds of artists that comprise the show but in the kinds of media one can see in the show itself.

“It’s interesting that the Asian artists, according to some of the North American artists, had a strong social justice component to their work,” said Versluis. “The display really shows you different ways to look at art based on cultural context. For instance, the North American artists seem to be more educated within art academies and tend to think more in terms of postmodern work. In contrast, most of the Asian artists show a strong allegiance to formalism, the form of a painting as well as figurative work.”

Versluis heard about the show through Art Professor Rachel Hostetter Smith, curator of the exhibit, who teaches at Taylor University. “I was interested in the theme of the show and thought it would be worthwhile to bring to Dordt,” said Versluis. The show is being funded by the Andreas Center for Reformed Scholarship and will remain at Dordt until the end of the 2011 school year.

Professor Smith will be at Dordt on November 18 for a reception and gallery talk. Exhibiting artists include: Roger Feldman, U.S.A.; Edgar Talusan Fernandez, Philippines; Daniel Enrique Garcia, U.S.A., b. Peru; Emmanuel Garibay, Philippines; David J.P. Hooker, U.S.A.; Barry Krammes, U.S.A.; Timur Indyah Poerwowidagdo, Indonesia; Rondal Reynoso, U.S.A.; Wisnu Sasongko, Indonesia; Chris Segre-Lewis, U.S.A., b. Jamaica; Erland Sibuea, Bali; Ni Ketut Ayu Sri Wardani, Indonesia; Jo-Ann Van Reeuwyk, U.S.A. and Canada; and Soichi Watanabe, Japan.

A Sabbatical at Thirst [3st] for the 2012 spring semester

2011-10-30T14:25:00.022-05:00

A picture of the design office of Thirst [3st] in Chicago. The studio walls display some of the seminal and most interesting design artifacts of the late 20th and early 21st century. Photograph courtesy of Thirst.

On 21 October, David Versluis was notified by Dordt College Provost, Dr. Erik Hoekstra that the Dordt College Board of Trustees officially approved his proposal for a post-graduate, sabbatical leave of absence during the 2012 spring semester.

Following are a few key elements from Versluis’s proposal:

Rationale
The main goal of this leave of absence is to investigate how developments in technology, business, and social priorities have impacted design education and practice in the 21st century. It is apparent that the changing qualities of culture and society have placed unique demands on design educators in preparing students in specialization toward fields such as service and interactive design.

Concept

We are a society that increasingly questions consumption and advertising, which traditionally is at the heart of the graphic design discipline. However, we also seem to demand and rely on a dynamic technological economy that affects many aspects of life. As a result there is an increased demand for service-based jobs as our country re-evaluates economic sustainability. People are demanding quality, reflective, and meaningful experiences in their world.

In the last 20 years, the general situation of design has moved from mainly:
Single-artifact systems to design-language systems, focusing on a unified visual and semantic messages across multiple printed pieces.
One-way communicative artifacts, such as brochures, to interactive artifacts, such as software.
Designed artifacts to design thinking, where the focus of the design process is applied in the context of large-scale business, organizational or cultural problems.
Commercial goods toward time-based, service design, which is about providing the resources for people in a system to learn, adapt and share the knowledge they gain about the world with other parts of the system. [1]

The objective of this leave of absence is to achieve the purpose of maintaining professional relevance and remaining academically current in the rapidly changing discipline of graphic design and design education. This effort would certainly and positively impact student learning by modeling inspiration and enthusiasm about design. In addition, departmental outreach would be further enhanced by faculty quality expertise gained through actual professional experiences that could be publicized. This indeed would translate into developing student confidence and building finer program expectations and program credibility.

Methodology
During this time Versluis be working on site with the Thirst / Chicago design group with Rick Valicenti and his team of very talented and tech-savvy young designers. This is an opportunity to engage in working in one of the most imaginative design environments in the world.

Kolko, Jon. “Remapping the Curriculum.” From “Voice” — New Contexts/New Practices: Six Perspectives on Design Education. Ed. Julie Lasky. AIGA, 1 Dec. 2010. Web. 25 Feb. 2011.

J.D. Gordon Advertising — a firm that honors the personal approach of graphic design

2011-10-25T09:48:00.005-05:00

Jeff Gordon, principal of J.D. Gordon Advertising (photograph is from the J.D. Gordon Advertising website).

AIGA Dordt College Student Group is very pleased to announce a field trip to J.D. Gordon Advertising in Sioux City, Iowa on Wednesday, November 9, 2011.

This is from J.D. Gordon's website:

“… creativity isn’t just about making a pretty picture, designing a head-turning campaign or writing a snappy jingle. Although we’re very good at all those things. Our creativity goes far beyond the expected, seeping into our media plans, our daily communications and even our lunch meetings.”

Designer, Young Ae Kim can do it all — exceptionally well

2011-10-21T14:47:00.025-05:00

photographs by versluis, 2011

Speaker, Designer, Teacher, Product Developer and Sales — Young Ae Kim, it seems, can do it all very well. On Tuesday, October 11, 2011 the Dordt College Department of Art and Design and the AIGA Student Group recently hosted an all day event with Young Ae Kim. We were honored and delighted to have her serve as a visiting designer. And her students accompanied her from the University of South Dakota, which was especially great to have community between Dordt and USD students. Interestingly, Young Ae Kim has training in product design and so some of her portfolio work showed the relationship of promotional materials for her own products.

We thank Dordt students, Michelle Stam and Ellie Dykstra who compiled the following notes from Young Ae Kim’s presentations.

Designer tips for students (notes by Michelle):

Ask to see the work of other companies. Go and visit them. This way you can see what they do and build helpful relationships within the design community. Make as many connections as you can.
Be welcoming and patient. Communicate well. Get along with all kinds of people, even one’s you don’t like.
Put yourself out there / take chances.
Educate people logically — help them see how your design could benefit them and improve their business.
Do a lot of research about the subject matter and the client. You want to know them the best you can so that you can better fulfill their needs.
Employers want to see work, not degrees.
Look at the big picture and where different opportunities might lead. You have to think about the future, not just what you want to do now.
Try to map out where you want to be in 5 year increments from now to 50. This will help motivate you and give you goals to aim for.

Quotes by Young Ae Kim — notes by Ellie

Be an entertainer.
Be experienced in all areas of life.
Be willing to do anything — having many experiences will expand you.
Know the difference between looking good and being creative.
“50 inches of invisible concrete on your face” (learn to take criticism).
Be outgoing and don’t be shy — you are a communicator
Have a big heart.
Present yourself in a professional manner.
Develop a business plan and how you can make it better.
Don’t compromise and seek out job you really want.
Know what you like and go after it.
Doesn’t matter where you work, its how you work and who you work with.

Onawa Public Library

2011-10-10T19:42:00.014-05:00

Principal Architects: Normand Smith Patton and Grant C. Miller
Onawa Public Library, 1908
Addition (not shown) designed by FEH Associates, 2005-06
Onawa, Iowa (just off I-29 in Western Iowa, between Sioux City and Omaha)
photograph by Versluis, 2011

Patton and Miller was the Chicago architectural firm that designed the initial Onawa Public Library as another Carnegie Library in the United States in 1908. Construction began that year and was completed in 1909. Interestingly, along with the Carnegie monetary gift of $10,000 the library was built with a matching donation from an altruistic local judge, S. Addison Oliver. Near the completion of the library Judge Oliver also gave an endowment of $10,000 to be used for new book acquisitions.

The architectural mode of the Onawa Public Library is characteristic of the Chicago School. The Chicago School, although somewhat synonymous with Prairie School tends to be more eclectic than pure Prairie School architectural design. In its day Prairie School architecture was considered modern, efficient, and progressive. Actually, the state of Iowa has some excellent examples of early twentieth century Prairie School architecture by Louis H. Sullivan and many other architects associated more or less with the Prairie School; perhaps that’s the reason Carnegie’s Library Project Manager chose the idiom for Onawa.

The domestic style of the library is striking particularly as the landscape foliage turns autumnal. With dark earthy brick color and a large sheltering tiled hip roof, the classic symmetry creates a unified and harmonious composition. Chicago School architecture suggests the confluence of many influences, e.g., H.H. Richardson, Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, English Arts and Crafts, Neoclassical, etc.; this building exhibits Prairie School attributes, but also includes Romanesque Revival elements such as prominent semi-circular arches on the main floor windows and the Japanese style lintel over the front entry stoop.

Hand-painted Clarendon Extended & Regular

2011-10-08T07:10:00.017-05:00

Photograph of a vintage World War II railroad troop sleeping car manufactured by the Pullman Company, Chicago in the early 1940s.
New Buffalo Railroad Museum, New Buffalo, Michigan
Photograph by versluis 2011

The Victorian typestyle Clarendon Extended on the side of this restored railroad car is painted homemade but the name “Pullman” is nicely lettered. The Clarendon suggests the beginnings of the Pullman Palace Car Company in the nineteenth century. Note how the letterer amputated the toe in the leg terminal of the “R” in Troop and Sleeper to maintain tight letter spacing.

Young Ae Kim: visiting designer at Dordt College

2011-09-30T09:05:00.034-05:00

above: portrait of Young Ae Kim
below: portfolio project for SangsangMadang — KT&G Imagination Seed Identity Program.
The SangsangMadang company’s website states:

KT&G Imagination Seed is where you grow your artistic imagination:
supports new imaginations
supports and advocates cultural variety and uniqueness.
communicates and shares with the world
The concept of KT&G Imagination Seed:
We aim open projects, such as external co-projects, which allow individuals and the public to realize projects that they can plan, exhibit and perform by themselves.
We pay attention to and seek out small but worthy art works.
We support young artists of design, photography, music bands, etc. with our practical artist support programs.

The Dordt College Department of Art and Design is pleased to announce Young Ae Kim will be on campus Tuesday 11 October as a visiting designer. During the day she will be visiting several classes as well giving an afternoon presentation highlighting her various projects. Young Ae Kim who teaches graphic design at the University of South Dakota in Vermillion is an energetic teacher and versatile designer and artist. Each year she runs the acclaimed week-long graphic design workshop called “Design Habit” which is open to all students who would like to participate.

Here’s the schedule:
Young Ae Kim: Visiting Designer
Tuesday 11 October (All events held in the Art Gallery Lobby)
Dordt College Department of Art and Design
9:30 a.m. Senior Seminar (the M.F.A. in Graphic Design)
11:00 a.m. Graphic Design 3 (“Imperfect Beauty”)
Lunch with students and faculty
1:30 a.m. AIGA Presentation Young Ae Kim will discuss her personal work.

Young Ae Kim’s USD webpage mentions that:

[She] has a B.F.A. in Industrial Design from Sookmyung Women's University in Seoul Korea and she holds an M.F.A. in Graphic Design, Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), Savannah, Georgia. She writes, “I am happy with a design when it makes people smile. There are many ways an object can make someone smile: familiarity, surprise, beauty, satisfaction, pride, simplicity, humor or wonder. If an object stimulates this reaction whilst performing the function for which it was created, then it is well designed.…”

Bakkerij Versluis: Logotype

2011-09-28T08:37:00.017-05:00

Above: the Bakkerij Versluis storefront, Woerden, Netherlands
Photograph by versluis, 2004 (note the sunflowers in the upper bay window)
Below: Banner is taken from the Bakkerij Versluis website

Bakkerij Versluis (probably no relation) is located on Voorstraat in Woerden, Netherlands — Woerden is just off E30 between Utrecht and Gouda.

Here’s a quick non-comprehensive logo analysis:

The Versluis logotype is relatively simple and rather an enjoyable trademark — the casual script type style seems to convey friendliness that reminds one to give thanks for our daily croissant, bread, and banket (a traditional Dutch almond pastry).

The shape of a crescent-shaped bread roll — the croissant, inspired the interesting form of the upper case “V” in the logotype, which relates to the angular and square ends of the script style letters. The deeper color suggest Versluis as purveyors of good, wholesome, and sweet things to eat.

Charis Exhibition, boundary crossings: a journey with direction

2011-09-22T13:11:00.012-05:00

Roger Feldman
Pivots: Inside Passage
2009
Painted wood, metal straps, and stone
Site-specific installation at Calvin College
16’ x 12’ x 12’
photograph by versluis, 2011

Starting the middle of October Dordt College will be hosting the Charis Exhibition in the Campus Center Art Gallery. Charis is a Greek word meaning “Grace” or, essentially “goodwill on the part of the doer.” The exhibition was a collaborative art-making project in the summer of 2008 between selected North American artists and selected Indonesian artists. Interestingly, Dordt alumna, Krista (Koning) Krygsman designed the wonderful catalog which accompanies the show.

The piece pictured above is a full-scale version from a maquette, which was developed during the project — the maquette is in the show.

Professor Rachel Hostetter Smith, exhibition curator, writes in the introductory essay of the exhibition catalog, “Roger Feldman investigates the tensions that arise in this global economy as beliefs, values, and needs come into conflict with one another.” His Pivots series was produced in the context found in Indonesia through participation in the Charis Project.

Inside Passage was a commission and a cooperation of students and community members under Feldman’s direction to build the art piece on site. One may enter into the piece through an open passageway and walk through, encountering gentle obstacles which force a change in direction but leads to open spaces above and through to the other side.

A prominent painted exterior panel represents the bright Indonesian sky. In addition, here’s a description about the piece from Feldman’s website:

Three semi-circular walls join a geometric right-angled wall and refer to the four major world religions of Islam (green) [shown above], Hindu (yellow), Buddhist (orange) and Christian (white) faiths. The exterior does not reveal the interior experiences nor the sound component due to its orientation. An overhead bundle of poles tie the four religions together as they share a burden of co-existence.[1]

Smith, Rachel Hostetter, ed. Charis: Boundary Crossings. Grand Rapids: Calvin College, 2009. 14. Print.

AIGA Nebraska: the Reboot Camp “Small Talk” with Robynne Raye (Modern Dog Design Co.)

2011-09-16T11:15:00.029-05:00

Robynne Raye photograph by versluis 2011

Reboot Camp with Seattle-based graphic designer Robynne Raye was a three-day design workshop organized by Paul Berkbigler, education director for AIGA Nebraska and hosted by Northeast Community College in Norfolk, Nebraska (Phil Schimonitz, graphic design instructor). As Paul said in the promotional materials, “this is an opportunity to meet with one of America’s top designers.” The workshop, which took place from September 15-17, 2011 was team oriented and geared for professional designers, design educators, and students.

At the end of the first day of the workshop Robynne held a “Small Talk” (small group session) with workshop participants and for those just interested. Several students and I made our way to Norfolk to gather for a Q & A with Ms. Raye.

Interestingly, Raye graduated from college with an art education degree, but since teaching jobs were scarce at the time, Robynne turned to graphic design. Near the beginning of the session she stressed that the roots of her company, Modern Dog Design, were in serving non-profit organizations and developing Identity projects. Raye said, “Non-profits have been very good for us because we feel we’re making something of a difference with graphic design by really helping people. However, we’re able to stay in business because of our [loyal] for-profit clients.”

At the end of the session Ellie, a Dordt student, asked Robynne about her design process at Modern Dog (I’m paraphrasing):

I use the Internet – Google. But first we think about the project and then we talk about the project. We look at and study a lot of other designs and images.

We don’t necessarily try to be original — it’s very important that we know the source of every inspirational thing we look at. We’re always aware and know where our ideas have come from. We parody through redrawing, which helps translate a copy either with hand-drawing or the computer into our own unique interpretation.

Minnesota Center for Book Arts: Día de los Muertos Postcard Contest

2011-09-13T19:19:00.018-05:00

Current work: © David Versluis (photography and digital design)
Día de los Muertos / Day of the Dead postcard contest (4" x 6")

The photographs are a pair of one hundred years old sailing ship deadeyes, which have been scanned from a 35mm contact sheet of photographs that were shot in Grand Haven, Michigan in 1982.

The Minnesota Center for Book Arts (MCBA) call for entries states: any media may be used — the subject matter should reflect the traditions and art associated with El Día de los Muertos.

The Dordt College advanced graphic design class is also participating with each student submitting at least one design. All the entries are displayed in the MCBA Open Book Lobby Gallery in Minneapolis from September 16 to November 6, 2011.

Frederickus Reinders and His Memorial Icons

2011-09-10T11:26:00.025-05:00

Fred Reinders (1874-1959)
Liberty (after The Statue of Liberty)
painted cement
ca. 1945
photograph by versluis, 2011

This piece is one of several statues which can be found in Hospers, Iowa (pop. 690) on Main Street, in the Hospers Memorial Park (adjacent to the library and community center). The pieces were made by a local artist, Frederickus (Fred) Reinders, who wanted to commemorate the end of World War II in 1945. According to the local library’s website, “There was a formal dedication held on Saturday September 15, 1945.” About twenty-five years earlier Reinders had constructed an elaborate memorial in the middle of Main Street to memorialize the sacrifices of World War I.

It has been said that these statues are in the Folk Art tradition; however, the statues as well as other works by Reinders show a complexity that reveal some artistic training and cleverness. The charming look and naiveté of the pieces result from the rather rudimentary medium which Reinders had to work with.

To build the pieces Reinders modeled the figures in cement on an armature of steel and chicken wire mesh. The Liberty statue is positioned on the east side of the park but interestingly, that was not Reinders’ initial intention. The library’s website states that Liberty is “holding a torch that was to have lit the north end of the park. She clutches a book inscribed with the word LAW. For without law, liberty cannot be upheld.”

Here’s a brief biography of Reinders from the library’s website:

The Hospers Memorial Statues were built by Frederickus (Fred) Reinders. Reinders was born in Groningen Netherlands on December 18, 1874. Reinders was enrolled in an art school in the Netherlands at the age of six. He immigrated to the United States in 1893. Reinders first made his home near Platte, South Dakota. After a year or two of farming Reinders left the Platte area because of severe drought conditions and came to the Hospers area with his newlywed wife Jantje Dolphin Reinders. Fred Reinders went into business in Hospers as a house painter but soon discontinued the work due to health reasons. He then sold furniture and obtained a license as a mortician. In 1935, Reinders retired at the age of 61 and devoted his time to his hobby of portrait and picture painting and sculpting. Fred Reinders died on January 10, 1959 at the age of 84.

The statues have been carefully restored by Dordt College Art Professor Jake Van Wyk and repainted by Dordt alumnus Josh Wynia. In fact, the dragon of war piece in the Memorial Park is a terra cotta recreation by Professor Van Wyk.

Futura and the Dordt College architectural sign of 1955

2011-09-07T10:59:00.021-05:00

Pictured above is the original Dordt College architectural sign of 1955, which is composed using the Futura typeface. It’s perhaps the classiest exterior sign on campus. The 8 inch high metal letters are 1.875 inches deep and are mounted to 4 inch thick limestone blocks with .5 inch stand-offs, which can create pronounced drop shadows. The generous letter spacing seems to mitigate the encroachment of the geometrically circular “O” into the space of the other letters.

Futura is a sans serif face that adheres to the tenet of being assembled from geometric shapes and the characteristically consistent stroke width suggests automation. Futura was developed with 1920s Bauhaus influences and is the quintessentially twentieth century modern (universal) typeface with classical proportions that helps to convey the concept of form ever follows function. It was one of the commercially popular sans serif type styles of the mid-twentieth century.

Regarding “universal” Futura during the Bauhaus era, Ellen Lupton (crediting Richard Southall and Christopher Burke) puts it this way:

While any graphic designer of the period would have required skills in hand lettering, only a few embarked on the more challenging task of creating a complete, industrially produced typeface. One who did so was Paul Renner, who began work on Futura in Munich in 1924. Although early versions of his alphabet included experimental characters with extreme geometric forms, the final typeface — released in 1927, after three years of ongoing development — is more conservative. The circular “O” of Futura links it to the cruder, more programmatic experiments of the Bauhaus.[1]

Lupton, Ellen. “Herbert Bayer: Designs for ‘Universal’ Lettering. 1925 and 1927.” Bauhaus 1919–1933: Workshops for Modernity. Ed. Barry Bergdoll and Leah Dickerman. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2009. 200-03. Print.

Dordt is showing the 2011 “Book It!” show from AIGA Nebraska

2011-09-05T18:52:00.018-05:00

Photograph by Aanna Stadem © 2011

Cover designer credits from left to right: Lewis Carrol’s “Alice in Wonderland” (© Emily Yoble); Franz Kafka’s “Metamorphoses” (© Peter Morris); Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick” (© Peter Morris)

The following copy is from the Dordt College public information office:

SIOUX CENTER, IA – “Let’s face it folks: as designers, we might not always take time to read all the copy, but our heads generally swivel to see great cover graphics,” said a recent article by the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) Nebraska. Because great book cover designs should be celebrated, Dordt College is hosting Book It!, a graphic design competition and exhibition hosted by AIGA Nebraska showcasing the best book cover designs.

The exhibit will be on display now through October 10 in the entrance to the Dordt College Ribbens Academic Complex.

Cover designs on display have been judged as the top 15 picks by the panel of judges, all of whom are established graphic designers, including Rodrigo Corral of New York City, Roberto de Vicqu de Cumptich of New York City, and Bryony Gomez-Palacio of Austin, Texas.

Also on display in the Dordt College Campus Center Art Gallery is the famous Herman Miller Summer Picnic poster collection featuring the work of Steve Frykholm. The gallery is open from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.”

“Integrazione scenica of the villa into the landscape”: The Getty Center, Los Angeles

2011-09-02T14:18:00.018-05:00

photograph by versluis, 2011

The Richard Meier quote in the title of this piece is from Michael Brawne’s essay and book about the Getty Center. The picture above is overlooking the space between the Museum and the Getty Research Institute for the History of Art and the Humanities. The architect Meier and his large team have combined the buildings “in a special gesture” while the people in the scene enliven the spaces. To the left is the circular Central Garden designed by Robert Irwin.

In the middle ground — the sloping line of mature London plane trees (“Yarwood”) help “soften” the buildings and hide the “classic” cascading stream of water that empties into the circular pool below.

For insight about the design of the Getty Center, Brawne quotes Meier:

Sometimes I think that the landscape overtakes it, and sometimes I see the structure as standing out, dominating the landscape. The two are entwined in a dialogue, a perpetual embrace in which building and site are one.

In the garden the organization, conversion and perfection of nature took place according to prescribed architectural rules, which brought about the Integrazione scenica of the villa into the landscape. The plan of the villa can be regarded as a rational scheme superimposed on the landscape in which those parts of the landscape covered by the scheme are ordered and intensified.[1]

Brawne ends his essay with a profound truth by saying:

The thousands who make the journey uphill to the Getty Center each day… can in no way escape taking delight in the paintings and sculpture, in the architecture and its surrounding gardens, in the light and the view, in the joyful and civilized atmosphere that has been created.[2]

Brawne, Michael; (John Linden, photographs; John Hewitt, drawings). The Getty Center: Richard Meier & Partners. London: Phaidon Press Ltd, 1998. 35. Print.
Ibid, 48.

Jaume Plensa: people of letters

2011-08-30T14:00:00.034-05:00

Jaume Plensa, Spanish
“I, you, she or he...” (2006)
© Jaume Plensa
Frederick Meijer Sculpture Park, Grand Rapids, Michigan
photograph by versluis, 2011

Jaume Plensa’s sculpture includes three figures and the photographs above indicate a front view, a back view of another figure along with a close-up.

The quintessential collage artist of the twentieth century, Kurt Schwitters once wrote, “Not the word but the letter is the original material of poetry.” [1] In addition, perhaps Plensa’s sculptural content suggests “we are hollow men” (T.S. Eliot).

In this sense Plensa’s figurative sculptures are poetic soliloquies. His classic figural forms seem paradoxical as partially transparent yet solid. This piece suggests a community or “family” comprised of a group of three individual figures. Each figure is formed by an open mesh of metallic uppercase sans serif letters that are tack-welded together. The figures are seated on flat limestone boulders and seem to balance on the stone.

Technically, there's a smoothness and polish to the edge of the metal letters, which possibly suggests that they may have been cut by water-jetting or Wire EDM.

Plensa is best known for the “Crown Fountain” in Chicago's Millennium Park, which was installed in 2004.

Schwitters, Kurt. “Consistent Poetry,” 1924. Modernism: An Anthology of Sources and Documents. Ed. Vassiliki Kolocotroni, Jane Goldman, and Olga Taxidou. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1998. 284. Print.

Risk: Street Art Chic

2011-08-27T10:15:00.008-05:00

The “RISK” tag from his installation wall piece for the Art in the Streets exhibition at the MOCA’s Geffen Contemporary in Los Angeles. The show completed its run at the museum on August 8. photograph by versluis, 2011.

From illegal graffiti to the merger of a commercial art brand and gallery art — Risk’s personal and compelling lettering style is from the heart. And his paintings express an energy that achieves high visual impact. Earlier this year the Los Angeles Times did an interview with Risk:

Risk helped to import Wild Style graffiti, with hard-to-decipher, [bubbly forms and] interlocking letters, from the New York subways to the L.A. freeways. At the Geffen, the artist takes over part of a wall inside and has parked a salvaged bus, painted in fiery colors, outside.…

At 43, Risk represents another generation, but these artists share something in common. They have all witnessed their rebellious, adolescent gestures become a popular activity — and big business. They’ve seen their own art and their colleagues’ migrate into fine art galleries on the one hand and onto clothing, advertising and entertainment on the other.… [1]

Finkel, Jori. “Risk, more of L.A.’s street art pioneers paint a colorful history.” Los Angeles Times 10 Apr. 2011. Web. 27 Aug. 2011.

Pae White and the convergence of technology, art and design

2011-08-22T11:55:00.019-05:00

Pae White
Der Wërks, 2010
Mixed media
© Pae White
(MOCA) The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
photograph by versluis, 2011

This site–specific installation piece is a quirky and playful response that describes the surface planes, which comprises this transitional space. In this case the space is an enigmatic tunnel-like corridor connecting two galleries at the MOCA. Apparently the viewer’s vantage point is like a hotdog with ketchup, mustard and pickle on top (the works).

Interestingly, White uses points and lines to construct the word “pickle” along with the other condiments in an emphatic, physical, and expressive way.

The MOCA documentation tag gives a brief artist statement:

Der Wërks deals with transitions; it marks the passage between spaces and textures, generations and approaches — all loosely processed through the matrix of an abstracted hot dog, Each space is a puzzle; it’s the contingencies of the puzzle that interest me.

The Artist’s Museum logotype designed by Pae White — here’s a link to the color version.

Ms. White is a highly versatile artist and seems to ignore the traditional borders between the applied and fine arts. As a graphic designer she developed the graphic identity for MOCA’s large artists group exhibition The Artist’s Museum in 2010-11.

White, who lives and works in Los Angeles, was born in Pasadena, California, in 1963. She earned her M.F.A. degree at the Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, in 1991.

Dordt Alumni in Design: Taylor Van Kley

2011-08-18T09:09:00.016-05:00

Portfolio: 2011 Catalog Cover

ICS (Iowa Cutter Supply) Logo Ideas

Truck Trailer Graphics

We recently asked Taylor Van Kley to be featured as a Dordt alumni working in design. Taylor kindly submitted the following:

I graduated in May of 2005 with a B.A. in Art: Graphic Design. I worked at KSOU Radio before landing my current job at Kooima Company® in February of 2007. Kooima Company is a manufacturing plant located in Rock Valley, Iowa. About 120 people are employed there. One side of their business deals with laser cutting and metal fabricating, and the other side makes agricultural replacement parts. I am the only graphic designer at Kooima Company, so I do designs for both sides of the company even though I am considered a member of the Ag Department. 

I use a variety of programs, including the Adobe Creative Suite 5, QuarkXPress, iMovie, and more to make flyers, catalogs, brochures, business cards, signs, semi trailer graphics, and anything else they need designed. The Ag catalog is probably the most time consuming project that I work on. I also do photography and videography for the company. Kooima has two websites, one of which I designed from scratch with HTML. Here’s a link to the website for the laser cutting/job shop side. The Ag Departmen t has their own website and I keep the Ag site updated using a built-in content editor. 

Last year, Kooima Company helped another ag business get started. The new business is known as Iowa Cutter Supply, a supplier of used forage harvester parts. I was able to make some designs for them, including a logo (shown above). 

Outside of work, I recently finished a new website for my home church (Central Reformed Church in Sioux Center, Iowa). The pastor told me to keep it simple, so that is what I did. You can see it here: www.centralreformed.org. If you would like to see more of my work, please see my portfolio. The site contains a few additional and interesting side projects.

architectural block type: Newkirk, Iowa

2011-08-15T15:00:00.023-05:00

photograph by versluis © 2011

Here’s an interesting example of a local 70 years old architectural block type style with nice letter spacing. The name is found on a dilapidated, obsolete public school building located in the very small crossroads (Dutch Reformed) settlement of Newkirk, Iowa (organized in 1882 as North Orange; Sioux County, Holland Township). The auditorium was added to the older classroom building in 1941. The addition was a community project constructed by the WPA (Works Projects Administration). And the building suggests very conservative Art Deco styling with streamlines as indicated by the photograph above.

In this case individual sans serif block style letters made of wood or hard rubber are cleverly adhered in reverse, on the inside surface of the wall formwork, as molds for the reinforced concrete. Once the poured concrete has hardened and the forms removed — the result is a “cast-in-place” sign, which produces the appearance of incised letters chiseled in stone. With this process there’s more than meets the eye. For example, the width of the letter stroke determines the depth of the letter as well as the angle of the bevel. This slight bevel helps to pull the letter molds out of the concrete and makes the edges stronger and helps prevent spalling.

“Architectural type has to compromise between materials and legibility.” [1]

Spiekermann, Erik, and E. M. Ginger. Stop Stealing Sheep & find out how type really works. 2nd ed. Berkeley: Adobe Press, 2003. 73. Print.

sliced, uppercase typography = a noisy rebelliousness—a hint of disrespect

2011-08-10T06:20:00.022-05:00

photograph by versluis, 2011

This framed piece was photographed at the recent Art in the Streets exhibition in Los Angeles and indicates the upper portion of a Polish poster for “Beautiful Losers: Sztuka współczesna i kultura ulicy.” This poster was a promotional piece when the “Beautiful Losers” exhibition was displayed at the Muzeum Sztuki, Lodz, Poland during May–August 2007.

As an identity “Beautiful Losers” uses a striking logotype, which was initially developed by Iconoclast Editions in 2004 for a multimedia project about “skateboarder/gang/graffiti art.” The design of the logotype fittingly utilizes sliced, uppercase typography that connotes a noisy rebelliousness with a hint of disrespect. The project, “Beautiful Losers: Contemporary Art and Street Culture” became a global touring exhibition along with an art book catalog and seems to have been the prototype for MOCA’s Art in the Streets show this year. An acclaimed documentary film, titled Beautiful Losers was produced in 2008, which featured many of the participating artists. Here’s The New York Times review of the movie (the comments are interesting too). And another movie review from the Guardian UK.

Here is a description about “Beautiful Losers” from Iconoclast, which collaborated with the artists to produce the traveling exhibition and catalog:

Beautiful Losers is an exhibition of multi-media art and design that explores the recent work of a diverse group of visual artists that have emerged from the subcultures of skateboarding, graffiti, punk, and hip hop in U.S. urban centers. The core of the project involves painting, sculpture, and photography, as well as film, video, performance, and product design by more than thirty individuals who have emerged in the last decade—some now established figures in the art world, but many receiving their first broad exposure here. [1]

Beautiful Losers: “Press Release.” Iconoclast Editions. Iconoclast, 2004. Web. 11 Aug. 2011.

Steve Frykholm: Herman Miller Summer Picnic Posters (1970-1989)—Dordt College Campus Center Art Gallery

2011-08-08T07:53:00.037-05:00

above: Steve Frykholm, courtesy of Herman Miller, used with permission
below: Show installation photograph by versluis, 2011

The Dordt College Campus Center Art Gallery (the department of art and design) proudly presents the exhibition:

Steve Frykholm, serigraphs
Herman Miller Summer Picnic Posters, 1970–1989
August 1 – October 2
On display are 20 posters from the Roger and Jeanne Knop collection, Muskegon, Michigan.

Herman Miller (located in Zeeland, Michigan) is known for their innovative furniture designs. Each year a poster is designed to promote the Herman Miller annual company picnic. This exhibition features, chronologically, the first twenty posters, which were designed by Steve Frykholm. The first poster, designed in 1970, started this wonderful series of serigraphs (silkscreen prints) and graphic design. The posters feature super-sized items like ice cream cones, cake, and fruit to illustrate the summer picnic theme. Several of Frykholm’s Summer Picnic posters are in the permanent collections of New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and the Smithsonian, Washington DC.

Steve Frykholm has worked for Herman Miller for over 40 years. He is the creative director and vice president of design for the National Design Award-winning furniture company. In an illustrious career he has worn many hats: designer, art director, artist and client. His work has been widely published and has been included in exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art, Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum and Danish Museum of Decorative Art. In 2010 he was awarded the AIGA Medal, which is the AIGA’s highest award.

Locally, Nemschoff with corporate offices and manufacturing facilities in Sheboygan, Wisconsin also has a manufacturing plant in Sioux Center, Iowa. Herman Miller owns Nemschoff, which is a leading provider of quality healthcare furniture.

Chaz Bojórquez: calligraphic graffiti and art

2011-08-05T10:30:00.010-05:00

Chaz Bojórquez, (b. 1949, Los Angeles; lives and works in Los Angeles)
Tres Placas (Three Tags), 2011
Acrylic paint on wall (Courtesy of the artist)
photograph by versluis, 2011

Art in the Streets exhibition at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA.
Closes August 8, 2011.

This is copy from the show documentation tag for this piece:

Tres Placas (Three Tags) is a three-layered tag that represents an evolution of my letter styles. The first layer, in light grey, is my name written in an early style representing the past. The second layer, in dark gray, marks the streets in my neighborhood where I first tagged. The top layer tag, in black, is written in my current letter style, stating “Los Locos de Cali” (“West coast crazies”) because we are crazy for living the life. —Chaz Bojórquez

This is an excerpt from the exhibition brochure:

The graffiti styles that emerged fro the American housing projects, subway yards, and bleak suburban parking lots during the 1970s form the foundation for what is possibly the most influential art moment since Pop—one that continues to thrive forty years after it began.

Interestingly, I’ve seen examples from “artists” in this show (Barry McGee for instance) on railcars passing through Sioux Center, Iowa.

Ellsworth Kelly and Richard Meier: The Getty Center Los Angeles

2011-08-01T19:56:00.010-05:00

left: Ellsworth Kelly, American
Untitled, 1988
Bronze
© Ellsworth Kelly
Gift of Fran and Ray Stark
Photograph by versluis, © 2011

right: Statue of a kouros (youth), Rear view
Stone sculpture, Naxian marble
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Fletcher Fund, 1932
© http://www.metmuseum.org/

Heading north from downtown Los Angeles, on the 405, and approaching the J. Paul Getty Museum one is struck by how the architecture stands out like a bright shining city on a hilltop in the Santa Monica Mountains. This monumental complex is the visualization of architect Richard Meier and his Renaissance realization of an ideal city of the twenty-first century.

Once inside the Museum complex at the south end of the Courtyard, one encounters Ellsworth Kelly’s striking sculptural piece called “Untitled,” which looks out to a panorama of the city of Los Angeles. The precise geometric contour is indicative of Kelly’s very fine drawing ability and hypersensitivity to classical form. The piece is fitting for the space and certainly complements Meier’s building that was built with blocks of Italian Travertine stone. Apparently, Kelly studied examples of ancient Greek sculpture as a basis for his piece. As the Getty Center’s website states:

In the early 1970s, Ellsworth Kelly began creating totem-like [obelisk] sculptures in a variety of materials including wood, aluminum, and weathering steel. This work is one of a handful of “totems” Kelly executed in bronze. The artist used a source from antiquity — the rigid, upright statues of young men known as kouroi.

Thus it seems appropriate to juxtapose and compare a photograph of Kelly’s sculpture to a picture of an archaic kouros statue from the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. This Greek sculpture, a grave marker, was chiseled from marble. The MMA website describes the statue this way:

The [contrapposto] pose provided a clear, simple formula that was used by Greek sculptors throughout the sixth century B.C. In this early figure, geometric, almost abstract forms predominate, and anatomical details are rendered in beautiful analogous patterns. The statue marked the grave of a young Athenian aristocrat.

National Farmers’ Bank of Owatonna, Minnesota

2011-07-30T19:06:00.024-05:00

photographs by versluis ©2011
Note: the mural of milk cows in a pasture is by Chicago based artist Oskar Gross (1871-1963).

The 1908 National Farmers’ Bank (now Wells Fargo) of Owatonna, Minnesota
Louis H. Sullivan (1856-1924), principal architect

According to Jennifer Komar Olivarez, “Sullivan thought that a building should evolve organically, ‘germinating’ like a seed into a whole plant.” And, “He also felt that every structure needed a consistent, unifying ‘system of ornament.’”[1] Ornament was essential to Sullivan’s architectural design strategy, which was quintessentially inspired by the flora and fauna indigenous to the United States Midwestern prairie landscape. This importance is also characterized by the colors and textures of tapestry brick a preferred material that was used in Sullivan’s Midwestern “Jewel Box” bank buildings of the early twentieth century.

The following text is from the historical marker near the site:

Banker Carl Bennett wanted more than a prominent new building to house his family’s business. He wanted a work of art. Bennett’s search for an architect led him in 1906 to Louis Sullivan, one of the country’s most inventive designers. Together they created a magnificent home for the National Farmer’s Bank in the heart of downtown Owatonna. This brilliant collaboration of the patron and architect produced what many consider the finest small-town bank in America.

After helping to make Chicago the country’s architectural capital in the 1890s, Sullivan came through with a bank design for Owatonna unlike any other. Believing that function and form of a building should complement one another, he conceived a structure resembling a treasure chest, a fitting image for a bank that housed people’s savings.

Sullivan chose for his bank a theme he used often—an arch within a square—then attached to it a rectangular office building. He combined those simple, monumental shapes with complex ornamental details that bring the building to life. Set in sandstone-and-brick walls are two huge stained-glass windows, each framed by a wide band of terracotta—a hard, molded clay-accented by a narrow band of glass mosaic.

The architect did not create this masterpiece alone. His sketches were completed by his draftsman, George Elmslie, who designed much of the ornamentation and went on to become a noted Minnesota architect. Joining them were a team of skilled craftsmen who created the ornate interior—a “color symphony” of painted plaster, stained glass, and huge cast-iron chandeliers. The finished bank was dedicated in 1908.

Remodelings have altered some of the interior features. But much of the original splendor of Louis Sullivan’s bank remains. In 1976 it was designated a National Historic Landmark.[2]

Olivarez, Jennifer Komar. Progressive Design in the Midwest: The Purcell-Cutts House and the Prairie School Collection at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Minneapolis: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 2000. 20. Print.
Historical marker: Minnesota Historical Society.

The Purcell-Cutts House in Minneapolis: a unified vision

2011-07-26T16:35:00.015-05:00

photograph by versluis 2011

The Edna S. Purcell House (now the Purcell-Cutts House), 1913 (east elevation)
(Architects: William Gray Purcell and George Grant Elmslie)
Near Lake of the Isles, Minneapolis

For William Gray Purcell responsible architecture required that we must look and see and be sensitive to our environment — fitting for it’s time and place.

Think of… our prairies, fragrant [and] beautiful…vast riverways, our great lakes, and the procession of the seasons moving across the face of them…. Think of us as a people born into such [an]… environment, and dream of an architecture arising from the dynamics of a [people]…so nurtured, so blessed…. Do we believe in our spiritual resources? Then let us rely upon ourselves, let us not forsake ourselves. Do we believe in the divine creative impulse dwelling within us and working through us? Then let us…believe that beneficence may be worked through us, that genuine power is common to us all…. Do we believe in the reality of life? Then let us not deny our presence in…an ordered universe. Do we believe in the romance of life? Then let us utter a song! —William Gray Purcell [1]

Concerning details of the geometry of the house Jennifer Komar Olivarez writes:

The Purcells’ new house had a steel-reinforced structure and reddish buff-colored stucco exterior. In keeping with its site, the two-story house appeared strongly horizontal, owing to the overhanging eves, including a seven-foot projection at the front (east) of the house. The eves also regulated light and heat entering the house as a shield on hot days. A wall of windows under the eves connected the interior of the house to the garden and reflecting pool. Bands of windows on the second floor, some spanning more than one room, contributed to the horizontal line [along with the piers of spruce and cypress wood trim]. And a continuous band of red and blue stencil designed by Elmslie provided an imaginative, low-cost alternative to an expressive terra-cotta frieze. [2]

Here’s a link to an excellent website, produced by the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, with 360° Quicktime® views of the interior.

Kennedy, Roger G. Introduction. Progressive Design in the Midwest: The Purcell-Cutts House and the Prairie School Collection at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Jennifer Komar Olivarez. Minneapolis: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 2000. 14. Print.
Olivarez, Jennifer Komar. Progressive Design in the Midwest: The Purcell-Cutts House and the Prairie School Collection at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Minneapolis: Minneapolis Institute of Arts, 2000. 38. Print.

stone as a memorial and primordial “living” thing: “Cairns”

2011-07-21T09:30:00.026-05:00

photographs by versluis, 2010

Top: the Des Moines Art Center, Des Moines, Iowa and the original building designed by Eliel Saarinen in 1948. The exterior is claded with white-gray Lannon stone (a dense limestone). The ends of the entry arch seem to be pulled gently, by gravity, back to the base grade.

Below: The Three Cairns, 2002 (partial views) at the Des Moines Art Center is by British artist Andy Goldsworthy (born 1956, Cheshire, England). The middle photo is a detail of the counter part. Goldsworthy’s sculptural “Cairns” are site-specific installation pieces, which are built with indigenous materials. In this case, Goldsworthy uses Iowa (dolomite) limestone that was chosen to correlate with Saarinen’s original building.

This passage by Goldsworthy seems to provide insight into The Three Cairns, “Stone has shown me things about the structure of growth. I have found an energy in stone that can best be described as a seed that becomes taut as it opens.” [1]

Stones are primordial things that can be exposed on the surface of the land or lay hidden down under in the soil. A stone can be revealed, gradually, by being pushed out from beneath the earth by wind, rain, and erosion — or natural forces within the earth itself.

Goldsworthy, Andy. Wood. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1996. 23. Print.

2011 CIVA Biennial Conference: The Future of Matter/The Future of Paradise

2011-07-15T12:06:00.013-05:00

Photograph by versluis, 2011

A panel discussion about the acclaimed Biola University’s Visionary-in-Residence Program, Los Angeles. The 2011 CIVA Biennial Conference, Saturday afternoon, 18 June.

Pictured left to right: John Chan, the 2011 Biola Visionary-in-Residence; along with the following Biola University faculty: Barry Krammes, Professor of Art and Biola University Gallery Director; Astri Swendsrud, Adjunct Professor of Art; Daniel Callis, Professor of Drawing & Painting and serves as co-director of the Urban Studies Program at Biola; Brent Ridley, Associate Professor of Physical Science.

The 2011 CIVA (Christians in the Visual Arts) Biennial Conference was held at Biola University in Los Angeles, from June 16-19. The theme of the conference was Matter and Spirit: Art and Belief in the Digital Age. The conference was structured by three major themes:

Why Matter Matters: Technology and the Created Order
The Problem of Matter: Technology and the History of Art-Making
The Future of Matter: Technology, Art-Making, and Hope

On the final afternoon of the conference a panel discussion was held highlighting the 2011 Biola University Visionary-in-Residence Program. For 2011, John K. Chan was selected by the Biola University Art Department as it’s Visionary-in-Residence. And John was present to help elaborate on the theme: “The Future of Paradise: Projective Ecologies of Second Nature” a topic that coincided with the final Conference theme and presentation of “The Future of Matter.”

When John asks students about what they think of when they hear the word “Paradise” — their predominate response is a stereotypical Eastern tropical paradise. However, the promotional materials for Biola’s 2011 Visionary-in-Residence Program says this:

From the resplendent ecology of Eden to the celestial archetype of New Jerusalem, the Biblical narrative begins in the garden and ends in the city. The Future of Paradise is an interdisciplinary exploration of this cosmological narrative, through the vantages of art, architecture, sociology, theology and ecology, aspiring to critically examine our cultural conditionings and their contribution to the escalating ecological crisis all around us, while also reclaiming the disintegrating connection between our bodies and the biosphere.

In addition, the CIVA materials states:

John Chan is an Environmental Designer, Assoc. AIA, and is a LEED Accredited Professional with a portfolio of notable architectural projects ranging from large-scale master planning and institutional buildings to idiosyncratic, small-scale residential structures. Chan currently investigates the meaningful integration of ecological intelligence within the collaborative dialogue of design. In 2008, John established Formation Association, an Environmental Design Collaborative.

The Formation Association is involved in a variety of very interesting projects.

Addendum: Coincidently and interestingly, John Thackara in “Design Observer” gives a brief report about the current exhibition in Paris called The Fertile City: Towards An Urban Nature.

Eames House (1949): “Arts & Architecture” Case Study #8

2011-07-13T16:11:00.017-05:00

Photograph by versluis, 2011

The Eames House seems, ironically, to contrast with nature and yet at the same time is integral to nature. This horizontal architectural structure of steel, glass, and sheet metal is close in proximity to the Pacific Ocean and becomes a backdrop for the strong verticality of magnificent eucalyptus trees.

Charles and Ray Eames, a husband-and-wife design team, were the principal designers for their house in Pacific Palisades, just northwest and adjacent to Santa Monica, California. The house, built in 1949 was one of the “Case Study Houses” commissioned in 1945 by John Entenza, editor of Arts and Architecture magazine. The main objective of the so-called Case Study Houses was to utilize wartime technology and materials to build modern homes that could fulfill the housing shortage after World War II. [1]

In A Global History of Architecture the authors write this short description about the Eames House:

For the Entenza project, the Eames initially had in mind a pristine Mies-like cube standing on two slender steel columns, cantilevered out from the slope of a hillside lot. However, in 1947, the Eames [especially Ray] decided to build the house more to conform to their personal lifestyle. Still using the same amount of steel, they designed it to enclose more space. The new house, anchored by a retaining wall, nestles against the hillside, parallel to its contours, making it a statement as much about the site, the location, and the inhabitants, as about the deployment of prefabricated industrial materials. Their house featured extremely thin steel framing, with exposed corrugated metal roofing; the building consisted of 18 bays, 2.3 meters wide, 6 meters long, and 5 meters high, which determined the rhythm of the structure. Glazed panels—transparent. opaque, or translucent, as the situation demanded, and occasionally interrupted by painted panels in bright, primary colors [however, gold instead of yellow]—appeared to be an homage to Mondrian. The windows were operable at midlevel, and sliding doors connected to and integrated the courtyard. Grass, plants, and trees surround the building on all sides. [2]

Neuhart, John, Marilyn Neuhart, and Ray Eames. Eames Design, The Work of the Office of Charles and Ray Eames. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1989. 106-21. Print.
Ching, Francis D. K., Mark Jarzombek, and Vikramaditya Prakash. A Global History of Architecture. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2007. 719. Print.

Frank Lloyd Wright: Aline Barnsdall’s “Hollyhock House,” 1917, Los Angeles (Hollywood) [1]

2011-07-07T16:46:00.030-05:00

View from the Barnsdall House and the famous Hollywood sign

Entry (center) and cast concrete block colonnades (details).

North elevation (partial)

West elevation

South elevation (partial)

East elevation (partial) the background indicates major restoration in progress

North elevation (kitchen)

North elevation (dining room)

photographs by versluis 2011

The hollyhock has a central stem that elevates the blossoms and topped with buds. Perhaps this another reason is why hollyhock was chosen as the emblem for Frank Lloyd Wright’s Barnsdall complex (now the Barnsdall Art Park) on “Olive [orchard] Hill.” Obviously the name is a play on words with the Hollywood location.

Regarding the design Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer writes:

The design for Hollyhock House represents a totally new direction in Wright’s work: … sculptural concrete masses, slightly canted or sloped, with flat roof terraces over the entire house. Here at last is architecture in sympathy with the region, not pretending to be anything other than a building that belongs where it is built. Since Barnsdall’s favorite flower was the hollyhock, Wright built the abstractions of the plant into the decorative elements of her home, which she had already named “Hollyhock House.” Running bands of these “flowers” adorn the concrete parapets, colonnades, and planters, as well as appearing on the backs of the house’s specially designed chairs. … [2]

Larkin, David, and Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks, eds. Frank Lloyd Wright The Masterworks. By Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer. New York: Rizzoli and the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, 1993. 126. Print.
Ibid, 132-33.

To God be the Glory (Soli Deo Gloria)

2011-07-05T11:51:00.013-05:00

Photograph by versluis © 2011

It’s not everyday you see the Dordt College motto on the roof of a barn. This is the old barn from the Crull homestead located several miles west of Rockford, Illinois near German Valley. Steve Crull, (Dordt alumnus ’72) says that over forty years ago, as a Dordt student, he was back home working on the farm for the summer when his dad had the idea to reroof the barn and cleverly weave the two-color shingles to form the letters. So Steve and his brothers shingled the barn as one of their summer jobs. Interestingly the letter style naturally seems to anticipate bitmapped typography, which would come along a little later with the dot matrix printer.

As a side note: the name “Crull” is of German descent and if you follow US 20 west from Rockford into Iowa you’ll find settlements of Germans who are of the Reformed (Christian) persuasion. Among others, the Iowa towns include Ackley in Hardin County and Wellsburg in Grundy County; in fact, at one time, many of the members of the Christian Reformed denomination in this part of Iowa were Germans and not Dutch. (reference)

Note: I may have seen this story about Crull's barn in the Dordt “Voice” awhile ago.

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles

2011-07-01T13:36:00.022-05:00

Photographs by versluis, 2011

The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles is a sublime building designed in a postmodern architectural idiom that reflects the significance of harmonious colors, light, rhythms, space, and time, which seems to “appreciate the creative spirit indigenous to the local community.” Additionally, the program of the Cathedral is unified and has many of the traditional features that connect it to the great Roman Catholic Cathedrals of the past. When entering the church one is literally guided in procession to the place where the central liturgical elements commemorate with the Eucharist (The Thanksgiving).

In 1996 the Spanish architect, Professor José Rafael Moneo, was commissioned to design the Cathedral. Construction began on May 1999 and by spring of 2002 it was completed — in all the complex essentially resides within a city block.

The architect uses natural light to reveal the materials of the exterior and interior architectural spaces and the materiality of eating the Eucharistic elements. As the Cathedral’s website explains:

Spanish architect, Professor José Rafael Moneo has designed a dynamic, contemporary Cathedral with virtually no right angles. This geometry contributes to the Cathedral's feeling of mystery and its aura of majesty.

Inspired by the themes of LIGHT and JOURNEY, architect Professor José Rafael Moneo chose natural light to flood the Cathedral. Sunlight streams through glass-sheltered, Spanish alabaster mosaics, combining the opaque white of alabaster with its various hues of earth tones — red, yellow, brown, orange and rust. Light also enters the Cathedral and devotional chapels by way of large, slanted shafts, reminiscent of those used by the early Franciscans when they designed the California Missions.

The Cathedral features the largest single use of alabaster windows in the world — some 33,500 square feet. This powerful natural light emphasizes the purity and beauty of God’s creation.

The very striking and intricate tapestries created by artist John Nava for the Cathedral are meant to convey the Communion of Saints along the south and north walls of the nave. The Cathedral’s website iterates:

Twenty-five fresco-like tapestries depict 135 saints and blesseds from around the world, including holy men and women of North America canonized by the Church. Twelve untitled figures, including children of all ages, represent the many anonymous holy people in our midst. All the figures direct our eyes to the light of the great Cross-window above the Altar where the Eucharist is celebrated.

Nava combined digital imaging and ‘Old Master’ methods in creating the saints for the tapestries. He constructed figures from multiple studies, combined drawn and painted elements, had costumes made when needed and even drafted family members to serve as models on occasion. He wanted the figures to look like people we know now, and did not use a highly stylized form to depict the saints. Nava’s desire is that people identify and see that ‘a saint could look like me.’

The plaza fountain (a detail pictured above) senses the biblical story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. The Hebraic inscription in the stone has all the characteristics of fine Hebraic script typography.

Margaret Kilgallen: images that are flat and graphic

2011-06-30T10:11:00.027-05:00

Margaret Kilgallen (1967-2001), San Francisco
Main Drag, 2001
Kilgallen’s “Main Drag” is an interesting combination of contemporary art and text— typography, folk art, and street art.
(installation views) photographs by versluis
(for more installation photographs, see juxtapoz)

This piece is one of the works in the exhibition “Art in the Streets” currently at the Geffen Contemporary of the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Los Angeles. This highly energetic and powerful exhibition highlights the unique visual language of graffiti and street art from the 1970s to becoming a global phenomenon. The exhibition opened April 17 and will run to August 8, 2011. It will then travel to New York next year.

The late Margaret Kilgallen was trained in printmaking and had a strong interest in letterpress, nineteenth century wood type, and hand-painted commercial signs. “Main Drag” is an exceptional example from her oeuvre as she translates, painting by hand, antique (old-west) display wood type styles into large-scale mural installations. She felt there was beauty in the imperfect hand drawn line and shape, and in the appearance of lettering to effect meaning and thought. Her obelisk/tower (totem) of stacked boxes seems to suggest over-grown letterpress type chase furniture. Old hand-painted commercial signs drawn from display type and folk-art traditions, in particular, inspired her typography. And her illustrations of human figures seem strong and independent within the urban (skid row) landscape. Often her compositions significantly feature characters of men and women in actions such as walking, biking, surfing, and fighting.

MOCA’s online website for the show states:

“Art in the Streets” will showcase installations by 50 of the most dynamic artists from the graffiti and street art community, including Fab 5 Freddy (New York), Lee Quiñones (New York), Futura (New York), Margaret Kilgallen (San Francisco), Swoon (New York), Shepard Fairey (Los Angeles), Os Gemeos (São Paulo), and JR (Paris). MOCA’s exhibition will emphasize Los Angeles’s role in the evolution of graffiti and street art, with special sections dedicated to cholo graffiti and Dogtown skateboard culture. The exhibition will feature projects by influential local artists such as Craig R. Stecyk III, Chaz Bojórquez, Mister Cartoon, RETNA, SABER, REVOK, and RISK. [1]

The Curve. MOCA.org, 9 Mar. 2011. Web. 20 June 2011.

Architect Howard B. Burr of Waterloo, Iowa: The 1916 Edmonds House, Marcus, Iowa

2011-06-29T08:12:00.027-05:00

Edmonds House, 1916
Marcus, (Northwest) Iowa
North elevation
photograph by versluis, ©2011, all rights reserved.

According to the website, “Prairie School Traveler” this solidly constructed brick “Four-square” with Prairie School (Style) details was designed by Waterloo, Iowa architect Howard B. Burr. It was built in 1916 for the Edmonds family. [1]

Born in 1878 in Clinton, Iowa, Ira C. Edmonds was an entrepreneur and president of the Edmonds-Londergan Company, Marcus, Iowa in the early 1900s. In addition to being a coal and lumber supplier in Northwest Iowa, he owned a few banks, had substantial real estate holdings, and farming interests. [2]

Regarding the Prairie School architectural design idiom Robert Guy Wilson writes this about Prairie School architect Vernon S. Watson’s house design, which could also apply to the Edmonds House:

The so-called “four-square” became the ideogram of the Prairie School. The origins of this essentially boxy and rectilinear form lay in middle-class houses illustrated almost continuously in house pattern books from the mid-1800s onward. Frequently cubical or square in both plan and mass, the “four-square” was the standard housing stock used—and repeated ad infinitum—across the United States. The best known of the Prairie School variations was Frank Lloyd Wright’s “Fireproof House for $5,000,” published in the Ladies Home Journal in April 1907. Most of the Prairie School architects—Griffin, Purcell and Elmslie, John S. Van Bergen, William E. Drummond, and others—created variations on this type. [3]

In the Edmonds house the architect communicates “Prairie School” with a sheltering form of the low-hipped roof and deep eves while the symmetrically balanced placement of large windows is classical design. The entrance is on center, and the rectilinear quality is emphasized through light-colored trim and broad flat brick surfaces. Uniquely interesting is the “Japanese style” pagoda gable and facade of the front stoop. In addition, the horizontal emphasis is achieved through the car canopy on the left and to the right by the covered veranda, and low privacy walls of the terraced patio.

Gebhard, David, and Mansheim, Gerald. Buildings of Iowa. Oxford: Oxford University Press, (1993): 484 Print.
Hull, Arthur M., and Sydney A. Hale, eds. Coal Men of America: A Biographical and Historical Review of the World's Greatest Industry. Chicago: The Retail Coalmen, 1918, 119. Print.
Wilson, Richard Guy. “Prairie school works in the Department of Architecture at the Art Institute of Chicago.” The Prairie School: Design Vision for the Midwest 21.2 (1995): 100-02. Print.

Design Habit 2 @USD

2011-06-23T15:42:00.034-05:00

Design Habit 2: Graphic Design Workshop 2011, 5 June – 11 June
University of South Dakota, Art Department|Graphic Design, Vermillion, South Dakota.

Photo caption: USD graphic design student, Amanda Connelly, is positioning a pedestal for her display of handcrafted artist's books while Aaron Packard a professional photographer for Lumo Studio looks on. photograph by versluis.

“Habit is a second nature that destroys the first… .” —Blaise Pascal, Pensees

Recently, by invitation, I participated as one of the professional portfolio reviewers on the final day of Design Habit 2. The event poster says, “The Graphic Design Summer Workshop is open to college students, K12 teachers, and prospective college students with demonstrated talents in the visual arts and a strong interest in graphic design.” The Workshop culminated on Saturday afternoon, June 11, with an exhibition in the John A. Day Gallery in the Warren M. Lee Center for the Fine Arts on the campus of the University of South Dakota. In all, I was able to discuss/review seven individual portfolios.

Under the direction of professor Young Ae Kim, students assembled and installed their work completed during the week long Workshop. Many also displayed a major project, which was completed during the Spring Semester. A formal exhibition reception allowed students to present their projects to design professionals, instructors, colleagues, family, and friends. Student projects were hypothetical projects about promoting products that are made with sustainable materials. Projects including visual identity and public awareness campaigns on a particular social issue. There was a workshop on handcrafted artist books too.

Design Habit workshops consisted of the following sessions:

Session 1: Web and Kinetic Typography in Graphic Design. This course offers software skills and strategic design problem solving.

Session 2: Print & Business practice in Graphic Design. This course stimulates thinking about the design process and the value of design.

Instructors were Young Ae Kim, Assistant Professor, University of South Dakota and Julius Woodard, Freelance Graphic Designer in Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia. Both are graduates of the Savannah College of Art and Design. Plans are underway for Design Habit 3 in 2012.

Herbert Bayer’s “Chromatic Gate” in Santa Barbara is in need of maintenance

2011-06-23T09:17:00.016-05:00

Photographs: (clockwise starting upper left) Chromatic Gate (a smaller version showing original color quality), Payton Wright Gallery, Santa Fe; Chromatic Gate, on the oceanfront — City of Santa Barbara, 1991, height: 21 feet (photo taken 6.20.11). The inscription on the circular concrete base commemorates Herbert Bayer, the 20th century modernist graphic designer, architect and artist. All photographs by versluis.

The Smithsonian American Art Museum Inventory of American Sculpture lists Bayer’s Santa Barbara sculpture. In 1975 Bayer moved from Aspen to live in the Santa Barbara area. Bayer died there in 1985.

An interesting article about the sculpture’s future was written by Jessica Hilo, and published by the “Daily Sound” last February. In the piece, Hilo provides some insightful quotes by Rita Ferri, Visual Arts Coordinator and Curator of Collections for the Santa Barbara County Arts Commission:

Ferri had the honor of meeting Bayer in the early 1980s. ‘I always remember this story: he and his wife Joella lived in Montecito, but they also lived in Morocco in the 1950s. He was always impressed by the bright colors and strong contrasts of the sun and the shadows [there]. And that started him using those progressive pigments he uses.

But he also loved the fact that when he would travel in Morocco, sometimes he would come to a place where there would be gates out in the desert … there would be no people living there. There would be an archway and nothing else.

He saw that as a beautiful symbol. A lonely symbol. That man leaves everything behind. A life once lived there. But an archway was a dimension. A romantic gesture.’

‘If I had my druthers, the Gate would be in the sand,’ Ferri continued, ‘where it’s supposed to be.’

Bayer always felt that a modern city needed a symbol of human thought.

And indeed, in the great cities of the nation, from St. Louis to New York, you do find iconic arches.

‘It has become a little bit more of our culture,’ Ferri said wistfully on the Chromatic Gate. ‘I think it would be rather sad to lose something like that simply because nobody cared. He left a piece of art in Santa Barbara and hoped that we would take care of it.’

Des Moines Art Center: I.M. Pei

2011-06-12T14:18:00.012-05:00

The Des Moines Art Center Sculpture Wing. Photograph by versluis © 2010.

The Des Moines Art Center’s addition for sculpture was designed by I.M. Pei and completed in 1968. Viewing the south elevation one can recognize the horizontal and vertical geometric concrete forms, which create a fairly rigid but playful pattern of rectangular voids. In a sense the building is monolithic and an architectonic sculpture that stands in contrast to showcase the sculpture collection found inside.

Here’s an excerpt from the Des Moines Art Center’s website:

Pei’s proposal for an addition to the Art Center was seemingly simple: a wing built across the open end of [Eliel] Saarinen’s U-shaped building on its south side. By choosing this gently sloping site, Pei was able to design a dramatic two-story gallery with a spectacular south-facing facade without overwhelming Saarinen’s low-lying building. [partially shown on right side]

Marion Mahony’s Amberg House: a pattern of piers and voids

2011-06-07T11:27:00.015-05:00

Marion Mahony Griffin, architect. David M. Amberg House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1909; partial front view; east elevation. Photographs by versluis ©2011.

The horizontal band of art glass and clear glass windows directly under the deep eves help the unify the structural composition and generates a strong sense of Prairie Style architecture. One enters the house via the lower level indicated by the lower left corner in the top photograph. Obviously and unfortunately the clear Plexiglas over the art glass hides the design details (however, the window areas have been “burned-in” as much as possible to give some idea of the window patterns).

Janice Pregliasco describes Marion’s architectural design as a pattern of piers and voids and states in her essay, The Life and Work of Marion Mahony Griffin: “The Amberg house is a perfect example of Marion’s attention to color. Red-brown brick, yellow plaster, brown roof tiles, and verdigris copper surround multicolored tiles inset under the eves that mirror the colored glass of the windows.”[1]

Pregliasco, Janice. “The Prairie School, Design Vision for the Midwest: The Life and Work of Marion Mahony Griffin.” The Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 21.2 (1995): 172-73. Print.

Gunnar Birkerts: Church of the Servant

2011-06-03T20:53:00.009-05:00

Exterior view (south elevation) of the Church of the Servant, Kentwood, Michigan—composite photograph by versluis, 2011. A newer entry foyer and narthex has been added to the front of the original building, which was designed by architect, Gunnar Birkerts in the late 1980s and constructed in the early 1990s.

Below is one of the whimsical concept sketches indicating recommended paint colors. Image is courtesy of Bentley Image Bank: Birkerts, Gunnar. Church of the Servant, Kentwood, Michigan, 1988-1994; BL000711. 2011. Bentley Historical Library, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Web. 3 June 2011. http://quod.lib.umich.edu/b/bhl/x-bl000711/bl000711.

Indeed the exterior design highlights the use and meaning of the interior space. The church’s website describes Birkerts’s architectural concept and the significance of the steeple apex as follows:

When Gunnar Birkerts designed the church, he conceived it using the metaphor of a village encircling a town square. Viewing Church of the Servant from the outside, the patchwork of colors gives the impression of a bustling city. Upon entering the building, the “village” gives way to a “town square”—that is, the sanctuary. At the center of this town square/worship space is steel “tree” reaching 60 feet into the sky that holds up a 32-foot diameter translucent skylight, allowing the light of God’s good creation to stream down on worshipers as they join in a circle around the Lord’s table. [1]

Scheer, Greg. Liturgy Lesson: Beneath the Tree of Life. Church of the Servant, n.d. Web. 4 June 2011. http://www.churchoftheservantcrc.org/liturgy-lesson-beneath-the-tree-of-life.

Herbert Bayer the expressionist

2011-05-27T20:40:00.011-05:00

Above left: Leaning Spiral Tower
Herbert Bayer
Welded COR-TEN® Steel
1967/2007
photograph by versluis, 2008.

This sculptural piece by Herbert Bayer was displayed at the Peyton Wright Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico (2008) and suggests characteristics of monuments designed by Tatlin and Gropius. To the right of Bayer’s “Tower” is the maquette of the Monument to the Third International (1920, unbuilt) by Vladimir Tatlin. Located underneath are pictures (elevation and plan) of the Monument to the Fallen of the March Insurrection (1920-21) designed by Walter Gropius.

Wolfgang Pehnt provides an interesting perspective about the expressive impact of the strong upward and oblique movement in an article titled Gropius the Romantic:

… In March, 1920, during the Kapp putsch which attempted to topple the Reich government, a number of workers had been killed in Weimar. Students of the Bauhaus had taken part in burying the victims and so incurred the displeasure of their director who feared political complications. Gropius, however, did enter the competition for the “Memorial of the Victorious Proletariat.” … this architectonic sculpture demonstrates how completely at home Gropius was with the formal ideas of Expressionism. Its form thrusts in a single direction that forces the observer to consider implications that derive from more than its actual substance: it cuts a rift in space. … [likewise] in Tatlin’s design, also made in 1920, for a monument commemorating the Third International, … [the] diagonal movement [is] similarly exploited for dynamic effect. …[1]

Pehnt, Wolfgang. Gropius the Romantic. Trans. Renate F. Franciscono. The Art Bulletin 53.3 Sept. (1971): 386-87. Print.

Pyramide du Louvre: a melding of the old and new

2011-05-25T13:57:00.015-05:00

I.M. Pei, architect
Pyramide du Louvre, Paris, France.
Entrance to the Musée du Louvre, The Louvre palace (Richelieu wing)
Photograph by versluis © 2010

I.M. Pei’s glass and steel “geometric” pyramid, which was commissioned in 1984 and completed in 1989, seems to emerge from underground to push a contrast between the old and the new. As a result the pyramidal structure represents an undeniable quality of modernity in contemporary culture and the compelling impact of design. [1]

In the reference book, A Global History of Architecture the authors give some insight and a brief context to the Pyramide du Louvre :

Postmodern Museum

Throughout the 19th century and into a good part of the 20th, the museum carried with it the imprint [of neoclassicism] of the Enlightenment. The ordering of space, the systematization of knowledge, and the owning of precious objects went hand in hand with the conception of history, the advances of archaeology, and the understandings of art.…

But by the 1990s, with the boom in the global economy and a heightened competition for tourist dollars, the museums soon became more than just signs of a city’s cultural strength; they had become instrumental to the economies of entire regions. A blockbuster exhibition could bring in millions of dollars in secondary revenue and taxes. If there is one buildings type that piqued the interest of architects, planners, politicians, and the public alike, it was the museum. What the civic center or philharmonic hall had been in the 1960s, the pedestrian zone in the 1980s, the museum had become in the 1990s. The transition began with the Neue Staatsgalerie by James Stirling (1977-83 and was completed by the time of the opening of the Pyramide du Louvre by I.M. Pei in 1989.… [2]

Ching, Francis D.K., Mark Jarzombek, and Vikramaditya Prakash. A Global History of Architecture. 1st edition. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2007. 749. Print.
Ibid.

The Paris Book Fair at the Porte de Versailles

2011-05-24T10:00:00.014-05:00

Upper right, clockwise: 2011 brochure cover design with the new “typographic” logo signifying the new Fair format. Below the brochure cover is the “mascot” symbol/logo that was used on the 2010 Salon du Livre de Paris street banners, which lined both sides of the Avenue des Champs-Élysées. Book publishing still lives. Street banners photograph © versluis 2010.

René Clement portrays the heritage of Orange City, Iowa in a book and exhibition

2011-05-19T13:48:00.040-05:00

Above: Cassie (Huizenga) Baker dressed in costume and wrapped in the American flag as the Orange City Tulip Festival Queen, 2006. Photograph © René Clement, used with permission. In the upper right, René is shown speaking about his project in Dordt’s gallery during the show reception (photograph courtesy of Jordan Edens). The Promising Land exhibition is on display this summer at Dordt College, Sioux Center, Iowa (installation view). The exhibition, which initially coincided with the Orange City Tulip Festival, has been partially funded by a grant from the Netherlands Consulate General in New York.

Promising Land is a book by award-winning photographer René Clement picturing residents of Orange City dressed in old-world Dutch costumes, shown in a variety of situations from satirical to traditional studio portraits. René says: “I started [the project] with portraits. I was fascinated with how beautiful their clothes were.” In addition, Clement’s portraits reflect the influence of the seventeenth century Dutch Master, Jan Vermeer (reference Girl with the Pearl Earring). The black background and chiaroscuro effect of each portrait is reminiscent of the Italian artist Caravaggio whose style influenced many artists associated with the so-called Golden Age of Dutch art in the 1600s. An interesting side bar note is that Clement’s photographic images perhaps correlates with Vermeer’s supposed interest in camera obscura.

An exhibit of 37 of his photographs will be at the Dordt College Campus Center Art Gallery in Sioux Center May 12-July 24. The gallery is open 8 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

Sioux City Journal did a very nice feature article about René, his book project, and mentions the show at Dordt.

Commemorating the Freedom Rides

2011-05-17T10:49:00.023-05:00

We’re posting this piece as a tribute to the Fiftieth anniversary of the Freedom Rides of 1961. The “Freedom Rides” were an important part of the non-violent protest against racial segregation; many of the Freedom Riders were college students.

Illustrated is a digital capture of the abbreviated version of “I Wonder Why…” —a photographic essay by Shirley Carter Burden, which appeared in Reader's Digest in February 1964. From a private collection. © 1964 Reader’s Digest, all rights reserved.

Not surprisingly Mr. Burden received several letters from very offended reader’s criticizing the piece. As Jeffery Dallas Parisi writes: “All letters of this sort were from prejudiced and racist readers across the country and their content is quite shocking and gives clear evidence of the extremely prejudiced sentiments people harbored during the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.” [1]

Parisi, Jeffery Dallas. “Shirley Carter Burden Papers, 1947-1989.” The New York Public Library Humanities and Social Sciences Library Manuscripts and Archives Division. The New York Public Library, Mar. 1993. Web. 15 May 2011.

Following the introductory title page (shown above) the essay begins as follows:

a somewhat uncanny resemblance

2011-05-10T09:53:00.013-05:00

Interestingly Roy Behrens, an art professor at University of Northern Iowa, has recently posted a well-written piece titled, The Gift of Gabberjabbs, Walter Hamady and The Perishable Press Limited. Behrens actually wrote and published the article in the January-February 1997 issue of Print magazine. The image above is of the title page spread from “John’s Apples,” Perishable Press Book No. 125 (1995). © The Perishable Press Limited. Used with permission. 

In the article, Roy writes: “John Wilde and [Walter] Hamady collaborated again in 1995, in a book for both adults and children (‘especially those of well-to-do-graphic designers’) titled John’s Apples, which centered on twelve poems about apples by Reeve Lindbergh).”

© David Versluis
Urban Edge, 1987
Collage/Photostat/Opaque white 

The design of the spread is reminiscent of a work I initially did in 1987 titled “Urban Edge” (revisions were made over the years). Similar in both composition and typographic college design, I was struck by the somewhat uncanny resemblance. The fact that Hamady’s book is letterpress makes it exceptional. “Urban Edge.” is just a sliced and diced Photostat.

Nuances of a logotype: a case study of the Steelcase logotype

2011-05-04T16:49:00.041-05:00

Here are a few older and newer examples of Helvetica as the typographic treatment for a company logotype:

First is the logotype form of the trademark, Steelcase. “Logotype means the special typographic treatment of the word.” Select the graphic for a larger view of details (image is from a photocopy).

“Steelcase, the primary mark for all [their] products and services, is registered in block form (unstylized) and in at least two logotype forms. Vance Johnson, a New York-based graphic designer, designed the current version, shown here, in the early 1970s. It was intended for use in one color, blind embossing, or in the spectrum of colors as seen on [their] trucks today.”

“Mr. Johnson started this design with the Helvetica medium typeface; the modifications that make it unique are highlighted in the captions.” [1]

Ross, Robert W., art director; David M. Versluis, graphic designer, and Donald Wheeler, writer. Steelcase Inc., Corporate Communications Standards and Guidelines. Grand Rapids: Steelcase, Inc., 1993. Section 1, pgs 1-4. Print.

Other companies using Helvetica as their typographic logotypes are:

Crate and Barrel Helvetica 65 Medium (modifications include tighter than normal letterspacing, and the unity suggested by the lack of word spacing. However, the letters are more precisely circular than normal Helvetica particularly the cap C, which is nearly closed.)

Modern Climate, Helvetica 75 Bold (modifications include rounded / softer corners and very tight letterspacing). The blue rain drop / rain maker significance.

Joan of Art

2011-04-30T13:54:00.008-05:00

David Versluis
A Collage piece from the Icon Series
Collage media: graphite, prismacolor, gold paint, colored paper, refuse printed material, and drawing on 22 x 30 BFK Rives Cream, 1980.
From a private collection

Photo credit:
Joan Mondale attends the Department of Labor’s “Bread and Roses” event.
Photograph Collection 1980, Location no. Walter F. Mondale Papers; Minnesota Historical Society, used with permission

The basis for the “Icon” series was finding a small elm tree growing in one of the spiked holes of a concrete parking lot car bumper. And after pulling it out, its roots were bound tightly in a cylindrical form. At that time I thought of this series of Collages as making banana bread.

The passing of Geraldine Ferraro several weeks ago prompted me to think, among other things, about this piece once again.

This piece was one of several in the series, which was exhibited as part of a group show in the early 1980s at Bergsma Gallery in Grand Rapids, Michigan. This show was the first show in the gallery when it relocated in prominent commercial space in the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel.

Highlighting the opening reception was a surprise visit by Joan Mondale who was in town as a keynote speaker for a National Organization of Women (NOW) Conference. Mondale was the wife of former Vice President Walter Mondale who at that time was laying the foundation for the Democratic Party nomination for President. That evening she cordially greeted me as we shook hands and said, “I like your work,” for which I politely thanked her. Following Ms. Mondale around was a small press entourage. Somewhere out there exists a photo taken during the reception with Joan Mondale in the foreground and myself in the background, blurred like one of Duane Michals’ photographs.

René Clement: “Promising Land” (how a Dutch photographer sees Northwest Iowa)

2011-04-29T09:38:00.019-05:00

Phohograph by René Clement © 2011, all rights reserved

After photographing in Orange City, Iowa, for five years, the book project Promising Land has been published and is available for sale. René Clement, a New York City-based Dutch photographer, will exhibit 38 photographs May-July at Dordt College Campus Center Art Gallery in Sioux Center, and do book signings May 18-21 in Orange City.

Here’s the news release written by Lisa Burg:

Dutch photojournalist from New York releases book on local culture.
Photography exhibit and book signing to be held in May in Sioux Center and Orange City.

After visiting Sioux County 10 times over the past five years to capture photographs for his book on Dutch culture, New York City-based photojournalist René Clement returns in May for an exhibit and book signing of his recently-published Promising Land. The Dordt College Department of Art and Design will host an exhibit of 38 of Clement’s photographs from May through July, with a reception and book signing on May 18. In addition, Clement will be on hand in during the Tulip Festival, May 19-21, for book signings at Holland House Interiors on main street Orange City.

Locally, Sioux County has long been known for its Dutch heritage. But when Clement “stumbled upon” Orange City he was fascinated with the discovery of a place where community members openly celebrate and display that heritage. As a Dutch immigrant himself, he found the town and its history intriguing.

“I had unexpectedly found myself in a small town peppered with windmills, houses with Dutch stair-step gable fronts, and an abundance of tulips” said Clement of his first trip through the town. “And since it was a Sunday, there was not a living soul to be seen on the streets of this small community guided by an unshakable Dutch Reformed tradition. My curiosity was peaked.”

His curiosity pushed him to evaluate the importance of roots, cultural influences and how they shape individual identity, and what happens when people share a common cultural legacy. As he studied the community, he found the inspiration for his book, Promising Land, a series of portraits and landscapes featuring people in traditional Dutch attire against a modern day America backdrop.

“Because I wanted to honor my subjects” desire to connect with their Dutch ancestry, I emphasized traits many of them held in common “blond hair and blue eyes, similar facial structure, and a timeless confidence reflected in their collective gaze,” said Clement.

The Dordt College department of art and design was awarded $3,700 from the Consulate General of the Netherlands for partial funding of an exhibition and publication of Promising Land.

The exhibit featuring Clement’s work will be on display at Dordt College from May to July 2011. A reception and book signing will be held at the exhibit/gallery on Wednesday, May 18, from 7-9pm. The exhibit and reception is free and open to the public. The Campus Center Art Gallery is open every day from 8am to 5:30pm.

Clement will hold book signings each day of the Orange City Tulip Festival, May 19-21, from 11am-3:30pm and 5:30-8pm at Holland House Interiors on Central Avenue in Orange City. The book is also sold through the web site reneclement.com.

René Clement is an award-winning photographer. He has been based in New York City since 1998. He works for newspapers and magazines, and is a member of the Hollandse Hoogte agency in Amsterdam. He spends much of his time working on long-term projects. His work has been selected for Time Magazine Pictures of the Year (2003) and the Dutch Zilveren Camera competition.

The Bridge as a Relational Metaphor

2011-04-27T08:19:00.009-05:00

Image from iStockphoto.

The bridge can be thought of as a relational metaphor about establishing connections. Driving along on the Zeeland Bridge, which is the longest bridge in the Netherlands, you feel as if you’re magically riding on water. Writer/designer, George Nelson writes insightfully about bridges in his book, How to See:

Bridges

Of all the structures and machines used for going places, the bridge is unique. Unlike the road, an earthbound strip, the bridge leaps, taking imagination with it. Like the plane, it defies gravity, but noiselessly. It “moves” with infinite grace without going anywhere. It never causes visual pollution; it soars across rivers and chasms, enhancing natural environments. The names of great bridge builders [and bridges] are remembered.

The beauty of bridges, as we perceive the best of them, is related to the fact that they are a single-purpose design, and that all of their components are directly related to this one purpose. Everyone understands what a bridge is and does. The same is true of aqueducts.

Technology, while continually refining bridge design, has little effect on our response: The Pont-du-Gard, built by the Romans a thousand years ago, is as satisfying an ornament in the French landscape today as it ever was. … [1]

Nelson, George. How to See: A Guide to Reading Our Manmade Environment. Boston, Toronto: Little, Brown and Company, 1977. 129-33. Print.

clean and elegant monochromatic relationships

2011-04-24T15:23:00.017-05:00

Herbert Bayer (1900-1985)
Concentric Circles
powdercoated aluminum 6061 T5
ca. 1969/2007
84-108 inches (7-9 feet)
Peyton Wright Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico
photograph by versluis

Within this structure of a formal rectangular cube are values of neutral white, which are physically rendered as shades and tints. The sculptural circles form stepped and regular concentric circular rhythms as they progressively reduce asymmetrically in scale to punctuate a circular void. On the other hand, one can also sense amplification as the concentric circles move from smaller to larger scale. The sculpture becomes a backdrop for the variations in lightness and darkness by reflecting the environs surrounding this piece.

The dappled light from the tree foliage creates patterns and interesting color combinations that unify color relationships that seem to suggest both literal and an illusion of space.

AIGA Dordt College student group: second anniversary

2011-04-22T11:46:00.009-05:00

Chef Giovanni Romano in the kitchen at the Fruited Plain Café, Sioux Center, Iowa.
Photo credit: Jenn Ackerman for The New York Times.

Today is the second anniversary of the dcaiga blog and this site has gained regular visitors from all over the world. In addition to this blog, the AIGA Dordt College Student Group has held monthly events with guest designers who come to campus to talk about the world of graphic design and the work that designers engage in.

