David Stairs
A Profession, of sorts
I’ve never been a joiner. When I was eleven years old I signed up for the Boy Scouts. All my friends were in Scouts. It was the thing to do in those days…. Continue Reading →
Jonathon Russell
My experience in the United Arab Emirates started with a trip to visit my in-laws in Dubai for spring break in 2003. It was a fun trip with my wife and our 7-month old daughter Emma and included visits to 3 of the 7 emirates,… Continue Reading →
by Victor Margolin
Anyone with doubts about Barak Obama’s ability to lead the United States should look at how he has run his campaign. Whereas John McCain’s considerably smaller organization has imploded more than once and is now in the process of self-destructing – riven with accusations and recriminations from within – Obama’s army of workers continues to bring out overwhelming numbers of supporters in states with a long history of delivering electoral college votes for the opposing party…. Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
Most anthropologists would agree that the number of languages in the world is declining. This is particularly true for those spoken by small communities that over the years have either dwindled to a few survivors or become extinct. While it is common for languages spoken by large groups to overwhelm those spoken by smaller ones,… Continue Reading →
Since June, Wang Jing in Nanjing and AGI member Robert Appleton in Toronto have been working on an international exhibition of design, art and music to benefit the survivors of the Sichuan earthquake. It opens in Nanjing this Sunday for one week only…. Continue Reading →
Catherine Jo Ishino
Hong Kong and PRC Design from the Reform Era (ca.1978)
In the next two sections, I will explore how China’s marketplace, citizenry, and identity have begun to transform with its entry into the overarching globalization narrative that has been taking place since the last part of the 20th century…. Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
One of the most privileged populations in America today is dolls. They are the beneficiaries of powerful forces of consumption that seek ever-new audiences for the plethora of goods that is available for sale. In earlier times, dolls were not thought to be such active participants in the consumption process…. Continue Reading →
Jesse Miller
Outside “Casa Rosenda” Monterrey, Mexico
The Architectural Masters Thesis. High expectations and the culmination of one’s educational career are commonly used to describe this thing that looms as the end of graduate school approaches…. Continue Reading →
David Stairs
Ezio Manzini is an optimist. Four years ago he envisioned a design conference dedicated to the notion that although things must, will, and do change, perhaps we ought to spend more time planning that evolution. This vision was realized last week at the Changing the Change conference held in the World Design Capital at Torino’s Institute of Biotechnology,… Continue Reading →
Catherine Jo Ishino
Min Wang, 2008 Beijing Olympic events poster
Until recently, a positive view on the state of modern Chinese graphic design was difficult to find in the Western trade press. Hong Kong, under the rule of the British Empire up until 1997,… Continue Reading →
David Stairs
Ball State Visual Communications student Kat Townsend documenting a hand-painted sign on a condemned house in Flint, Michigan. Photo by Laura Huffman.
Winning and losing: the dichotomy is endemic to the American way of life. From Vegas to American Idol,4 from athletic wagers to Dancing With the Stars,… Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
I live in a densely-populated downtown Chicago neighborhood. When I moved to the neighborhood six years ago, there was a small local video store within easy walking distance and a large CD emporium, Tower Records, not much farther away…. Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
Not long ago I received a letter from a friend inviting me to review an article for a journal he edits. However, it was a form letter that was sent automatically through the complex reviewing system the journal publisher has set up…. Continue Reading →
Designers Without Borders is the only non-profit organization in the world specifically dedicated to enhancing development through communication design education. We have long supported improved technological access for people in the developing world. DWB spent academic 2006-2007 working with hundreds of African students,… