Artist SeriesDavid Carson| 00:00 | (music playing)
| | 01:08 | David Carson: The lack of training
probably helped me.
| | 01:10 | When I started doing magazines, I just did
what made sense to me.
| | 01:15 | I read an article and tried to interpret it.
| | 01:17 | And then later other people said,
"Well, wait, you can't do that.
| | 01:19 | Those don't go there. You can't," you know?
| | 01:20 | It was just--self-indulgent was the big
negative term, which I think is
| | 01:25 | a very positive term.
| | 01:26 | I wouldn't want anybody working for me that wasn't
doing very self-indulgent work, totally absorbed in it.
| | 01:33 | So as we get more computerized, I think it
becomes more important than ever that the
| | 01:36 | work actually become more subjective, more
personal, and that you let your personality
| | 01:41 | come through in the work.
| | 01:43 | So it becomes more important that you pull from
who you are as a person and put that into the work.
| | 01:49 | (music playing)
| | 02:10 | I always realized like with Ray Gun that paid
practically nothing, but I had total freedom.
| | 02:16 | When I was done with that magazine,
I sent it to the printer.
| | 02:19 | Nobody had to okay it, nobody had to cut it.
| | 02:21 | I was always aware it was a very unusual situation,
and I needed to run with it, and I did every
| | 02:26 | issue--especially with the Beach Culture--
like it would be the last.
| | 02:30 | So people used to say that I
was disrespectful to the writing.
| | 02:33 | What I was doing in Ray Gun,
and I am very much the opposite.
| | 02:37 | I was reading the articles, trying to interpret
them, and trying to draw attention to them.
| | 02:41 | Occasionally it wasn't unusual that the
articles wouldn't be much there, and I was
| | 02:45 | just interpreting the title and just having
some fun with the title.
| | 02:49 | The starting point is never to make something
ugly or to make it harder to read or to make
| | 02:53 | it award-winning or to make it pretty.
| | 02:56 | The starting point is to try to interpret
something, what have I just read, what have
| | 03:00 | I just listened to?
| | 03:05 | (music playing)
| | 03:17 | It seemed like there was Neville Brody, and
then I came along, and then the next thing
| | 03:21 | doesn't seem to have happened.
It will.
| | 03:24 | It's inevitable, but I never thought it would
be this big gap in there.
| | 03:30 | (music playing)
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| Milton Glaser| 00:00 | (music playing)
| | 00:06 | Posters.
| | 00:10 | I think there must be about
200,000 or 300,000 posters here.
| | 00:14 | Hillman Curtis: Jeez!
Milton Glaser: Where am I going with design?
| | 00:19 | That's a hard question, because none of us has really
the ability to understand our path until it's over.
| | 00:29 | I've always believed that the life of a designer
is a life that is very much between two sensibilities:
| | 00:37 | that of the businessman, and that of the artist.
| | 00:40 | And everybody kind of has a sense of where
they fit in that spectrum.
| | 00:48 | If you feel close of the life of an artist
that has a relationship to the role of art
| | 00:54 | in culture, which is essentially a benign role.
| | 00:58 | My belief is that if you like Mozart, and
I like Mozart, we already have something in common.
| | 01:03 | So the likelihood of our killing
each other has been diminished.
| | 01:08 | That art performs this pacifying function in culture
in that its practitioners create commonalities.
| | 01:18 | They create things to gather about.
| | 01:21 | I always quote a guy named Lewis Hyde who
wrote about primitive cultures where there
| | 01:26 | is an exchange of gifts that cannot be kept
but have to be passed on, and the passing on
| | 01:32 | of gifts is a device to prevent people from
killing one another, because they all become
| | 01:40 | part of a single experience. And his leap of
imagination occurs when he says and this
| | 01:47 | is what artists do in a culture. Artists provide
that gift so the people have something in common.
| | 01:54 | I think for all of us who identify with the role
of artists in history have that intuition about
| | 02:02 | things and want our work to serve that purpose.
| | 02:06 | Similarly, as much as we want to work to sell products,
although not everybody feels the same way about it.
| | 02:16 | (music playing)
| | 02:30 | Why do I teach?
| | 02:34 | Fundamentally, I teach because
it makes me feel good.
| | 02:39 | It's helped me certainly clarify my own objectives.
| | 02:45 | There is nothing more exciting than seeing
someone whose life has been affected in a
| | 02:52 | positive way by something you said.
| | 02:54 | There is nothing more exciting than seeing
somebody change from a sort of condition of
| | 03:01 | inertness or inattentiveness into a mind that
begins to enquire about meaning.
| | 03:07 | I think if you don't do something to project
into the future that way, the possibility for
| | 03:13 | a total self-absorption and
narcissism becomes very much greater.
| | 03:23 | My idea about graphic designers and social
commentary is that is part of the practice.
| | 03:29 | I've always believed that because you have
access to people's minds, and you communicate
| | 03:34 | to people that there is a corresponding responsibility.
| | 03:39 | It's the responsibility of being a good citizen
and also recognizing that if you have the
| | 03:43 | ability to transfer ideas from one point to another
that those should be ideas that cause no harm.
| | 03:49 | So it doesn't matter so much whether a graphic
design is an effective vehicle as much as
| | 03:54 | for personal reasons, you want to be operating
within life of your time.
| | 03:58 | I mean, you want to do things that have some
relationship to your community, to your family,
| | 04:04 | to your city, to your country, to the world.
| | 04:14 | (music playing)
| | 04:19 | I think the most interesting thing that one
could say about one's later life is that if
| | 04:25 | you can sustain your interests in what you're
doing, you're an extremely fortunate person.
| | 04:32 | What you see very frequently in people's professional
lives and perhaps in their emotional life
| | 04:36 | as well is that they lose interest in that.
| | 04:40 | In the third act you sort of get tired and
indifferent and sometimes defensive, and
| | 04:46 | you kind of lose your capacity for astonishment,
and that's a great loss, because the world
| | 04:55 | is a very astonishing place.
| | 04:57 | So I think what I feel fortunate about is
that I am still astonished that things
| | 05:04 | still amaze me, and I think that that's
a great benefit of being in the arts where
| | 05:10 | the possibility for learning never disappears, where
you basically have to admit you never learned it.
| | 05:21 | (music playing)
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| Pentagram| 00:00 | (music playing)
| | 00:07 | Lisa Strausfeld: Pentagram is a collective
of designers who work in different media.
| | 00:11 | John McConnell: Based in London, New York,
San Francisco, Austin, and now Berlin.
| | 00:16 | Michael Gericke: It benefits from
the power of the collective group.
| | 00:21 | Woody Pirtle: Because of the variety of disciplines
that each partner brings to the table.
| | 00:25 | William Russell: The sum of the part
is greater than the individuals.
| | 00:27 | David Hillman: I mean, most of us are actually interested
in the big idea rather than actually just style.
| | 00:33 | Fernando Gutierrez: The essence of
the whole thing is is creativity.
| | 00:35 | Abbott Miller: And you can't really
change the group, you can just add to it.
| | 00:41 | DJ Stout: The other thing that's really great
about it is that you learn from the other partners.
| | 00:44 | Lowell Williams: There is a lot of collaboration,
which is the great advantage of Pentagram.
| | 00:48 | Angus Hyland: Because it allows the individual
designer to broaden their platform.
| | 00:53 | Paula Scher: By working with others
in a collegial environment.
| | 00:56 | James Biber: We also are going to have a
common interest in doing a great work for great people.
| | 01:01 | Lorenzo Apicella: And to find
reward in work of consequence.
| | 01:05 | Kit Hinrichs: And impact our
culture along the way.
| | 01:09 | Robert Brunner: It's a brand that that means
a lot to people in the profession about.
| | 01:12 | Daniel Weil: The enduring value of design.
| | 01:16 | Justus Oehler: Much more than just a design company.
It's a platform for you as an individual--
| | 01:21 | John Rushworth: To get the most
out of your life, your career.
| | 01:24 | Michael Bierut: With the support of your partners
and what you have learned from them, and in
| | 01:28 | the end what you can teach them.
| | 01:31 | male speaker 1: One, two, three, four.
| | 01:33 | female speaker 1: The thing I love most as years
go by is working on projects where I don't
| | 01:40 | know what I'm doing.
| | 01:42 | male speaker 2: What keeps it interesting is
it's about ideas, and it's about solutions
| | 01:47 | to problems and being asked to solve those
problems in a creative way all the time.
| | 01:52 | male speaker 3: You get to kind of explore somebody
else's business, and who they are and what
| | 01:57 | makes them great, and then somehow designs are
sort of interwoven into that and they realize
| | 02:01 | that it's a tool that they can use to make
their businesses better.
| | 02:05 | male speaker 4: Every day is a new day,
every client is a new client.
| | 02:10 | There are hardly any of the
jobs that are repetitive.
| | 02:15 | The journey is never the same.
| | 02:16 | male speaker 5: I love fiddling, I love doodling,
I love what we call visual puns, trying to
| | 02:25 | discover something on a very small scale.
| | 02:28 | male speaker 6: Graphics is the most fluid of
all of the design disciplines, and I think
| | 02:35 | that that's always been its appeal to me.
| | 02:37 | male speaker 7: And I loved the incredible unpredictability
and flexibility of--on day to day, trying to remain relevant.
| | 02:47 | male speaker 8: I think I love the--the part
of it that is about making meaning, that you
| | 02:55 | produce new meaning
through the vehicle of design.
| | 02:59 | male speaker 9: I'm a storyteller, and I tell
my life stories through pictures, and I like
| | 03:05 | being able to communicate with people.
| | 03:07 | That don't mean that I just won't be able
to clearly talk to them but to be able to influence
| | 03:12 | them along the way.
| | 03:13 | male speaker 10: It's a long, long journey, and
it's always about improving and being able
| | 03:18 | to work in something that
you're passionate about.
| | 03:22 | male speaker 11: I love just detailing something
so immaculately that all of the proportions
| | 03:30 | are perfect, the colors are right, and the
detail is the detail as it should be.
| | 03:35 | male speaker 12: Well, a lot of that doesn't
have to matter what typeface it is, it doesn't
| | 03:37 | matter what color is, it's some sort of idea
that just is a way of resolving contradictions
| | 03:44 | that the client is bringing to the table
that just seem irresolvable. So I love that moment.
| | 03:48 | male speaker 13: The businesses are shoving typeface
around the bit of paper.
| | 03:52 | I'll do that, but actually that's not what
is so important to me now.
| | 03:55 | It's working with them and helping them achieve
things which they didn't think were achievable.
| | 03:59 | male speaker 14: I mean, newspapers is about dealing
with text and actually persuading them of
| | 04:05 | the power of the photograph.
| | 04:06 | Whereas magazines, the pictures
and the text have to go together.
| | 04:09 | A good magazine is a series of surprises.
| | 04:12 | male speaker 15: An architecture
is an extraordinary discipline.
| | 04:15 | There is a kind of a magical process from
drawing on computer to the reality, and I
| | 04:21 | think that's very rough, I'm constantly surprised
and kind of fascinated with that process.
| | 04:26 | male speaker 16: Conceiving of
something is a tremendous thrill.
| | 04:31 | Making it happen requires enormous patience
and can be incredibly educational and inspirational,
| | 04:37 | but having made something is the whole point.
| | 04:40 | female speaker 2: I do design, I solve problems.
| | 04:43 | I don't invent solutions,
I find them in material and the source.
| | 04:49 | male speaker 17: I enjoy the architecture of
buildings, but I enjoy the architecture of
| | 04:54 | people's behavior within those buildings,
it's not only about silence and light.
| | 04:58 | male speaker 18: That wasn't always about commercializing
something, but there's this human part to
| | 05:03 | it that is very, very emotional and very much
about how people live and experience things.
| | 05:10 | male speaker 19: I think for an artist, your
happiness is really tied up in your work,
| | 05:17 | and if you're not doing great work,
you're not going to be happy.
| | 05:22 | male speaker 20: --and your office location,
and I do this just as this, I'm not going
| | 05:28 | to use it, I do it as a slate in a way to
set your--up a level, so any time you're ready.
| | 05:36 | Daniel: Daniel Weil, Designer, London.
| | 05:40 | Abbott: Now? My name is Abbott Miller, and I'm a Graphic
Designer, and I work in the New York office,
| | 05:48 | but I also work out of a studio in Baltimore.
| | 05:51 | Angus: Okay, I'm Angus Hyland,
I'm a Graphic Designer.
| | 05:55 | My local office is in London.
| | 05:58 | David: Okay. David Hillman, Graphic Designer, London.
| | 06:01 | DJ: I'm DJ Stout, and I specialize in publication
design, identity, and the office is in Austin.
| | 06:10 | John Rushworth: Okay, so John Rushworth.
| | 06:13 | I'm a Graphic Designer in
Pentagram's London office.
| | 06:16 | John McConnell: John McConnell. Graphic Designer,
and office is in the London.
| | 06:21 | Lisa: Okay, Lisa Strausfeld, I'm called a
New Media Designer, and I'm based in New York.
| | 06:27 | Justus: Justus Oehler, London and Berlin,
or Berlin and London, Graphic Designer.
| | 06:31 | Robert: Okay, I'm Robert Brunner.
| | 06:32 | I'm a partner at San Francisco,
and I work in Industrial Design.
| | 06:37 | Paula: Paula Scher,
Graphic Designer, New York.
| | 06:39 | Michael Bierut: Okay, Michael Bierut,
Graphic Designer, Pentagram, New York.
| | 06:43 | Michael Gericke: My name is Michael Gericke.
| | 06:45 | I'm a Graphic Designer in
the New York office of Pentagram.
| | 06:49 | William: Okay, my name is William Russell.
I'm an architect in the London office.
| | 06:53 | Fernando: Okay,
I'm Fernando Gutierrez.
| | 06:55 | I'm a Graphic Designer, and I'm the partner
in Pentagram, London.
| | 07:00 | Kit: I'm Kit Hinrichs,
Graphic Designer, San Francisco.
| | 07:03 | Lorenzo: My name is Lorenzo Apicella,
I'm a partner in the London office. I'm an architect.
| | 07:08 | Woody: My name is Woody Pirtle.
I'm located in New York.
| | 07:12 | I'm a partner in the New York
office of Pentagram Design.
| | 07:15 | And I'm a Graphic Designer.
| | 07:17 | Lowell: Okay, I'm Lowell Williams,
Graphic Designer in Austin, Texas.
| | 07:28 | James: I have all the time in the world, I know. It's one?
James Biber, Architect, New York.
| | 07:34 | (music playing)
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| Paula Scher| 00:00 | (music playing)
| | 00:08 | Paula Scher: There is light on the bottom, so the
thing is lit, so it's like really heroic and
| | 00:11 | then there is sort of like on the glass, and
the back level of the glass is like what side
| | 00:16 | of the building is, so it might say North
West and then on the top of the glass the
| | 00:20 | directory is screened over it.
| | 00:22 | So you're looking at this sort of like the
really beautiful sculptural layer typography.
| | 00:27 | As I started doing signage, there were either
things put on buildings, cut into flat surfaces
| | 00:31 | or painted around things.
| | 00:33 | Then this new iteration, both jazz, and this
was sculptural, which is sort of nice.
| | 00:39 | When I started designing Jazz,
I met with Whitton.
| | 00:44 | I asked what he thought should be reflected
in the logo, you know like sideways, I always
| | 00:48 | look for some hook of basis of being me able
to give back somebody's values to them visually.
| | 00:54 | And he said, "Well, it should be syncopated."
| | 00:58 | And I said, "Well what does syncopated mean?"
and he says, "Well, syncopated is when you got
| | 01:02 | a bunch of things in order,
and one of them is off."
| | 01:05 | So I had done--I had done these deliberately
thin letter forms and then filled in the A,
| | 01:11 | because these were all in
order, and this was off.
| | 01:13 | And then, when I said--then he said another
comment about Jazz guys being a little bit off.
| | 01:22 | And I said sort of like
square pegs in round holes.
| | 01:24 | And everything inside the space is based on
squares and circles, because the A has, like,
| | 01:31 | a square in the circle.
| | 01:32 | We did that, so when I played it back to him
he could fall in love with it.
| | 01:38 | (music playing)
| | 01:40 | The Public Theater identity was based on being
extremely loud and visible and urban, and
| | 01:52 | it was originally--a European designer told
me I did the first American Shakespeare posters,
| | 01:58 | that all the other Shakespeare posters really
were European until I did the Shakespeare
| | 02:03 | in the Park which was public theater language,
because they were loud, and they were about words.
| | 02:09 | And when the "Noise Funk" series came out,
the place first opened to public in '96, so
| | 02:18 | from '96 to I think, maybe to the beginning of '99,
there were series of a pile of them around the street.
| | 02:25 | They were designed out of The Public Theater
typographic language combined with these photographs,
| | 02:32 | various photographs of Sadie McGlover.
| | 02:34 | And the music was a tap-rap musical so that
the typography was designed to look like it made noise.
| | 02:42 | And they were everywhere, they were in the subways, they
were on the rooftops, they were on sides of buildings.
| | 02:49 | And then what happened was it started to become
this style, so this identity for this small
| | 02:55 | theater actually became a popularized style.
| | 03:00 | So New York City ate the identity
of the Public Theater in a way.
| | 03:07 | I operate very strongly with my instincts,
and I really either get--if I don't get
| | 03:13 | it in the first craft, I get it in the second.
| | 03:15 | And if I don't get it in the
second, I almost never get it.
| | 03:18 | Because as I said, it's like a--it's a very
intuitive kind of process for me. I've never been a refiner.
| | 03:25 | My best work are kind of big bold strokes
that came very quickly.
| | 03:30 | And it's problematic because some of the clients
like--a lot of clients like to buy process,
| | 03:34 | and I think they are not getting their money's
worth, like I solved it too fast.
| | 03:37 | I mean Michael Bierut told me to shut up in
an initial meeting.
| | 03:40 | I drew the City Bank logo, after we had the
first meeting, I drew it on a napkin worked out.
| | 03:47 | They had to merge travelers and city and travelers
had an umbrella and City Bank is a word, you
| | 03:52 | know in the lowercase thing of t as an umbrella,
it's sticking arc on the top, and you've got it.
| | 03:58 | I mean it didn't take, it's like a--it's
a second, it's all over the world.
| | 04:02 | Like how can it be that you talk to somebody,
and it's done in a second?
| | 04:06 | But it is done in a second.
It's done in a second in 34 years.
| | 04:10 | It's done in a second and every experience and every
movie and everything of my life that's in my head.
| | 04:17 | (music playing)
| | 04:28 | I learned typography by rubbing down press
type and all those students rubbed down very
| | 04:35 | neat Helvetica in the corner of all their images,
and my Helvetica would bubble and crack and look terrible.
| | 04:43 | I had this fantastic Polish illustrator who
was my teacher, his name is was Stanislaw Zagorski,
| | 04:49 | and he told me to illustrate the
type, to illustrate with type, not to try
| | 04:55 | to rub type down on a corner with press type.
| | 04:57 | And that piece of advice
has served me my whole life.
| | 05:02 | (music playing)
| | 05:15 | I can get my email out.
That's it.
| | 05:19 | male speaker: So you're sketching and--
Paula: Yeah, I thumbnail, and I go up to the team
| | 05:24 | and then either stuff I make that I paint,
and I do those maps and they are laborious,
| | 05:29 | and they are opposite of design,
they take me 6 months.
| | 05:32 | You know when I work that's how I do those
on weekends at my country house, and they are
| | 05:36 | very important to me because
there was left of craft.
| | 05:42 | I used to paint, when I used to make record
covers, I used to make a C print of the photograph
| | 05:48 | or the illustration, and then I would take
a piece of acetate, and I would paint the
| | 05:52 | typography on top of it by hand.
| | 05:54 | That's the way we used to present that stuff
before the computer.
| | 05:57 | And that was my craft, my craft was making
comps, and I used to make all--I have like
| | 06:02 | all kinds of beautiful layered mechanicals that
I've saved, the days that I used to use my hands.
