Designer Rick Valicenti gives presentation at Dordt College

SIOUX CENTER, IA – Design legend Rick Valicenti will share his optimistic perspective on communication design at Dordt College on Wednesday, October 9, at 7 p.m. Valicenti will present “Time Well Spent II” in the Ribbens Academic Complex classroom CL1444/1148. Event parking is located in the parking lot west of the Ribbens Academic Complex.

Valicenti is the founder and design director of Thirst, a Chicago-based communication design practice devoted to art, function, play, and real human presence. He has been influencing the design discourse internationally since 1988 and is a leading presence in design as a practitioner, educator, and mentor.

The White House honored Valicenti in 2011 with the Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award for Communication Design. In 2006, he received the AIGA Medal, considered the highest honor of the graphic design profession. In 2004, he was recognized as a Fellow of AIGA Chicago. He is a former president of the Society of Typographic Arts and is a member of Alliance Graphique Internationale.

Several works of Valicenti are in permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, Cooper-Hewitt National Design, and the Columbia University Rare Books Collection.

Valicenti’s presentation is sponsored by the Dordt College Department of Art and Design, AIGA Student Group, and the Co-curricular Committee.

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Chad Kouri: perceptual distortions

Chad Kouri
Xerograph Monotype Exercises
8 x 10—2013
© Chad Kouri

This is one of the pieces by Chad Kouri, which was on display at the 2013 Pop-up Exhibition: “Re/View, Work at Play” that ran during June in Block Thirty Seven at the Chicago Design Museum. The exhibition ran concurrently with Chicago Design Week. photo by versluis

The following information is taken for the exhibition label:

This series of ongoing experiments utilizes imagery from Jean Larcher's Geometrical Designs and Optical Art, which were created by dragging the book over the Xerox glass while a copy was in process. By using a machine whose sole purpose is to make multiples in order to create unique prints, the illusion not only lies in the work's aesthetic value, but also in concept—touching on contemporary themes in art and design including image usage and copyright, appropriation, authorship and originality.

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Pentagram’s Eddie Opara: “Stealth”

Stealth
Eddie Opara
174 x 80 — 2008
© Eddie Opara

This piece was featured in the 2013 Pop-up Exhibition: “Re/View, Work at Play” which ran during June in Block Thirty Seven at the Chicago Design Museum. The exhibition ran concurrently with Chicago Design Week. photo by versluis

The exhibition label for this piece states:

Stealth is a marriage of two parallel themes on the visibility of identity. The dynamic form and function of the stealth fighter provides the dimensional impetus, whilst the text is homage to Ralph Ellison’s invisible man “I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me.” — an indication of how black people have been treated in society.

Pictured below is a lower left close-up of Stealth.

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“Anamorphose”: an anamorphic / metamorphosis, metaphoric typeface by Simon Renaud

X, Y, Z
A is a name (Simon Renaud), Photographer: Véronique Pêcheux
15¾ x 23⅜ — 2013

This piece was featured in the 2013 Pop-up Exhibition: Re/View, Work at Play which ran during June in Block Thirty Seven at the Chicago Design Museum. The exhibition ran concurrently with Chicago Design Week. photo by versluis

The exhibition label for this piece states:

Anamorphose is a contemporary typeface drawn in a three dimensional grid that, while rethought to exist in a physical space, retains elements of Textura (used in the Gutenberg Bible). Anamorphose is anchored in the geometry of historic Blackletter typefaces and is created by hand. The forms are then photographed to visually echo digitally rendered imagery.

A is name is a Parisian studio founded by Simon Renaud and Jérémie Nuel in 2006. Their work centers on the design process in order to discover the artistry found in typographic forms and systems. As graphic designers, Renaud and Nuel utilize a systematic approach and methodology by researching the history of writing, science, and technology in order to develop an uniquely personal visual language.

Reference:
Leeman, Frederick, Joost Elffers, and Mike Schuyt. “Anamorphosen.” Trans. Ellyn Childs Allison and Margaret L. Kaplan. Hidden Images: Games of Perception, Anamorphic Art, Illusion. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1976. Print.

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Compliments for “Enlaced: A Burning Bush, Psalm 19” — a new sculpture for Dordt College, Sioux Center, Iowa

Enlaced: a Burning Bush, Psalm 19 — a sculpture for Dordt College
David M. Versluis, concept, design director, designer
8 feet at the base and 18 feet high
Weighs 6,550 lbs.
Southwest elevation looking toward Southview apartments

The dedication for Enlaced: a Burning Bush, Psalm 19 is scheduled for Monday November 4 at around 3:45 p.m.  Dr. Calvin Seerveld will be in attendance and will speak a few words. Seerveld’s “Burning Bush” insight from Psalm 19 in Rainbows for the Fallen World was part of the inspiration for the sculpture.

