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18 Jun 09

Waxin' & Milkin': A Visual Mixtape

waxandmilk.tumblr.com/...ography-poster-by-evan-stremke - Preview

typography diagramación convention design soporte de lectura advise editing

16 Jun 09

untitled

www.miltonglaser.com/...es3.html - Preview

design ethics style guide advise

STYLE IS NOT TO BE TRUSTED.

I think this idea first occurred to me
when I was looking at a marvellous etching of a bull by Picasso. It
was an illustration for a story by Balzac called The Hidden Masterpiece.
I am sure that you all know it. It is a bull that is expressed in 12
different styles going from very naturalistic version of a bull to an
absolutely reductive single line abstraction and everything else along
the way. What is clear just from looking at this single print is that
style is irrelevant. In every one of these cases, from extreme abstraction
to acute naturalism they are extraordinary regardless of the style.
It’s absurd to be loyal to a style. It does not deserve your loyalty.
I must say that for old design professionals it is a problem because
the field is driven by economic consideration more than anything else.
Style change is usually linked to economic factors, as all of you know
who have read Marx. Also fatigue occurs when people see too much of
the same thing too often. So every ten years or so there is a stylistic
shift and things are made to look different. Typefaces go in and out
of style and the visual system shifts a little bit. If you are around
for a long time as a designer, you have an essential problem of what
to do. I mean, after all, you have developed a vocabulary, a form that
is your own. It is one of the ways that you distinguish yourself from
your peers, and establish your identity in the field. How you maintain
your own belief system and preferences becomes a real balancing act.
The question of whether you pursue change or whether you maintain your
own distinct form becomes difficult. We have all seen the work of illustrious
practitioners that suddenly look old-fashioned or, more precisely, belonging
to another moment in time.
Thought changes our life and our behaviour. I also believe
that drawing works in the same way. I am a great advocate of drawing,
not in order to become an illustrator, but because I believe drawing
changes the brain in the same way as the search to create the right
note changes the brain of a violinist. Drawing also makes you attentive.
It makes you pay attention to what you are looking at, which is not
so easy.
4 more annotations...
- Of course we must know the difference between scepticism and cynicism
  because cynicism is as much a restriction of one’s openness to
  the world as passionate belief is.
- And then
  in a very real way, solving any problem is more important than being
  right. There is a significant sense of self-righteousness in both the
  art and design world. Perhaps it begins at school. Art school often
  begins with the Ayn Rand model of the single personality resisting the
  ideas of the surrounding culture. The theory of the avant garde is that
  as an individual you can transform the world, which is true up to a
  point. One of the signs of a damaged ego is absolute certainty.
- Iris Murdoch in her obituary. It read ‘ Love is the extremely
  difficult realisation that something other than oneself is real.
- Everyone interested in licensing our field
  might note that the reason licensing has been invented is to protect
  the public not designers or clients