| | 06:08 | So the computer made me feel like my hands
were cut off, because you don't type--you
| | 06:12 | don't type a design. That seems dull.
| | 06:15 | I remember meeting a guy named Aaron Marcus
years ago when programs were first being introduced,
| | 06:21 | and it seemed to me that the computer for
a designer should have been a light box, and
| | 06:26 | you're like digital repeat motion, and you
move your hands like this, because that's
| | 06:29 | what the idea of doing this, and that did
not, it's not like the right--and it doesn't
| | 06:34 | smell right, doesn't smell like an art
supply, it smells like a car.
| | 06:37 | There was going to be a moment, and it starts
like it can be a really short moment in relationship
| | 06:42 | to all this other garbage you got to do to
get to the point that you get to make the
| | 06:46 | stuff, but that's the thing
that I kind of live for.
| | 06:49 | Like this one moment where you figure it out,
and you get it, and you think it's going to
| | 06:55 | be the best thing you ever did, and it's like
really, really exciting, and I never get over
| | 07:00 | it, and it hasn't changed in 34 years.
| | 07:02 | And as long as I can feel that,
you can do it.
| | 07:06 | (music playing)
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| Sagmeister| 00:00 | (music playing)
| | 00:07 | Stefan Sagmeister: Everything I do
always comes back to me.
| | 00:20 | I think the main structure is that they start with
the hard things and finish with the easy things.
| | 00:28 | So now it's 5:30, this is definitely one of
the easy things, we begin with the interview.
| | 00:37 | I never wanted to be in the fine art world myself,
but I really always wanted to be a graphic designer.
| | 00:48 | And I talk about things before they are, you
know well developed.
| | 00:54 | I feel like I have already done them.
| | 00:58 | And then there is sort of like if I talk extensively
about them, I kind of like use the need to
| | 01:03 | do hem because I already sort of like turn them
over so many times, so I kind of like stopped.
| | 01:11 | I've been writing diaries I think since I
was twelve, and now I simply find the time
| | 01:17 | when I write it, didn't take any time,
15-20 minutes a week.
| | 01:23 | It really forces me to sort of like think
back and then begin sort of like evaluate
| | 01:27 | what happened and what then goes about.
| | 01:31 | Like people always said that, he always looks
for clients who are smarter than him, because
| | 01:39 | that's the only way you can really learn something.
| | 01:44 | At the time I look they are all like chalk
posters and sort of like felt that they all
| | 01:49 | say but a colorful and happy
profession we are in.
| | 01:55 | And I knew I didn't want to do that, because
I did feel that there is also quite a lot
| | 01:59 | of anxiety and angst and fear
around in our profession.
| | 02:07 | I always tried to go in a direction where
the final piece would incorporate the process visibly.
| | 02:20 | Having guts always works out for,
then we put the light one, me.
| | 02:37 | (music playing)
| | 02:44 | March Korea, Texas, April, Mexico City,
Berlin, then afterwards Munich.
| | 02:55 | Yeah. That's probably it.
That's probably the course.
| | 03:03 | (music playing)
| | 03:13 | This is an Adobe poster.
| | 03:17 | It's a simple idea for a student for design
achievement award, we had originally done
| | 03:24 | designed this whole thing in Photoshop to
show the client, and then of course the client
| | 03:30 | said excellent, that's it, it's done.
| | 03:32 | But we said, no, no, no, no.
Now we have to go and photograph it.
| | 03:35 | Then he said no, no, no it's fine, it's Adobe,
it's Photoshop, it's beautiful.
| | 03:41 | And but we did convince them to shoot it.
| | 03:44 | These are actual coffee cups here placed carefully
in paper cups, you know from a--we had to
| | 03:52 | rent a very high studio so
we could shoot it from the ceiling.
| | 03:56 | And of course not counting on the fact that
if you leave coffee in a paper cup for or
| | 04:02 | five hours, it actually
starts to leak or at least.
| | 04:07 | So by the time we were about down here, all
the cups on the top started to leak, so it
| | 04:13 | was a quite messy affair.
| | 04:15 | That would make the U.S. a better and safer place.
| | 04:19 | All doable, this is a regular budget, and
it includes things, smaller things like you
| | 04:24 | know sign the Kyoto treaty or pay UN dues
ungrudgingly, and it includes much larger
| | 04:30 | things like ending world hunger.
| | 04:32 | These are photos taken, and there is one big
difference, one week later I had eaten all
| | 04:41 | the things that you see in the picture.
| | 04:49 | And you also note the difference sort of like
in health from the top and the bottom picture.
| | 04:59 | It was not a lot of fun doing this poster.
I gained 23 pounds.
| | 05:06 | This, there is a disadvantage here.
Right, maybe he's quiet because he is recording me.
| | 05:13 | Okay. We shot this one in Arizona.
Trying to look good limits my life.
| | 05:27 | (music playing)
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| James Victore| 00:00 | (music playing)
| | 00:39 | James Victore: The studios always have like
one big table. I sit until I--I sit until
| | 00:45 | I make myself laugh you know working on these
things, or until I find something interesting and--
| | 01:00 | You know, to sit in front of computer
and type, it's not as interesting.
| | 01:05 | So I always kind of, I get you know I mean
especially with students I cut out posters,
| | 01:09 | and you know and give me a piece of black
paper and a pair of scissors, and I'll kick your ass.
| | 01:14 | I like that, I like me,
I like the immediacy of it.
| | 01:24 | And so I moved to New York to become a poster
designer, and I'd been here for a couple of
| | 01:27 | years and realized that I can only make posters.
| | 01:29 | There were no jobs and then this situation
came along, and I had you know--so I made
| | 01:35 | money sitting around and they were self produced
pieces yeah in response to the lack of discussion
| | 01:44 | about the pox infected blankets, you know
the genocide, and I want to kind of point that out.
| | 01:56 | This stuff comes from being pissed off, and
I am going to it my way, and I have an opinion
| | 02:03 | and all that, but what it really comes from,
what it really comes from is the fact that
| | 02:10 | that work, the Dead Indian, the hangman, the
socio-political stuff, the cultural stuff,
| | 02:16 | that is what graphic design is for, and it
is used at it's best, not to sell socks.
| | 02:23 | You know, it's good for selling
socks, but not for that.
| | 02:26 | Graphic design, you know I have been talking
about this recently at this nice little idea
| | 02:29 | that I have--graphic design is a big club
with spikes, you know, and I want to wield
| | 02:34 | it, I want to use, I want to use it in it's
pure, in it's strongest, in it's fullest potential.
| | 02:40 | (music playing)
| | 03:05 | You know a wonderful bit from "On the Road"
where he says and everybody said ah!
| | 03:14 | The mad ones, that day, the mad ones are for
me, you know everyone sitting back and goes ah!
| | 03:18 | That's what I want.
| | 03:21 | (music playing)
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| Pentagram 07| 00:01 | male speaker 1: I mean, this is--
Paula Scher: Okay, okay, okay.
| | 00:04 | male speaker 2: Go ahead Ben, call it.
male speaker 1: Go ahead.
| | 00:08 | Paula: Okay, Pentagram, The family of men.
| | 00:12 | In 1962, Alan Fletcher and Colin Forbes, two
British people and Bob Gill, an American founded
| | 00:18 | a firm and they called it Fletcher/Forbes/Gill.
| | 00:20 | And 1964, Theo Crosby joined them and he was
an architect and the notion was that if you
| | 00:25 | coupled an architect with graphic designers,
it would broaden their opportunity for work.
| | 00:30 | But at that point, Bob Gill who was getting
restless asked Theo Crosby how long it took
| | 00:34 | to build a building and Theo Crosby said,
it took about 4 years and Bob Gill said,
| | 00:38 | well that was too long to
wait for a proof, so he left.
| | 00:41 | So the business became called Crosby/Fletcher/Forbes.
| | 00:43 | Then Mervyn Kurlansky, who I believe was Alan
Fletcher's assistant, was elevated to a partner
| | 00:48 | and the business was still called Crosby/Fletcher/Forbes.
| | 00:50 | And then Kenneth Grange joined, and Kenneth
Grange was a product designer and he wanted
| | 00:54 | the business to be called Crosby/Fletcher/Forbes/Grange.
| | 00:57 | But Mervyn Kurlansky--who as you can tell
has a big long Jewish name--got pissed off
| | 01:00 | and said, well you know I want my name on the firm
if Kenneth Grange gets his name on the front.
| | 01:04 | And they had some partner's weekend and they
had a big fight and Alan Fletcher was reading
| | 01:08 | a book on black magic and they named the firm
Pentagram because there were five partners.
| | 01:11 | But that didn't work for very long because
then John McConnell joined in 1974 and they
| | 01:15 | were just named in 1972, and there were six
partners, so Pentagram made no sense, but nobody
| | 01:20 | cared and they kept the name.
| | 01:21 | And then Ron Herron joined in 1977, and
Colin Forbes moved off and founded New York.
| | 01:25 | So the London office became Kenneth Grange,
Theo Crosby, David Hillman joined, Howard
| | 01:29 | Brown joined, David Pelham joined in 1982,
and a guy named Ron Herron came and went away,
| | 01:33 | David Pelham came and went, in the New York
office Peter Harrison and Etan Manasse joined
| | 01:37 | Colin Forbes, and then in 1986 there were three
partners who became Pentagram San Francisco,
| | 01:42 | who were in independent business, Neil Shakery,
Linda Hinrichs and her husband Kit Hinrichs.
| | 01:46 | From 1990 to 1991 Peter Saville came and went,
Daniel Weil came and stayed, David Pocknell came and went.
| | 01:51 | Josh Rushworth became a partner,
he was a formerly associate.
| | 01:54 | Alan Fletcher left Pentagram in 1991 and went
off on his own and Howard Brown came and went.
| | 01:58 | In the New York office, Woody Pirtle joined in 1988,
Michael Bierut 1990, Paula Scher 1991, Jim Biber 1991.
| | 02:04 | In San Francisco Lowell Williams joined in
1991 after Linda Hinrichs left.
| | 02:08 | Etan Manasse died in 1990.
| | 02:10 | 1992 to 1993 Mervyn Kurlansky retired,
Michael Gericke became a partner.
| | 02:14 | Lowell Williams had a fight at San Francisco
and went off and founded the Austin office.
| | 02:17 | In 1994 to 1996, Justus Oehler
joined as a partner.
| | 02:21 | Theo Crosby passed away, David Pocknell left
the firm, Colin Forbes went off.
| | 02:25 | Peter Harrison went off, Bob Brunner joined
in the San Francisco office, and Neil Shakery went away.
| | 02:29 | 1997 to 1999 Kenneth Grange retired, Lorenzo Apicella
and Angus Hyland joined at London.
| | 02:33 | In New York, Abbott Miller joined in 1999.
| | 02:36 | Pentagram 2000, Fernando Gutierrez joined, Austin got
DJ Stout, and April Greiman pretty much came and went.
| | 02:43 | 2001-2005, William Russell joined, Justus Oehler formed
Berlin, and Lisa Strausfold joined in New York.
| | 02:48 | 2006 to 2007, Domenic Lippa and Harry Pearce
joined in London, David Hillman left,
| | 02:52 | Fernando Gutierrez left,
and Lorenzo went off to San Francisco.
| | 02:56 | New York was added to by Luke Hayman in 2006,
and that's where we are at the moment to be
| | 03:01 | continued and continued and continued.
| | 03:03 | male speaker 2: There is a Hong Kong office.
| | 03:04 | Paula: Oh I forgot about that.
I didn't say anything about that.
| | 03:07 | Yikes! I forgot about it.
| | 03:08 | I should, it should be said there, because
David went off and founded Hong Kong.
| | 03:11 | male speaker 2: Who did?
| | 03:12 | Paula: David, but he stayed
in London at the same time--
| | 03:13 | male speaker 2: David Hillman?
Paula: David Hillman.
| | 03:14 | Should we go back and put that in?
| | 03:18 | (music playing)
| | 03:25 | Paula: I usually describe Pentagram as having
a kind of Socialist/Capitalist model where
| | 03:32 | partners manage their own teams and profit
centers, and then we share profits equally.
| | 03:37 | male speaker 3: What's great about Pentagram
is somehow the structure has fixed it so that
| | 03:41 | the people really are important.
| | 03:42 | I mean, if you look at our letterhead there
are no slogans, it doesn't say, fine design
| | 03:47 | since 1972, it doesn't say what our disciplines
are, it doesn't say graphic design architecture,
| | 03:53 | digital design, product design.
| | 03:56 | The only thing it says outside of the name
Pentagram and the address are the names of people.
| | 03:59 | Paula: The Pentagram exists for the partners to do
the work they want to make the way they want to make it.
| | 04:07 | And that's what the platform is all about.
| | 04:09 | And you get to--you can use resources, you
can collaborate, you can use the shared intelligence,
| | 04:13 | you can ignore it all.
| | 04:15 | male speaker: I'm running relatively small
team, but I have this organization behind
| | 04:19 | me that allows me to approach bigger clients,
and that makes me visible to bigger clients,
| | 04:24 | which is beautiful.
| | 04:29 | male speaker 4: There's no managing partner,
there's no home office and those are questions
| | 04:32 | we get a lot, like what would the home office
think about this or where is the head guy
| | 04:37 | or something, and the answer
is always no and none.
| | 04:48 | male speaker 5: Some, what is it,
5 offices and 18-19 partners?
| | 04:54 | Partners retire, new partners come into the
mix, and there is a constant process or renewal.
| | 05:00 | male speaker 6: If anyone ever asks what's your
5-year plan or 10-year plan at Pentagram,
| | 05:07 | well, the answer in my view is
who is the next partner?
| | 05:10 | That's worrying about who the next partner
is is really what our business plan is about,
| | 05:17 | because if you get that right,
everything else follows.
| | 05:20 | male speaker 7: So I'm just working on the moment
just trying to finish off, it is the--the
| | 05:26 | actual poster for the Pentagram Talk
at D&AD next month.
| | 05:29 | And the idea behind it is I've taken the P
from Pentagram logo, it's a modern 20 P, and
| | 05:37 | I've chopped it up into 18 different pieces, each piece
symbolically representing each of the partners.
| | 05:45 | And the idea is they come together in a variety
of forms and create a single piece by their
| | 05:52 | movement and change. And but I
hope to gather this central idea.
| | 05:58 | (music playing)
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| Sagmeister 08| 00:44 | Stefan Sagmeister: Hi, my name is Stefan Sagmeister.
I am a designer here in New York.
| | 00:50 | I run a small office, and this is our show
here at Deitch Projects on Grand Street in Soho.
| | 00:57 | There are all the things that I have learned
in my life on display here.
| | 01:05 | (music playing)
| | 01:37 | Milton Glaser: I am going to do Worrying Solves Nothing.
Hillman Curtis: And why did you choose that?
| | 01:42 | Milton: You want the real story?
Hillman: Yeah.
| | 01:45 | Milton: Because 20 years ago I was in a taxi
cab going home from my office, and it was
| | 01:53 | driven by a very odd looking man who was watching
me intently in the rearview mirror.
| | 02:00 | When I got to my house I gave him a tip and
stepped out of the taxi and he said, "Listen to me."
| | 02:08 | I said, "What?"