Either after the presentation or before, the students and I treat our guest designer to dinner at the Fruited Plain Café in their Backroom Bistro where on Wednesday evenings an all-you-can-eat spaghetti dinner is served. Last September our first guest was Erik Rodne who’s a versatile designer with HenkinSchultz in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Erik is young and smart and came early that day to help me with students’ critiques. As we began to eat our meals Erik commented that the pasta was done to perfection! I appreciated the fact that Erik noticed because in small-town NW Iowa, Italian food is perhaps the last thing you would expect. We sent word back to the kitchen to thank the cook, Giovanni.

Just recently I was reminded of the exceptional food that’s served here at the Backroom Bistro when my daughter in the Twin Cities asked if we had seen the article about Giovanni Romano in The New York Times. (The New York Times. Yes!)

Here’s the article: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/us/03iowa.html

hot type and hot dogs full of mustard

2011-04-20T10:03:00.015-05:00

“Coney” a photograph by Keith Roghair, Dordt College senior; Doug Burg, instructor. Photo is used with permission – all rights reserved. (select image for larger view).

Although taken during the off-season this picture seems to reflect an organized cacophony of typographic styles found in the amusement park at Coney Island, New York. The strength and order of this type works for emotive effect and utility and not the intentions of educated designers. For the most part the audience are common folk. Whether the work signifies good taste or bad taste, the impact is interesting, compelling and alive.

Seeing this picture reminded me of this poignant passage from The Seven Storey Mountain. The author Thomas Merton, thinking back as a young man to the 30s, contrasts the forebodings about world war in Europe with the fond memories of hot dogs and beer at Coney Island. Merton writes:

The Europe I finally left for good, in the late November of 1934, was a sad and unquiet continent, full of forebodings.

Of course, there were plenty of people who said: “There will not be a war….” But Hitler had now held power in Germany for some time, and that summer all the New York evening papers had been suddenly filled with the news of Dollfuss’ murder in Austria, and the massing of Italian troops on the Austrian borders. It was one of the nights when I was down at Coney Island, with Reginald Marsh, and I walked in the whirl of lights and noise and drank glasses of thin, icy beer, and ate hotdogs full of mustard, and wondered if I would soon be in some army or other, or perhaps dead.

It was the first time I had felt the cold steel of the war scare in my vitals. There was a lot more to come. It was only 1934.

And now, in November, when I was leaving England forever the ship sailed quietly out of Southampton Water by night the land I left behind me seemed silent with the silence before a storm. It was a land all shut up and muffled in layers of fog and darkness, and all the people were in the rooms behind the thick walls of their houses, waiting for the first growl of thunder as the Nazis began to warm up the motors of a hundred thousand planes.

Perhaps they did not know they were waiting for all this. Perhaps they thought they had nothing better to occupy their minds than the wedding of Prince George and Princess Marina which had taken place the day before. Even I myself was more concerned with the thought of some people I was leaving than with the political atmosphere at that precise moment. And yet that atmosphere was something that would not allow itself to be altogether ignored. [1]

Merton, Thomas. The Seven Storey Mountain. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1948. 127-128. Print.

van de Velde Behrens & Guimard — phytomorphism (plant patterns)

2011-04-16T11:13:00.032-05:00

Pictured clockwise starting top left:

Leeuwarden Railway Station, interior column tile detail, designer anonymous, c. 1860s
Leeuwarden, Friesland, The Netherlands
© 2011 photograph by versluis

Peter Behrens
Ornamented initials to match the Behrens-Schrift type designs
for Rudhard Typefoundry, 1902. Image source: Mosley, James. “St Brides Printing Library.” Baseline International Typographics Journal, St Bride’s Issue (1990): 32. Print.

Henri van de Velde
Double title page for Ecce Homo, written by Friedrich Nietzsche, 1908. Image source: van de Velde. Nietzsche, Fr., “Ecce homo.” Ketterer Kunst. N.p., 17 Nov. 2008. Web. 18 Apr. 2011; http://www.kettererkunst.com/details-e.php?obnr=410805351&anummer=348.

Hector Guimard
Entrance to a Paris Métro station, c. 1900
“le style métro” — railings, balustrades, and lamp-holders
© photographs by versluis

Perhaps the insights of Phil Meggs can help us understand some of the contributions and historical importance of H. van de Velde as a design educator and P. Behrens who began to move design toward more objective geometric forms.

Although van de Velde became an innovator of Art Nouveau, he was far more interested in furthering the Arts and Crafts philosophy than in innovative style as an end in itself. After the turn of the [twentieth-] century, his teaching and writing (The Renaissance in Modern Applied Art, 1901; A Layman’s Sermons on Applied Art, 1903) became a vital source for the development of twentieth-century architecture and design theory. An example of his pedagogy is his observation that when a shadow is cast, a complementary form is created on the light-struck side of the shadow’s outline, and that this “negative” form is as important as the object casting the shadow. He taught that all branches of art—from painting to graphic design, and from industrial design to sculpture—shared a communal language of form and an equality of importance to the human community. Appropriate materials, functional forms, and a unity of visual organization were demanded. He saw ornament not as decoration but as a means of expression that could achieve the status of art. [1]

Meggs, Philip B. A History of Graphic Design. 2nd ed. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1992. 209. Print.

AIGA Nebraska: “Me, Myself and Design 2011”

2011-04-13T12:08:00.036-05:00

Portfolio reviews starting top left clockwise: Senior, Mark Veldkamp with reviewer Craig Hughes, Ervin & Smith; Senior, Addie Krosschell and Justin Kemerling, The Match Factory; Junior, Ellie Dykstra with Erikheath Thomas, Pen-Link, Ltd.; Junior, Annemarie Osinga with Julie Lingbloom, David Day & Associates. Top left photograph courtesy of Paul Berkbigler, Paul Berkbigler Design and Illustration.

Annually, the education arm of AIGA Nebraska organizes an invaluable event called Me, Myself and Design. This year MMD took place on Saturday, 9 April 2011, with a very good turnout in Omaha hosted by Metropolitan Community College—Elkhorn Valley Campus (faculty Jim Wolf and Luann Matthies). This fine event invites graphic design students from various college programs in the region to attend meetings with design professionals. This year the event introduced the theme, “The Future You” to students. Obviously, the focus is on what students needs to know about finding a job and the schedule for the daylong event begins with Q and A breakout sessions with students meeting the professionals. The event culminates, perhaps the highlight, with student portfolio reviews by guest professionals later in the afternoon.

Here are a few notes from the morning panel session that I attended:
“Client’s need design thinkers [problem solvers].” —Anne Maguire, Mutual of Omaha; Justin Schafer, Mutual of Omaha; Stephanie Jarrett, Ervin & Smith; Ben Swift, NoNoArt. All of these designers serve on the AIGA Nebraska board of directors.
Résumé advice for students:
Should have good typographic structure and layout and be easily readable.
Internship advice for students:
As an intern try to develop a role to play while on the job by taking the initiative and asking for work. Don’t be afraid of politely asking for help.

In the afternoon I went to the panel of designers affiliated with so-called independent design firms. This panel featured: Aaron Jarzynka, Local Hero Design; Donovan Beery, Eleven19; John Gawley, Omaha Publications; Clint Runge, Archrival; Adam Torpin, Oxide Design Co. One of points of discussion was about showing passion for design, which reminded me of correspondence I had several years ago with Mary Darby, president of Pulluin Software. I tell students her comments about portfolios and interviews, which are as follows:

Speaking from an employer’s perspective,

I have some definite criteria I use when looking at a candidate for a team position. There are specific elements I feel are helpful in a portfolio—and it is not just a final product, far from it in fact. Over the past few years, I have really learned to look at the process a person follows, their ability to make decisions independently, their proactive approach, teamwork capabilities, critical thinking, communication skills, ability to self-direct, passion, commitment, etc. If the final product is great but I can't see any evidence of the other elements I mentioned, I am not interested in that person as a team member. If the final product is just pretty good but I can see evidence of the things I listed above—I will choose the “pretty good” product over the “great” product every time and I think most employers would agree with me. There are ways to demonstrate these things in a portfolio.

[For instance] passion comes from love for the work itself (the task, process the person takes, the research they do, the torture and angst they go through to reach an end result, etc.) and it also comes from a desire to be part of “something” great.

In regard to measuring passion for the work,

When reviewing a portfolio and when interviewing, I want to see evidence of an acknowledgement of the needs of the project or the client, the process, the angst, the struggle, the identified foundation or solution they came to (why this style—why that color—) and why they chose that solution—some collaboration with others if appropriate, then their thoughts about the end-product and how they feel it meets the needs identified in the beginning of the whole process. Someone who is passionate will go through all of this—and be happy to articulate it or show it in a portfolio. If it is not in the portfolio but on interview they can explain it and I can see facial expressions and body language that would indicate how engaged they are. Passion does not mean a person is overly dramatic, or loud or anything like that—it means you can see the excitement they have for their work. … [1]
Darby, Mary. “Portfolio Development.” Message to the author. 2005. e-mail.

Herbert Bayer’s “Chromatic Gate”

2011-04-10T17:26:00.007-05:00

Herbert Bayer
Chromatic Gate
Aluminum 6061 T5 with automobile paint
ca. 1975/2007
144" x 168" x 48"
Peyton Wright Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico
photograph by versluis

Herbert Bayer’s “Chromatic Gate” suggests both architecture and sculpture, which interestingly helps define open spaces and entices one to step through space. This effect is enhanced by the stepped configuration of the brightly multicolored posts and lintels that form a horizontal and vertical rhythmical pattern that depending on your perspective ironically reduces or expands ones perception. On the other hand, the piece is a painting in three-dimensional geometric shapes, which emphases proportion, scale, pure hues, and environmental placement.

Peyton Wright Gallery in Santa Fe is a representative of the estate of the Bauhaus master Herbert Bayer. The Gallery has published, on their website, the following brief but concise biography about Bayer:

Herbert Bayer (1900-1985) Estate

Austrian-born artist Herbert Bayer (1900-1985) received no formal artistic education until he discovered the theoretical writings of the artist Vassily Kandinsky, as well as Walter Gropius’ 1919 Bauhaus manifesto, which declared the necessity for a return to true creativity and inspiration through crafts. Bayer traveled to Weimar to meet Gropius in October of 1921 and was immediately accepted into the Bauhaus. There, he was deeply influenced by the instruction of Kandinsky, Johannes Itten and Paul Klee.

Throughout his career, Bayer’s achievements in both the applied and fine arts exhibited a unique ability to combine the needs of industry and the structure of Bauhaus architectural style with the sensibility of the avant-garde and the expressiveness of his life-long fascination with nature. Of all his works, including photomontage, installation, earthworks and environmental art, Bayer’s paintings are perhaps the least well known. However, for Bayer, painting was “the continuous link connecting the various facets of [his] work. [1]
“Herbert Bayer (1900-1985) Estate.” Peyton Wright. Peyton Wright Gallery, n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2011. .

Some notes on John Vander Stelt: A Renaissance Man

2011-04-06T11:22:00.008-05:00

Mr. John Vander Stelt was our guest designer and presenter for our AIGA Student Group event held on Wednesday, March 30. John works as a creative director, graphic designer, illustrator, artist, husband, and father. We invite you to check out John's blog. Colleague Matt Van Rys is again our fine purveyor of meeting notes, which are as follows:

John has lived in Sioux County his whole life and has been a part of the art community in Northwest Iowa for a long time. Coming from a creative family, it was no surprise that as a child John was drawing a recognizable as a Blue Jay before kindergarten. John continued as an artist by attending Northwestern College in Orange City, Iowa as an Art Education major and enjoyed his student teaching experience, but didn’t feel it was his passion.

After college, John applied at K-Products and started as a Graphic Designer. Early on, he worked primarily designing and preparing artwork for promotional products, such as t-shirt screen printing and embroidery for hats.

After about two years, John moved to the catalog and creative department. This allowed for additional creative freedom and more direct client interaction. On many catalogs, John and his team would do up to six ideas for the client; often changing yearly due to evolving corporate tastes. A suggestion John has for students is to listen to your clients and design to best meet their objectives for the project; designing within their limitations while maintaining your creative freedom. John often uses Typography to express creativity through font choices, color, texture and such. Using type, while understanding the relationship between letters and utilizing positive versus negative space can exhibit the difference between a designer and an amateur.

About three and a half years ago, John left K-Products and began working as the Creative Director for Pizza Ranch, moving from a large corporate department to being the sole creative force behind a brand. While at K-Products, John worked with a variety of brands and had some concerns that working with just one brand would eventually get stale. However, just the opposite is true, and working with rebranding and branding has been very rewarding. John expressed that his job at Pizza Ranch was really an answered prayer.

John has developed the general direction for the Pizza Ranch brand and uses subtle techniques such as photo edges, distressing textures and textured typography to carry the brand through various pieces. This isn’t a change on a dime approach, but updating stuff as needed while continuing to re-evaluate whom Pizza Ranch is marketing to. For example, John has been adding more photos of people to help the customer relate better to the pizza product and the restaurant experience.

As the key creative person, John has a lot of creative control and also has to wear many “hats”, including writing the copy for his work, working on marketing plans, designing graphics for a Nascar stock car, directing photo shoots and even assisting with art direction on a TV commercial and an upcoming website update.

Dordt College Art Committee: Concept proposal for an East Campus Sculpture

2011-04-04T14:06:00.011-05:00

Illustration and maquette by David Versluis. Piece is entitled: “Burning Bush,” © 2011.
Scale: eighteen feet high x seven feet wide.

The design of this sculpture is guided by a sense of an intertwining of a Christian perspective that’s found within Dordt College’s academic community. This sculptural piece tries to convey this aspect by weaving together seven upright metallic forms. The individual upright pieces are grouped into a regular pattern and yet suggest variety with unity through the columns of different heights. The goal is to develop a symbolic respite on campus, whether the piece is placed within a new landscaped sculpture garden or simply juxtaposed with existing buildings and pedestrian walkways.

The rusty patina of steel surface suggests an honest character produced by natural environmental elements. COR-TEN® steel forms a stable rust-like appearance when exposed to the weather for several years.

The sculpture is comprised of seven columns, which to some extent allude to the Hebraic biblical symbolism of seven branches of the traditional temple lamp-stand called the menorah (Exodus 25:31-40). The menorah is thought to symbolize the burning bush as seen by Moses on Mount Horeb (Exodus 3). In addition, the design of the menorah suggests the six branches of human knowledge, which are symbolically guided by the seventh branch representing the light of God.

Psalm 19 talks about the ways in which creation reveals God’s patterning in beautiful poetic language. Emphasizing the import of the “burning bush” analogy Calvin Seerveld writes in Rainbows for the Fallen World:

“Psalm 19 is enough to leave you limp. It makes vivid that all creation is a burning bush of the Lord God, revealing his just, merciful presence by the praise of countless creatures. It sings the glory of the law and ordinances by which Yahweh’s mouth rules all goings on in history with wisdom and compassion … and … it ends by confessing … that in keeping the law and in doing what’s right there is no justification … [God] save us! … Set us free from our sinful selves to be your willing servants, Lord!”

This sculpture celebrates the common reality found in Psalm 19 in which all human beings exist. If implemented a sculpture area would be a public space — a place where the Dordt community could congregate, meet, talk, and interact.

Referenced materials:

Strauss, Gideon. “Wonder, Heartbreak and Hope.” Capital Commentary. The Center for Public Justice, 28 Jan. 2011. Web. 23 Feb. 2011. .

Seerveld, Calvin. Rainbows for the Fallen World: The Aesthetic Life and Artistic Task. Downsview, Ontario: Toronto Tuppence Press, 1980. 17. Print.

The Wilderness Downtown

2011-04-01T16:28:00.003-05:00

The Wilderness Downtown

what an amazing website!

herbert bayer’s monochromatic space-painting and the design of self-contained sculpture

2011-04-01T10:36:00.023-05:00

Undulated Wall
Herbert Bayer (1900-1985)
Powdercoated aluminum on a COR-TEN® steel base.
c.1967/2007

Bayer’s sculpture was photographed May 2009 at the Peyton Wright Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Photograph was taken with the gallery’s permission. We wish to thank the gallery for their graciousness. Photography by versluis by ©2009.

Although written in the context of a different project what Bayer says below seems apropos for this sculpture as well:

vistor, walking around…, experiences varying views and impressions. by walking through space-painting, he becomes participant in space-time concept.… changing shadows, the tree, [retinal vibrations], contribute to impressions.… [1]

Bayer, Herbert. Herbert Bayer: Painter, Designer, Architect. New York: Reinhold Publishing Corporation, 1967. 140. Print.

Classic Roman Style Letters

2011-03-29T16:22:00.008-05:00

This photograph shows just a portion of the stone carved lettering, which indicates the entrance to the archaeological Crypt beneath Notre Dame in Paris. Photograph by versluis © 2010.

From Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris:

The archaeological Crypt under the Parvis de Notre-Dame de Paris was built to protect the ruins discovered during the excavations that began in 1965, conducted by the Commission du Vieux Paris. The crypt was opened in 1980 with the aim of presenting elements from the successive buildings constructed on the site from Ancient [Roman] times to the 19th century.

About Roman lettering Phil Baines and Andrew Haslam write in their book, Type & Typography:

[Iowan] Edward Catich put forward the theory that the stone V-cut letters of Trajan’s Column were not merely the product of a skilled stone carver using a chisel. He suggested that the letters were first painted onto the carving surface, allowing the spelling and length of the inscription to be checked before carving. A skilled calligrapher, Catich recreated the strokes he considered necessary to the structure of each letter.

A brush creates letters differently from a pen: it is turned as it makes strokes, and different amounts of pressure can be applied to create thick and thin marks. [1]

Baines, Phil, and Andrew Haslam. Type & Typography. New York: Watson-Guptill Publications, 2002. 41. Print.

Good Taste, Bad Taste and the Amusement Factor

2011-03-26T14:04:00.011-05:00

Photograph by versluis, copyright © 2011

Located on the east side of the small city of Pocahontas, Iowa is this monumental, twenty-five foot tall Pocahontas statue. This amusing statue is an attention grabber on Iowa’s Highway 3 where the road is a commercial strip through town. Pocahontas is namesake of the city and county and the statue is an emblematic “signature” of community values and virtues. The legendary story of Pocahontas is an endearing icon of honesty, respectability, and hospitality.

While the statue is not meant for commercialism, it does however fit into the architectural idiom of vernacular commercial forms. Presumably the attraction with its folk-art charm helps the economy of the area.

A plaque on the skirt indicates that Albert J. and Frank W. Shaw erected the statue in 1954. An armature and an applied surface utilizing a combination of cement and stucco, is a stable construction material that readily accepts paint pigments, support the structure.

The Pocahontas statue fits into the vernacular commercial builders portfolio along with “the giant ducks, giant milk bottles, giant coffee pots and other curiosities that once lined America’s highways. Ironically, the elements of this antiestablishment aesthetic have recently been co-opted by arbiters of [good] taste as [unvernacular and outsider art].” [1]

Rubin, Barbara. “Aesthetic Ideology and Urban Design.” Common Places, Readings in American Vernacular Architecture. Ed. Dell Upton and John Michael Vlach. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 1986. 482. Print.

AIGA Dordt College Student Group Event: John Vander Stelt

2011-03-23T15:46:00.011-05:00

John Vander Stelt, guest designer and presenter:

Creative Director • Graphic Designer • Illustrator • Artist
Wednesday, March 30 — 4 to 5 p.m.
Dordt College Department of Art and Design Lobby Display Area

John E. Vander Stelt has been in the graphic design field for nearly 25 years and has served clients in achieving a variety of visual communication and marketing goals. Currently, John is the creative director and graphic designer responsible for developing the graphic identity, advertisements, and various print collateral for Pizza Ranch, which is based in Orange City, Iowa.

In addition, John is an artist who has embraced his subject matter of family and small-town life. His love for art goes back to his childhood and his inspiration is sought in the family and small–town life he loves. Vander Stelt lives and creates his work in his studio in Maurice, Iowa.

Vander Stelt is a native of Maurice, Iowa and it is there, in the midst of the Heartland, where he seeks the inspiration for his work. Vander Stelt takes a traditional approach to the realism, which pervades his subjects. His artistic heroes include his Grandfather (John Vander Stelt, Sr.), Edward Hopper, Thomas Eakins, Grant Wood and Norman Rockwell.

John studied art from an early age and comes from a family with a creative spirit. The artist's friends, family and small-town surroundings are crucial elements in his work. He graduated from Northwestern College in Orange City, Iowa with a degree in fine art. His artwork is included in public and private collections throughout the country.

Chicago Tribute Marker for László Moholy-Nagy

2011-03-21T11:18:00.011-05:00

Photography credits (clockwise, starting upper right):

Sokolik, Frank. Moholy-Nagy at his desk, Institute of Design, Chicago. c. 1945. Photograph. Moholy-Nagy Foundation, Ann Arbor. Web. 21 Mar. 2011.
Set design for “Things to Come,” used on the cover of the brochure for The New Bauhaus. c. 1936. Photograph. Moholy-Nagy Foundation, Ann Arbor. Web. 21 Mar. 2011.
Versluis, David. Chicago Tribute Marker for László Moholy-Nagy. 2011. Photograph.

The Chicago Tribute Marker for Moholy-Nagy states the following:

László Moholy-Nagy
Artist and educator
1895–1946

László Moholy-Nagy came to Chicago in 1937 to direct the New Bauhaus, an experimental art and design school. One of the most creative personalities of his time, Moholy-Nagy was a writer, painter, photographer, filmmaker, teacher, set-designer, builder of light-space machines, and philosopher of new aesthetics. He believed that art offered a way to reorder society after the traumatic years of World War I, and technology would pave the way.

Hungarian-born, Moholy-Nagy served in World War I and received a law degree before joining the faculty of the Bauhaus, a German school for the modern application of art and technology. He joined some of the most innovative thinkers of the day—Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, and Joseph Albers—and became a crucial figure in modern photography, pioneering the photomontage and developing the camera-less medium of the “photogram.”

The New Bauhaus, located in the old Marshall Field residence at 1905 South Prairie Avenue, closed for financial reasons after only one year. In 1939, Moholy-Nagy opened his own “School of Design,” which changed its name to “Institute of Design” in 1944. He directed the Institute of Design until his death. His textbook, Vision in Motion, became a standard text for art and design education worldwide. Moholy-Nagy lived here at 2622 North Lakeview Avenue.

“cabin of remembrance” in Michigan, no. 2

2011-03-20T08:16:00.004-05:00

Hand-lettered sign found in a log cabin memorial built (c. 1956) by Peter Versluis (Henry Koster, carpenter) near Grand Rapids, Michigan. The cabin, in part, memorializes some of the homesteaders in Western Michigan during the 1840s and 50s.
—“May you leave this cabin with a pleasant consciousness that those whom we commemorate have helped to enrich your life.”

“cabin of remembrance” in Michigan

2011-03-17T08:41:00.011-05:00

Hand-lettered sign found in a log cabin memorial built (c. 1956) by Peter Versluis near Grand Rapids, Michigan. The cabin, in part, memorializes some of the earliest Irish settlers in Michigan during the 1840s.
—“Wisdom is a friend which will never fail you.”

Roy’s logotype

2011-03-14T08:21:00.003-05:00

This homemade, vernacular road sign for an old archery indoor practice range is located on Highway 3 near Cherokee, Iowa. Roy is a rather uncommon first name and Roy’s logotype is rendered as a stylized calligraphic signature that seems unique and friendly. In addition, when a circle encloses the logotype the combination forms a mark that has visual impact of simplicity and strength. Obviously, the sculptural arrow reinforces the point (no pun intended) in a visually compelling way.

intrinsic color and pattern

2011-03-09T15:14:00.012-06:00

“The Juggler,” a Parisian street performer who seems to be playing for the camera, is performing near the Carrousel Venitien at Place Saint-Pierre in Montmartre. This location is below the hill from the basilique du Sacré-Coeur (Basilica of the Sacred Heart). Photograph © 2010 by versluis.

Besides being one of the best street performances in Paris this performer was also visually compelling by the intrinsic color and pattern of his attire. In addition, this photograph tries to capture the unruffled balance and symmetry of the juggler’s dynamic movements.

One of the things suggested by this photograph is a passage from George Nelson’s book, “How to See” in which he writes, “Just how much any of us sees of the most intimate personal environments is an open question. Can you describe to colors and pattern of any rug in your dwelling? The wallpaper in the bedroom? When were they last looked at?”[1]

Nelson, George. How to See: A Guide to Reading Our Manmade Environment. Boston, Toronto: Little, Brown and Company, 1977. 224. Print.

new work: “Saint John Passion” performance poster

2011-03-03T16:24:00.018-06:00

The 2011 Sioux County Oratorio Chorus Poster, © 2011
Size: 11 x 17 inches, 27.94 x 43.18 cm
David Versluis, designer and photographer

This crucifixion image is a photograph of a medieval French lifesize wood sculpture and predates J. S. Bach’s musical work by many years. However, the image still seems appropriate for promoting the performance of the Saint John Passion by the Sioux County Oratorio Chorus (Iowa). The sculpture is from the collection of the Musée de Cluny in Paris, which is officially known as Musée National du Moyen Âge (National Museum of the Middle Ages). Light passages in the image were generated by the shadows in the original photograph and created through Adobe Photoshop® invert techniques that reinforce the power of the image. Sometimes Photoshop can produce cheap special effects, but I believe the strikingly dramatic effect of the image in this poster signals an important theme in Bach’s work.

In scripture God expresses his style with exceptional word pictures and metaphors. As we approach the Lenten season next week (Ash Wednesday is 9 March) let us do so with imagination—“O lieber Heiland” (“O precious Savior”). [1]

Schmidt, Thomas. A Scandalous Beauty: The Artistry of God and the Way of the Cross. Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, a division of Baker Book House Company, 2002. 7-8. Print.

A very nice “thank you” from AIGA Nebraska

2011-03-02T16:39:00.006-06:00

Sending this keepsake in the mail is a great way to say thanks. Especially if you appreciate letterpress typography and printing as I do. This piece is also a fine epitaph for László Moholy-Nagy and I think he would have approved of the funky rendition of his quote.

All the best to the Board members of AIGA Nebraska and to Jim Sherraden—manager of Hatch Show Print in Nashville, Tennessee.

By the way, I learned all I know about wood engraving and letterpress printing from Jim Horton of Ann Arbor, Michigan—thanks Jim.

Integral design

2011-03-01T09:29:00.010-06:00

With news last week of the big Boeing contract we thought about this print ad from our archives. The ad, which ran in the May 10, 1963 issue of Time magazine is designed to show a rational grid-like precision, which seems appropriate for “Testing, testing….” the Boeing 727.

In his book titled Typography, Swiss designer, typographer and teacher, Emil Ruder makes a strong case for utilizing grid systems in organizing type and pictorial elements on a page. In describing the Boeing ad we have adopted what Ruder states in his book, “The layout is based on a grid unit of [twelve] squares for various picture sizes, which allow for numerous positions and sizes. Consistency of design can be achieved by developing an underlying grid pattern to which all elements must comply”.

Ruder further adds, “…This pattern is the means of establishing a formal unity between the different amounts of text and different sizes and shapes of pictures. The pattern should not be conspicuous in the final result but rather be concealed by the diversity of the pictorial subjects and typographical values”. [1]

Ruder, Emil. Typography: a Manual of Design. Trans. D. Q. Stephenson. New York: Hastings House, Publishers, Inc., 1981. 185-86. Print.

Andy Warhol and the parodic model

2011-02-26T12:04:00.013-06:00

The Dordt College 2011 Annual Junior Art Show poster was designed by Ellie Dykstra and others with photography by Annemarie Osinga.

This year’s Junior Art Show poster is an imaginative parody of the parody by referencing Pop artist Andy Warhol’s reproduction of media stars. It may seem obvious, but the art show poster is based on the parody of multiples in Warhol’s Hollywood imago pieces of the 60s and 70s, which he serigraphed photos taken from glossy magazines. The junior students are using pseudo serigraphy from Adobe Photoshop, but I enjoy the colors and density of typed information in the poster layout. In addition, what I appreciate about the Dordt Student’s poster is expressed by the tongue-in-cheek attitude and bright toothy smiles that critique and mimic Warhol’s work but without the mockery, which seems to characterize much of postmodern art parody. The poster is filled with signs of life, energy, and enthusiasm without the inanimate vacuity sometimes associated with Warhol’s Pop art. [1]

This poster, besides being fun, is also about the relationship of images and their originals.

Kearney, Richard. The Wake of Imagination. London: Century Hutchinson Ltd. and Routledge, 1988. 254-397. Print.

The close affinity of advertising and art in Holland

2011-02-22T13:54:00.010-06:00

In the background of this photograph is the Amsterdam Centraal Train Station as it faces the city centrum. One arrives on the Metro and enters through the station and into the city, which is an interesting transition. Photo by versluis, March 2004.

The extended contemporary billboard contrasts strikingly against the 19th century Neo-Renaissance and Neo-Gothic style architecture. The train station was designed by Pierre Cuypers and A. L. van Gendt, and opened to the public in 1889. The billboard functions as both advertising art space and for covering the back of kiosks of various vendors. Apparently the tour boat is docked because of lack of space somewhere else.

It seems the billboard advertisement or art photography is related to a photo exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum or is it promoting men’s outerwear? Perhaps the display suggests “The Old Man and the Sea” theme of body and spirit. The photography sequence describes both the external ocean atmosphere, but also the inner landscape within the soul. The result is when advertising alludes to art and visa versa. However, on the other hand, perhaps the mural is suggesting worries about global sea level rise.

Laurens Jansz Koster (or Coster) (1370-1440) and Johann Gutenberg

2011-02-18T14:09:00.015-06:00

Photograph by versluis © 2011

In the market-place of the city of Haarlem, The Netherlands, adjacent to the great St. Bavo Church stands a bronze statue of Laurens Jansz Koster, who supposedly was the first European to print with movable type. In his hand he holds up the letter “A”, representing this fact in that Alpha (beginning) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. The base of the statue has this Latin inscription: Memor’uc sacrum Typographia, are artiuin omnium coneervutrix, hir. primum invenla, circa annum 1440.

Obviously, Johann Gutenberg is known as the originator of movable type and the beginning of modern Western printing. In 1450 he produced the first typographic book (1). However, running contrary to this fact is that for centuries the Dutch in Haarlem have claimed and honored Koster as the first European to print books using movable type. Never mind that the Chinese and perhaps the Koreans were developing movable type characters around 1040 A.D., 500 years before Gutenberg (2).

According to Gutenberg expert Albert Kapr:

A monument still stands in Haarlem’s Grote Markt to the ‘inventor of the art of printing’. The Frans Hals Museum in the Groot Heiligland has a fine collection of blockbooks and prefigurations of printing from movable type, including copies of the Biblia pauperum and Donatus, an Abecedarium, a Septem vitia mortalia [Seven Deadly Sins], and the previously mentioned Spieghel onzer behoudenisse. In the Vleeshal, where the Enschedé Museum is housed, reposes an over-lifesize sculpture of Laurens Janszoon Coster, who holds a piece of type, and Hadrianus Junius, book in hand. The Coster legend lives on. (3)

As an aside, my mother’s maiden name is Koster; very likely no relation, but I like to think that there is.

For a brief biography of Koster please see Koster, Or Coster.

Meggs, Philip B. A History of Graphic Design. 2nd ed. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1992. 65. Print.
Ibid. 28.
Kapr, Albert. Johannes Gutenberg: Persönlichkeit und Leistung. Trans. Douglas Martin. Brookfield, Vermont: Ashgate Publishing Company, 1996. 106. Print.

“Print + Environmental Graphic Design” — a presentation by Sarah Franken

2011-02-11T15:26:00.021-06:00

Photograph of Sarah Franken beginning her presentation. Photograph by versluis © 2011

On Wednesday 9 February a group of us from the AIGA Dordt student group gathered to participate in the presentation by Dordt College alumna Sarah Franken. Sarah’s topic conveyed her experiences working since graduating from Dordt as an Environmental Graphic Designer.

The web site for the Society for Environmental Graphic Design (SEGD) describes Environmental Graphic Design this way:

Environmental Graphic Design embraces many design disciplines including graphic, architectural, interior, landscape, and industrial design, all concerned with the visual aspects of wayfinding. [In addition,] the SEGD is the global community of people working at the intersection of communication design and the built environment and dedicated to communicating identity and information, and shaping the idea of place.

Dordt’s adjunct instructor in web design, Matt Van Rys, graciously provided notes on Sarah’s presentation, which we are publishing here:

Sarah Franken is a gifted graphic designer with unique experience in exhibition design.

Sarah is a 2006 Dordt graduate. While at Dordt, Sarah spent the spring semester of her junior year attending Chicago Semester; looking for some interesting experiences in the big city, being a small town Sioux Center native. Many art students at Dordt who use this opportunity gain excellent experience. Shortly after graduating, Sarah began working as a full time member of the Field Museum’s Exhibition Department in the Graphic Design division.

Sarah’s work as a member of The Field Museum design team had special emphasis on gallery/exhibition environmental design. The Field Museum is part of Chicago’s Museum Campus, which includes The Field Museum, the Adler Planetarium, the Shedd Aquarium and Soldier Field. This is an active area, full of tourists, located along the shore of Lake Michigan.

Sarah shared some of the process of exhibition design. One of the main components is to understand the hierarchy of information. The curators, 3D designers and graphic designers are all responsible for maintaining this hierarchy. The hierarchy usually begins with the entrance to the exhibition, the “attractor area,” to draw visitors in. The entrance often includes a signpost of information that is repeated later in the exhibition when the visitor transfers from one gallery to another, within the overall exhibition. Changing galleries also involves other visual shifts, such as carpet color or changing other graphic elements. In addition, the planning process involves figuring out what the voice of the exhibition needs to be.

Sarah described what an exhibition team would consist of: a project manager, 3D designer, graphic designers, production manager (budget and building), developers (information/writing), builders, media team (web, video and projections); about 10 people, give or take. This group of people can end up working together anywhere from 1 to 3 years depending if an exhibition is temporary or permanent or on the size and complexity of an exhibition. Once the donors, curators, researchers and other planning parties determine the direction of the exhibition, the team begins concepting the 3D space. Using the hierarchy of information they begin the designing. Sarah mentioned that quite often much of the graphics come together in the last six months before the installation and opening of an exhibition. In addition, the graphics department is heavily involved with the additional printed and web collateral for promoting the exhibition. When she started out in exhibition design, her job consisted of about 80% production work, 20% design. But Sarah notes that this is key for building the skills to be a technically stronger designer. She suggests that if you have an internship opportunity, use your time to learn by asking questions and by being a polite nuisance.

Sarah expressed that one of the rewarding parts of exhibition design is sifting through the information while designing and then ultimately watching the visitors interacting with the exhibition; absorbing, learning and sharing with the artist and the museum. Other highlights include working with large format printing and unique substrates, working with show installers and suppliers and understanding how lighting a 3D space, such as a gallery, vastly changes the impact of the space and how the visitor perceives it.

Although Sarah doesn’t work at The Field Museum anymore, she recently began working for the Science Museum of Minnesota designing exhibitions for various institutions around the country.

Some of the exhibitions Sarah designed:

In March 2007, “The Ancient Americas” permanent exhibition opened. This was the first major exhibition Sarah worked on for the Field Museum. Permanent exhibitions are a big deal, as they often take 2-4 years of work by the design team and are kept in the museum for several years, sometimes up to 20. For “The Ancient Americas,” Sarah was primarily a production designer, taking direction from her Lead Designer, working up the graphics within the established structure.

The next large exhibition Sarah worked on was “The Aztec World”. Sarah was involved from the beginning as co-designer and played a key role in determining the overall design of the exhibition and branding elements. One of the key elements of the design was a signature color, turquoise. This color was used to it’s largest impact by creating a 45 ft wide Styrofoam “slab” of turquoise at the entrance to the gallery.

Sarah’s first solo exhibition as Lead Designer was an exhibition of The Field Museum’s Chinese Rubbings collection, called “Lasting Impressions”. The Field Museum’s collection is the largest and best outside of East Asia. One of the challenges of this exhibition was presenting the rubbings in a budget-friendly way that would allow them to be rolled up and stored later. The solution was a large acrylic frame, creating shadow boxes with magnets holding the rubbings in place.

To see examples of Sarah’s superb print design and exhibition design, visit her on-line portfolio.

The Bernbach formula: a visual/verbal fusion

2011-02-10T16:18:00.018-06:00

This is the 5th carbon — how come you’re still making carbon copies?

Xerox print ad published in Time magazine, February 26, 1965

from the collection of David Versluis

Negative space successfully emphasizes the image and headline while the visual weight at the bottom third of the page draws the viewer to the text and signature. While I’m not certain this is a Doyle Dane Bernbach (DDB) print ad it does seems to model the Bernbach formula.

In Philip B. Meggs’s important book on graphic design history he wrote:

A synergistic relationship between visual and verbal components is established.… [In mid-twentieth century advertising] Bernbach and his colleagues smashed through the boundaries separating verbal and visual communications and evolved the visual/verbal syntax: word and image are fused into a conceptual expression of an idea so that they become completely interdependent.…

…Because concept becomes dominant, the design of many Doyle Dane Bernbach advertisements is reduces to the message: a large arresting visual image, a concise headline of bold weight, and body copy that stakes its claim with factual and often entertaining writing instead of puffery and meaningless superlatives. Often the visual organization is symmetrical, for design arrangement is not allowed to distract from the straightforward presentation of an idea.…

Meggs, Philip B. A History of Graphic Design. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold Company Inc., 1983. 412. Print

AIGA Student Group presentation — Sarah Franken, graphic designer

2011-02-07T15:14:00.008-06:00

Poster design by Sarah Franken © 2011

Sarah Franken will be our next guest designer for Wednesday, February 9, from 4 to 5 p.m. in CL room 1223. The focus of her presentation will be about Print + Environmental Graphic Design. There will be a time for Q and A as well.

Sarah mentions that:

My life and work since graduation from Dordt in 2006 has involved: Chicago, museums, public transit, cats, concerts, and striving for great design. Extra special emphasis on the 2nd and last items on that list, since that’s what you all might be the most interested in. I’ll be talking about my time working as a graphic designer in a museum setting and the kind of design skills I’ve learned, some of which I never expected or even knew I needed to learn. Hope you’ll join me.

Here’s some more basic info:
• Here’s a link to my portfolio.
• I currently work at the Science Museum of Minnesota as a Graphic Designer.
• I’m a member of AIGA Iowa.
• Previously, I worked at The Field Museum (of Natural History) in Chicago.

Quotations on creativity — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

2011-02-06T14:36:00.022-06:00

Art is the gift of God, and must be used
Unto His glory.…
—Longfellow

This quote is found in a dramatic lyrical poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow entitled, Michael Angelo. Longfellow’s illustrated book was published in 1884.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. Michael Angelo. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1884. 25-26. University of California Libraries/California Digital Library. Web. 5 Feb. 2011.

Head-Piece engraving from the book; S.L. Smith, illustrator. p.7

A scene from the poem: “A Chapel in the Church of San Silvestro. Vittoria Colonna, Claudio Tolommei, and others.” The noblewoman, Vittoria Colonna has received the Pope’s blessing to build a new convent. Caption: Vittoria Colonna, Michael Angelo, and others. In the Chapel of San Silvestro. “If friends of yours, then are they friends of mine. Pardon me, gentlemen. But when I entered I saw but the Marchesa.” Book engraving was illustrated by F. D. Millet. p. 23

The scene begins as the building committee is meeting with Michelangelo. The scene unfolds with Vittoria and Michelangelo discussing the design of the convent. Here are passages from pages 25 and 26 that reveal Longfellow’s quote (I’ve used bold face for emphasis):

Vittoria.
But that
Is not what occupies my thoughts at present,
Nor why I sent for you, Messer Michele.
It was to counsel me. His Holiness
Has granted me permission, long desired,
To build a convent in this neighborhood,
Where the old tower is standing, from whose top
Nero looked down upon the burning city.

Michael Angelo.
It is an inspiration!

Vittoria.
I am doubtful
How I shall build; how large to make the convent,
And which way fronting.

Michael Angelo.
Ah, to build, to build!
That is the noblest art of all the arts.
Painting and sculpture are but images,
Are merely shadows cast by outward things
On stone or canvas, having in themselves
No separate existence. Architecture,
Existing in itself, and not in seeming
A something it is not, surpasses them
As substance shadow. Long, long years ago,
Standing one morning near the Baths of Titus,
I saw the statue of Laocoön
Rise from its grave of centuries, like a ghost
Writhing in pain; and as it tore away
The knotted serpents from its limbs, I heard,
Or seemed to hear, the cry of agony
From its white, parted lips. And still I marvel
At the three Rhodian artists, by whose hands
This miracle was wrought. Yet he beholds
Far nobler works who looks upon the ruins
Of temples in the Forum here in Rome.
If God should give me power in my old age
To build for Him a temple half as grand
As those were in their glory, I should count
My age more excellent than youth itself,
And all that I have hitherto accomplished
As only vanity.

Vittoria.
I understand you.
Art is the gift of God, and must be used
Unto His glory. That in art is highest
Which aims at this. When St. Hilarion blessed
The horses of Italicus, they won
The race at Gaza, for his benediction
O'erpowered all magic; and the people shouted
That Christ had conquered Marnas. So that art
Which bears the consecration and the seal
Of holiness upon it will prevail
Over all others. Those few words of yours
Inspire me with new confidence to build.
What think you? The old walls might serve, perhaps,
Some purpose still. The tower can hold the bells.

Michael Angelo.
If strong enough.

Vittoria.
If not, it can be strengthened. …

Soli Deo Gloria (Glory to God alone)

Dordt College’s motto

Reminiscences about “Plucked Chicken Press” — founded in 1978 by Will Petersen and Cynthia Archer — specializing in lithography

2011-02-02T10:22:00.018-06:00

Front and back of the Plucked Chicken Business Card, c.1980 — from the collection of David Versluis

One afternoon, perhaps in the fall of 1980, while researching art internship sites for students at Trinity Christian College, Palos Heights, Illinois my colleague Jake Van Wyk and I visited Plucked Chicken Press and met with Will Petersen to discuss the possibility of providing a student internship. Cynthia Archer was there to greet us as well as we entered the workshop, which was housed on the second floor of an old industrial building. Petersen was professional and friendly and with a sense of humor — he was a genuine character. We were impressed with his collection of lithographic stones. The press was located in downtown Chicago just west of the fork in the Chicago River.

Along with the “Plucked Chicken” logo and printer’s mark — the business card design is based on the printmakers numbering system, which is a good way of recognizing a limited edition original art print. Usually, but not always, for authentic prints the artist signs their name in the bottom right-hand corner on the front just below the image. On the bottom left corner opposite the signature the artist writes the number of each print in the edition. So, for example, a print numbered “3/30” signifies that it is the 3rd print out of 30 in the print run.

As published in the current Plucked Chicken Press website (courtesy of Oakton Community College, Skokie, Illinois) here’s a nice synopsis about the origins of the Plucked Chicken logo:

Plucked Chicken — The Journal and the Logo:

Plucked Chicken, a journal of art and poetry, was founded in Morgantown, West Virginia, in 1977. The Chicago poet and writer, Effie Mihopoulos, provided a glimpse of the journal’s birth in an April 1981 Serials Review:

The magazine was started because Petersen just having quit his teaching job [at the West Virginia University] (at 49) and feeling like a plucked chicken, had boxes and boxes of notes, letters, prose and other miscellanea that needed sharing, an outlet. He had a strong editorial background ranging from work with mimeographed magazines in grade school to [poet] Cid Corman's second Origin series; he was also associated with Bussei, which published [poet] Gary Snyder's first poems and [writer] Jack Kerouac's first haiku. Working with shapes one day, Petersen and his wife [Cynthia Archer] came up with one the size of a postage stamp that they liked — it looked like a plucked chicken, and since it seemed symbolic of the artist (a bird that can't fly, ready for the stew or to be barbecued, all goose bumps and no feathers), the name stuck.

The journal ended in 1980 with issue number six when Petersen and Archer moved to Chicago, but the name and logo continued to identify the press they had founded in 1978. Every print published by the Plucked Chicken Press was embossed with this logo.

Susan Jackson Keig, a pioneer in the development of graphic design

2011-01-29T10:49:00.040-06:00

Photograph credits: Susan Jackson Keig’s c.1982 blind-embossed business card from the collection of David Versluis. The black and white portrait is from 27 Chicago Designers. 27 Chicago Designers. Vol. 34. Chicago: 27 Chicago Designers, 1982. Print. The late Morton Goldsholl was posthumously honored as a recipient of a 2009 AIGA Fellow Award. Photograph of Ms. Keig accepting the award on Goldsholl’s behalf. Ms. Keig received the 2002 AIGA Fellow Award.

“Once they find out what you can do, they can’t do without you.”
—Susan Jackson Keig, Designer

Susan Jackson Keig design consultant, Chicago, is listed by R. Roger Remington in his Graphic Design History Resource as a woman pioneer in the development of North American design. Currently, at age 92, Keig still manages her design practice.

I first heard Susan Jackson Keig speak in 1982 at the annual STA (Society of Typographic Arts) fall conference in Chicago, where she and Bruce Beck gave an presentation on the history of the STA. The duo recalled memories with first-hand anecdotes, presenting a commendable early history of Chicago graphic design. They focused primarily on the charter members of a group called “27 Chicago Designers.” The STA was a professional association of graphic designers based in Chicago and founded in 1927. Keig and Beck were both STA Fellows, interestingly—Keig was conferred in 1964 and Beck a year later in 1965.

In 1983 I had the opportunity to meet Ms. Keig at an evening STA event featuring a guest design manager (I think it was Christopher Pullman, WGBH). As I introduced myself she was friendly and gracious, with a sense of Southern hospitality—perhaps a reflection of her Kentucky roots. I still have the business card that she gave me that evening. I was teaching at the time at Trinity Christian College in Palos Heights, Illinois and Ms. Keig seemed interested in the school’s part of the family tree of the Dutch Reformed Church. At that time she was involved in the graphic identity for Chicago’s Prairie Avenue Historic District.

Ms. Keig has been honored as a Distinguished Alumna of the University of Kentucky College of Fine Arts where she graduated with a BA in art in 1940. In addition, in 2010 she was honored as an inductee into The University of Kentucky Hall of Distinguished Alumni. For the occasion the UK alumni association wrote a brief biography:

Susan Jackson Keig is an internationally recognized art designer in private practice. She also is a Fellow and past-president of the Society of Typographic Arts/American Center for Design, and she has lectured at Yale University, Heritage of the Arts SUNY and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Some of her design projects include an LP record and album for Buckminster Fuller, a medallion from the Free Congress Foundation for Margaret Thatcher, and the Clare Booth Luce medallion from the Heritage Foundation for Ronald Reagan.

She is a leading authority on the Shakers, their village at Pleasant Hill, and has more than 3,000 photographs of Shaker Village. This is her 40th year of designing and producing the Shaker calendar for Pleasant Hill.

She taught at the Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, has had one-woman exhibits in Louisville and New York, and is a Distinguished Alumna of the UK College of Fine Arts.

A few years ago at an AIGA Chicago evening event called “Fresh Talent 2008”. Ms. Keig, speaking to the audience, optimistically and wisely said, “Once they find out what you can do, they can’t do without you.” These are indeed encouraging words to take to heart as graphic designers.

Unity of text and form

2011-01-27T10:49:00.015-06:00

MoMA gift store shopping bag, c.1999. Size: 8.5” x 11.5”
From the collection of David Versluis

The name MoMA is used to form consistent pattern of a continual recurrence, repetitious and rhythmical nature. To achieve contrast and variation the line The Museum of Modern Art, New York is used to emphasize the slightly off-center in this fairly rigid composition. The neutral typographic style of “Helvetica” and “corporate gray” reinforces the unity of text and form. (1)

Ruder, Emil. Typography: a Manual of Design. New York: Visual Communication Books; Hastings House, Publis, 1981. 134-98. Print.