So iconic of the city that I was constantly inundated with its presence on a trip to New York last year.
Not surprisingly I was intrigued to find out the thinking behind it.
After a few days sightseeing in this amazing city, I attended a one day conference set up for art, design and graphic design students from all over the UK. It was Held at the The Parsons School of Design in New York, a pioneer in design education since 1896. Considered the leading place for design innovation, the conference included presentations from design legends. The two in particular that I found most inspiring were Milton Glaser and Bob Gill. Both creative veterans have been a major influence and impact on contemporary illustration and graphic design. Glaser's work is characterized by directness, simplicity and originality, executed mainly through book jackets, album covers, advertisements and direct mail pieces and magazine illustrations.
Similarly Bob also worked in magazine illustration but then went on to teach. Amidst his ongoing graphic design projects he managed to publish some inspirational material including:
Forget all the rules you ever learned about graphic design. Including the ones in this book. was published in 1981.
It became required reading in many design classes in the United States and Europe. The title and the chapter headings reveal a lot about Gill's ideas about design: "The problem is the problem," "Interesting words need boring graphics," "Think first, then draw," " Boring words need interesting graphics," "Less is more," and "More is more".
It was really interesting to see how two of America's most renowned graphic designers had such an audacious approach. In the Q&A session, a student asked Glaser how he came up with the idea of the I love NY logo....
His response.. a quick scribble on a tissue in the back of a taxi, and extraordinarily I found out that Gill was once told he shouldn't be a graphic designer, perhaps a photographer instead.
Fine examples of my belief that designers are born not made.
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