He said, "I was watching you."
| | 02:12 | He said, "You are worried."
I said, "Yeah a little bit."
| | 02:18 | He said, "You've got something on your mind?"
I said, "Yeah, yeah."
| | 02:24 | He says, "Worrying doesn't help." And I left,
and I went upstairs.
| | 02:30 | I realized I had been speaking to the Buddha
who was disguised as a taxi driver.
| | 02:36 | So when I showed this paraphrase of that idea,
Worrying Solves Nothing, as if that's for me,
| | 02:44 | the Buddha would have liked me to repeat that
to the world.
| | 02:55 | Bob Gill: Works Out for Me.
Hillman: Yeah, so what do you think of Stef?
| | 03:03 | What do you think of Sagmeister?
| | 03:05 | Bob: I think he is very hot, and it's nice
that somebody who is so hot is talented and
| | 03:17 | is also a very nice person, so that's great.
| | 03:20 | It doesn't often happen that way, give me
another one.
| | 03:24 | Hillman: Money Does Not Make Me Happy,
do any of these resonate with you?
| | 03:32 | Bob: No.
| | 03:34 | Stefan: Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far
is also the title of our book and has
| | 03:41 | all--as a title it has all the things that
I have learned like the deflating monkey behind
| | 03:49 | me, that is connected with the big monkey
that sits on top of the gallery saying
| | 03:55 | Everybody Thinks They Are Right, definitely.
| | 03:59 | A case in point for the entire show and the
discussion is that it's spawned.
| | 04:05 | Everything I Do Always Comes Back To Me, something
might be banal, but still very, very true
| | 04:12 | that all the good things and the bad things that I
have ever done somehow reflect and come on later on.
| | 04:20 | Having Guts Always Works Out For Me, a truism
I learnt a long, long time ago, and it's one
| | 04:28 | of the few things that while I completely
understand that it's probably not internalized
| | 04:34 | as in I still have to talk myself into being
or jumping over a wall or having more guts
| | 04:44 | or fighting fear every single time.
| | 04:47 | Drugs are fun in the beginning, but have become
a drag later on.
| | 04:52 | Not that I ever was a serious drug addict,
but I did have a while or a time in my life
| | 04:57 | when I drank too much and
experienced this properly.
| | 05:03 | And then Trying To Look Good Limits My Life
is out there doesn't necessarily reflect so
| | 05:12 | much to my physical looks, even though it
points to those as well, but more so this
| | 05:19 | goal to always be the nice guy to all of us
kind of like have to look properly to not
| | 05:28 | be able to make tough decisions or be more of
confrontational, but that is truly fencing my life in.
| | 05:38 | Hillman: What do you think of Stefan Sagmeister?
| | 05:41 | Massimo Vignelli: He is great, he is creative, he is
crazy, he is beyond the boundaries.
| | 05:47 | Designer tends to be
as objective as they can.
| | 05:52 | He tries to be as subjective as he can.
So right there you have an amazing mantra.
| | 05:56 | A big apple, big difference.
You know, he is an artist.
| | 06:00 | He is a different type of designer.
| | 06:01 | He is probably being sick of being a designer,
and now what all does, realize his life,
| | 06:09 | you know, takes his life as an artist.
| | 06:13 | Hillman: What do think about this whole
thing about these phrases?
| | 06:17 | I mean, his book and the show and everything.
| | 06:21 | Debbie Millman: Well, I think as a personal body of
work, I think it's really riveting in that
| | 06:28 | Stefan is sharing with the world the things
that he has learned.
| | 06:33 | I think he is also letting people know that
he learned this the hard way, and I think
| | 06:39 | that that's wonderfully revealing.
| | 06:42 | But I also think as a professional body of
work, it goes a long way in letting the world
| | 06:48 | know that graphic designers are indeed artists,
and I think that's really important and a
| | 06:54 | tremendous contribution to art design.
| | 06:59 | (music playing)
| | 07:08 | Stefan: Helping Other People Helps Me.
Having Guts Always Works Out For Me.
| | 07:14 | Thinking Life Is Going To Be Better Is Stupid.
I Have To Live Now.
| | 07:19 | Starting a Charity is Surprisingly Easy.
Being Not Truthful Always Works Against Me.
| | 07:25 | Everything I Do Always Comes Back to Me.
Assuming Is Stifling.
| | 07:29 | Drugs Feel Great In The Beginning
But Do Become A Drag Later On.
| | 07:34 | Over Time I Get Used To Everything
And Start Taking It For Granting.
| | 07:38 | Money Does Not Make Me Happy.
My Dreams Have No Meaning.
| | 07:41 | Keeping a Diary Supports Personal Development.
My Dreams Have No Meaning.
| | 07:53 | Keeping a Diary Supports Personal Development.
Trying to Look Good Limits My Life.
| | 08:00 | Worrying Solves Nothing.
Complaining Is Silly.
| | 08:03 | Either Act or Forget.
Everybody Thinks They Are Right.
| | 08:09 | (music playing)
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