Sculpture Project Credits:
Thank you to the donors for generously funding the sculpture project.
Dordt College Art Committee, Sally Jongsma, chair
Lauren Ochsner, maquette welder, Golden Prairie Art, Maurice, Iowa
William Morren Design, LLC, industrial designer, Hillsboro, Wisconsin
Daniel Dykstra, engineering/structural analysis, Grand Rapids, Michigan,
D+M Metal, Inc., manufacturer, Comstock Park, Michigan
Stan Haak, et al., site preparation and concrete foundation forms, Dordt College Maintenance Dept.
Mark Van Voorst, Van Voorst Concrete, Hull, Iowa
Nelson Wynia, Nelson’s Welding and Machine, Sioux Center, Iowa
Mike Wynia, supervisor, Hoogendoorn Construction Inc., hoist service,
Canton, South Dakota

Regarding the sculpture here are some compliments from esteemed colleagues and acquaintances:

“Having stood alongside David during the original proposals, many technical plans, and delays, its a joy and a privilege to see and experience the final result, in the flesh.”
—Jake Van Wyk, Professor of Art, Dordt College. Van Wyk is an artist and teacher with over 35 years experience

“What a simple powerful presence it has.”
—Roy R. Behrens, Professor of Art, and Distinguished Scholar, University of Northern Iowa. Behrens was a nominee in 2003 for the Smithsonian Institution’s National Design Awards

“It looks fantastic!…. And I love the name!”
—Phil Schaafsma, founder and director of Eyekons, Grand Rapids, Michigan

“Brilliant”… “Magnificent”
—Rick Valicenti, founder and design director of Thirst/3st, AIGA Medalist and Fellow of the AIGA Chicago. Honored at the White House Valicenti was awarded the Smithsonian Cooper-­Hewitt, National Design Award for Communication Design in 2011

“…it looks wonderful.”
—Joseph Michael Essex, Partner, Essex Two, Chicago and Fellow of the AIGA Chicago


North elevation looking toward East Campus


East elevation looking toward Covenant Hall


Installation of the uprights to the baseplate on 20 August. Pictured R-L is a Hoogendoorn Construction worker, Nelson Wynia, Jake VanWyk

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A centennial piece: Purcell and Elmslie’s Madison State Bank “Skylight”

William Gray Purcell, American, 1880–1965 and George Grant Elmslie, American (born Scotland), 1869–1952
Skylight, 1913
From the Madison State Bank, Madison, Minnesota (demolished 1968)
Purcell, Feick and Elmslie, architects
Glass, zinc caming, (with three new replacement panels and new oak frame)
Mosaic Art Shops (E.L. Sharretts), Manufacturer, Minneapolis, 1912–1930
From the collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art
Photograph by versluis

This large art glass piece which is on permanent display at the MIA in Minneapolis has the characteristics of a frame within a frame design by collaborators Purcell and Elmslie. The original panels of the art glass, comprising the top and bottom rows will be one hundred years old this year; the center horizontal section of three panels are very fine reproductions.

The museum didactics for this piece state the following:

This is a recreation of the central skylight located over the teller cages of the Madison State Bank. The skylight originally comprised nine panels, however, the square central panel and two of the long border panels seen here are reproductions. For the bank, Purcell, Feick and Elmslie produced a long, narrow plan for the middle of a block. The exterior featured a window wall with aqua, orange, and yellow terracotta ornament enlivening the brick façade. This was similar to Purcell and Elmslie’s other bank designs and also to Louis Sullivan’s National Farmers’ Bank in Owatonna (1908).

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George Grant Elmslie and Alfonso Iannelli — two designers for the 1936 Oliver P. Morton School, Hammond, Indiana

George Grant Elmslie, American (born Scotland), 1869-1952
Main building cornice panel, Terracotta. 1936
Manufactured by Midland Terracotta Company, Chicago, 1919–39; Fritz Albert (American, 1865-1940), modeler
From the Oliver P. Morton School, Hammond, Indiana
(demolished 1991); William S. Hutton, architect, and George Grant Elmslie, designer
Collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, gift of Cathers and Dembrosky
Photograph by versluis

An interesting correlation of symbolism and motif exists between George Grant Elmslie and Alfonso Iannelli who were two designers for the 1936 Oliver P. Morton School, Hammond, Indiana.

A wonderful exhibition titled, “The Progressive Pencil: George Elmslie’s Prairie School Designs” is currently on view at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Regarding this piece the exhibition label explains the following:

In the 1930s, Elmslie collaborated with the architect William S. Hutton on three public elementary schools in Hammond, Indiana: the Oliver P. Morton School, the Thomas A. Edison School, and Washington Irving School. All three received funding from the Public Works Administration, part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933.

The Morton school and the concurrently designed and built Edison school impressively combined Prairie School rectilinearity with Elmslie’s organic ornamentation and large-scale figural sculpture. This panel—one of a series crowning the cornice of the Morton school—features the dynamic “flying V” Elmslie favored, along with abstracted floral and foliate ornament.

Alfonso Iannelli
American (born Italy), 1888-1965
Screen for Oliver P. Morton School, Hammond, Indiana, 1936
Photograph by versluis 
Photograph taken from the exhibition, “Modernism’s Messengers: The Art of Alfonso and Margaret Iannelli — 1910 to 1965”

The panels were designed and made as multiples, stacked on one another and the joints grouted for the installation. The exhibition label for this piece states, “This panel was part of a decorative perforated terracotta screen above the entrance of the Oliver P. Morton Elementary School in Hammond, Indiana.”

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