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Communicate: Independent British Graphic Design since the Sixties
Barbican Gallery, London

Thursday, September 16, 2004

Communicate: Independent British Graphic Design since the Sixties
Barbican Gallery, London
September 16, 2004 – January 23, 2005

Curator: Rick Poynor

Statement: «Think of any iconic image, your favourite album cover, book or magazine and the chances are it will feature in this exhibition.
Communicate charts the emergence of independent British graphic design over the last forty years. It examines graphic designs influence on contemporary culture, publishing and the music industry. Highlighting its use in protest, the ever-increasing significance of the web and the experimental work created by designers who aren’t compromised by working to a commercial client’s brief.
Featuring more than 600 exhibits from album covers for New Order and Primal Scream, identities for BBC 2 and Big Brother, Biba and Paul Smith, magazines including OZ and i-D, posters for CND and the Anti-Nazi League and web sites for The Guardian and Donnie Darko. Communicate celebrates the achievements of designers as diverse as Alan Fletcher, Ken Garland, Michael English, Barney Bubbles, Peter Saville, Neville Brody, The Designer’s Republic, Tomato, Fuel, Intro and Hi-ReS!»

Designers included in the exhibition: Åbäke, Aboud Sodano, Airside, Alan Fletcher, Alan Kitching, Alex Rich, Angus Hyland (Pentagram), Anthony Burrill (Friendchip), Atelier, Aubrey Powell (Hipgnosis), Barney Bubbles, Barry Godber, Ben Drury, Bluesource, Bob Gill, Bob Wilkinson (Sans + Baum), Bryan Haynes, CDT, Central Station Design, Clare White, Colin Forbes, Damon Murray (Fuel), Daniel Brown -, David Bothwell, David Hillman (Pentagram), David King, David Pelham, De-construct, Dennis Bailey, Derek Birdsall, Foundation 33, Geoff White, George Daulby, George Mayhew, Gerald Nason, Graphic Thought Facility, Hamish Muir (8vo), Hapshash and the Coloured Coat (Michael English and Nigel Waymouth), Harri Peccinotti, Herbert Spencer, Hi-Res!, James Goggin, Jamie Reid, Jann Haworth, Jannuzzi Smith, Jock Kinneir, John McConnell (Pentagram), John Sewell, Johnson Banks, Jon Goodchild, Jon Wozencroft, Jonathan Barnbrook, Julian House, Intro, Kate Stephens, Katy Hepburn, Keith Cunningham, Ken Garland, Kerr/Noble, Klaus Voorman, Less Rain, Lucienne Roberts (Sans + Baum), Made Thought -, Malcolm Garrett, Margaret Calvert, Mark Farrow, Mark Holt (8vo), Mark Porter, Martin Sharp, Matt Willey, Me Company, Melvyn Gill, Michael Burke (8vo), Michael Nash Associates, Moira Bogue, Neville Brody, Nicholas de Ville, Nick Bell (UNA), Nigel Grierson, North, Patrick Wallis Burke, Paul Elliman, Paul Stiff, Pearce Marchbank, Peter Blake, Peter Miles (Fuel), Peter Saville, Phil Baines, Raymond Hawkey, Rebecca & Mike, Richard Hollis, Robert Brownjohn, Robert del Naja, Robin Fior, Rod Clark, Roger Law, Romek Marber, Roy Giles, Ruari McLean, Scott King, Simon Esterson, Simon Johnston (8vo), Siobhan Keaney, Spin, State, Stephen Coates, Stephen Hiett, Stephen Male, Stephen Sorrell (Fuel), Storm Thorgerson (Hipgnosis), Stuart Bailey, Studio Myerscough, Stylorouge, Terry Jones, The Chase, The Designers Republic, Thomas Wolsey, Tom Hingston, Tomato, Tony Arefin.

Catalogue of the exhibition: Rick Poynor, ed., Communicate: Independent British Graphic Design Since the Sixties, London: Laurence King Publishing, 2004.

Traveling exhibition.

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Barbican Gallery, London

I Profess: The Graphic Design Manifesto

Friday, July 9, 2004

I Profess: The Graphic Design Manifesto
Scene Metrospace, East Lansing, MI
July 9 – August 15, 2004
and other venues (traveling exhibition), 2004-2007

Curators: Chris Corneal and Maya Drozdz

Juried exhibition, based on the following call for poster entries, addressed to faculty members: «Edward Tufte uses the term ‘self-exemplifying’ to describe something that is, simply, an example of itself. As graphic design educators, we each have a philosophy at the core of our teaching practice.
That philosophy is implicit in our syllabi, our critiques, our grading criteria. But how often is it at the forefront of teaching practice itself? Just this once, design a poster that embodies your teaching philosophy. We ask that you actively engage an audience of students and colleagues in intelligent, provocative dialogue about your most fundamental beliefs regarding graphic design, in its teaching and learning, and in professional practice. Design your manifesto.
The premise of this call for entries is that we, as educators, perceive a need to make explicit the beliefs that [often implicitly] permeate the myriad aspects of our teaching practice. To that end, we are soliciting current college instructors of graphic design to submit posters in response to the theme for possible inclusion in this upcoming exhibit.
The exhibit will showcase a wide range of viewpoints and pedagogical and ideological priorities that will serve as inspiration and as starting points for dialogue among students and faculty. With this exhibit, the curators aim to encourage debate and to provoke the next generation of graphic designers to actively shape the future of our profession.
The work will be exhibited at Michigan State University, and will then travel nationally to several galleries affiliated with schools of art and design. A didactic beside each poster will explain the designer’s intent and further articulate his or her philosophy.
This is a collaborative effort between Chris Corneal, Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at Michigan State University, and Maya Drozdz, Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, MA.»

Selected designers on display: Bob Aufuldish, Audrey Bennett, Timothy Brunner, Audra Buck & Erin Wright, Andrew Byrom, Chris Corneal, Rebecca Davis, Beckham Dossett, Maya Drozdz, Edward Fella, Danielle Foushee, Amy Franceschini, Gary Golightly, Stuart Henley, Daniel Jasper, Esen Karol, Susan Agre-Kippenhan & Mike Kippenhan, Susan LaPorte, Wade Lough, Ljubica Marcetic-Marinovic, Steven McCarthy, Jennifer Morla, Ambica Prakash, Scott Santoro, David Stairs, Mark Thomas, Chris Van Wyck, Wendy Walker, Women’s Design & Research Unit.

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This exhibition is among curated shows discussed in the framework of design authorship in the paper by Steven McCarthy, “Curating as meta-design authorship,” in visual design scholarship, Vol. 2, No. 2, 48-56.

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In the following images, some of the selected posters and installations of the exhibition at Scene Metrospace, East Lansing, and at Autzen Gallery, Portland State University.
Thanks to Chris Corneal for providing documentation of the project.

DSCN2447
DSCN2442
DSCN2431
DSCN2432
DSCN2433
IProfess_Autzen1
IProfess_Autzen2
IProfess_Autzen3
TimothyBrunner
SusanLaporte
StuartHenley
MarkThomas
EsenKarol
DanielJasper2
DanielJasper1
BobAufuldish
BeckhamDossett
AndrewByrom
I_Profess_Scene
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Public Address System

Friday, January 9, 2004

Public Address System
Henry Peacock Gallery, London, UK / January 9 – February 14, 2004
Grafik Europe, Berlin, DE / October 2004

Statement: «Public Address System is a collection of posters by typographers that were featured in an exhibition of the same name in London and Berlin in 2004. The brief was simple: to design an A2 poster that was a typographic interpretation of a speech. The typographers’ responses are awe-inspiring and provoke deep thought about not only the issues addressed by the often famous speeches, but also about the very nature of speech, typography and posters. The featured works are made from all manner of materials, from Perspex, to gold foil, to a collage, including torn book pages and a 7-inch vinyl record. These highly innovative approaches to poster design endorse the importance of typography in visual culture and its power in everyday life; what emerged from the exhibition, above all else, was that far from being dry or retiring, typography arouses passion.»

See also the catalogue of the exhibition.

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Wim Crouwel fonts
Galerie Vivid, Rotterdam

Sunday, March 17, 2002

Wim Crouwel fonts
Galerie Vivid, Rotterdam, NL
March 17 – May 2, 2002

Statement: «An exhibition dedicated to the fonts designed by Dutch designer Wim Crouwel. Wim Crouwel is one of the founders of Dutch design office ‘Total Design’ and he was director of Museum Boijmans van Beuningen in Rotterdam. The exhibition shows the complete alphabets of the typefaces designed by Crouwel [computer cut and mounted on a wall of 13×3 meter].
Together with eight original posters from the collection of the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam the exhibition at VIVID features unique first publications and graphic experiments of Crouwels work. His latest work, VIVIDs own exhibition announcement, will be there too.
The designs of Wim Crouwel are still fresh. It contains the original spirit on which a lot of contemporary design is based. Therefor his work is both inspiring and influential for present and future generations. VIVID wants to demonstrate this creative continuity.
An example is the famous experimental computer font ‘New Alphabet’ (1967), a radical experiment conceived in response to his experience of the first device for electronic typesetting. The characters were designed to follow the underlying dot-matrix system.
‘Gridnik’ (1976) was designed as a single weight typewriter face. A modified version was used for the low-value postage stamps of the PPT, Dutch post office, which feature the stamp value only, displaying the numerals to full effect. The font is named Gridnik because of Crouwels devotion to grids and systems in his work to create visual order. In the 1960s he was often affectionately referred to as ‘Mr Gridnik’ by his friends and contemporaries.»

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Galerie Vivid, Rotterdam

Adversary: a exhibition (of) contesting graphic design

Tuesday, March 13, 2001

int_mac

(Installation view, Old Dominion University gallery, Norfolk, Virginia)

adversary: a exhibition (of) contesting graphic design
Tweed Museum of Art, University of Minnesota Duluth
March 13 – April 8, 2001
and later traveling to other venues

Curator: (exhibition collator) Kenneth FitzGerald
Statement: «adversary presents graphic design that challenges and/or expands common conceptions of design’s purpose, content and process. A primary challenge is to the construction of design as solely a commercial activity – and which promotes the politics of a consumer culture. Print and interactive works directly confront this representation and/or offer alternate forms/contents. The exhibition features design made expressly for the exhibition (printed at the University of Minnesota Duluth’s Visualization and Digital Imaging Lab) along with pre-existing designs from a variety of contexts. The participants cover a range of positions within the field, including professional practitioners, academics and graduate students, to beyond and between.»
Organization/support: «adversary was commissioned by Zero Station, a gallery of contemporary art and design in South Portland Maine. Printing of original artworks was supported by a grant from UMD’s Visualization and Digital Imaging Lab. Additional support was given by the UMD Art Department.»

See also the essay written by FitzGerald providing more details about the exhibition concept and the designers whose work was featured in the show.

(Continued)

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Work from Holland (graphic design in context)
Moravian Gallery, Brno

Wednesday, July 5, 2000

Work from Holland (graphic design in context)
Moravian Gallery, Brno, CZ
July 5 – September 24, 2000
19th International Biennial of Graphic Design Brno

Curator: Peter Bil’ak

Participants: 75b , Boy Bastiaens, De Designpolitie, Dept, Dietwee, Studio Dumbar, Experimental Jetset, Bureau Piet Gerards, Jop van Bennekom, Irma Boom, Studio Boot, Marianne van Ham, Max Kisman, Koeweiden & Postma, SYB (Sybren Kuiper), Letterror, Harmen Liemburg & Richard Niessen, Lust, Martin Majoor, Karel Martens, Maureen Mooren & Daan van der Velden, Mevis&Van Deursen, Roelof Mulder, Robert Nakata, Jan van Toorn, Thonik, Gerard Unger, Mart. Warmerdam.

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Moravian Gallery, Brno

Designer as Author: Voices and Visions

Thursday, February 8, 1996

designer-as-author McCarthy

Designer as Author: Voices (juried show)
Northern Kentucky University, Highland Heights, Kentucky, 1996
February 8 – March 8, 1996

Curators: Steven McCarthy, Cristina de Almeida
Statements: «It is a nationally curated exhibition of exemplary self-authored graphic design […]»
«[…] Our goal was to find out existent avenues for self-authorship in graphic design and to assess how this kind of practice, which has frequently run in parallel to mainstream graphic design, is currently taking place. We were looking for projects in which designers were involved as thoroughly with literal content as they were with visual form. This involvement could consist of either the origination of verbal/visual content or of close collaboration with writers. We were also looking for writers/editors that were using type in ways that amplify meaning, add a commentary, or simply help to complement their writing. Self-originated projects are not new among graphic designers. Ventures on this area abound in variety […]. For many years now, graduate work has also become an especially fertile arena for authorial experiments in design. Many are the motivations that can bring graphic designers to self-initiate their own projects. For some it means the opportunity to use their skills and modes of expression to locate questions as well as to investigate solutions. It can also mean an opportunity for interdisciplinary endeavors allowing them to openly address their personal ideologies into the process of generating visible messages. As the design profession is increasingly challgnged by technological developments and deep transformations in work relations, the pervasive presence outside academia of graphic designers as facilitators of their own agendas can be seen as an indicator of visible avenues for the practice […]. At the same time, increased involvement in content making through mutual cooperation with specialists of other disciplines is enriching the whole design experience in unexpected ways. Endeavors in the borders of the field, exploring overlapping concerns between design and language, literature, philosophy or history, seems to be contributing to expand the field […]
This show does not intend do exhaust the subject of authorship in design or even trace delimitations. This was an attempt at pointing towards possible directions for authorship in design through what is believed to be a comprehensive display of this kind of work. More than a specific genre or style, authorship takes place whenever the individual voice/vision of the designer is considered a crucial part of the semantic process. […]» (Cristina de Almeida, in “Re:Port for Exhibition”, exhibition leaflet)

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The exhibition’s call for submission is also mentioned in Michael Rock’s well-known essay “Designer as author”, Eye, Number 20, Spring 1996.

Additional information about this exhibition and further discussion of McCarthy’s notion of graphic design authorship as well as of curating as meta design-authorship can be found in essays written and co-authored by McCarthy himself:

– Steven McCarthy, “Curating as meta design-authorship”, Visual: Design: Scholarship – Research Journal of the Australian Graphic Design Association, Volume 2, Number 2, 2006, 48-56
– Steven McCarthy, “Designer-Authored Histories: Graphic Design at the Goldstein Museum of Design”, Design Issues, Volume 27, Number 1, Winter 2011, 7-20
– Cristina de Almeida & Steven McCarthy, “Designer as Author: Diffusion or Differentiation?”, paper, DECLARATIONS of [inter]dependence and the im[media]cy of design international symposium, Concordia University, Montréal, 2002

See also McCarthy’s recent book The Designer As…: Author, Producer, Activist, Entrepeneur, Curator, and Collaborator: New Models for Communicating: Author, Producer, Activist, … collaborator: New Models for communicating (BIS Publishers, 2013).

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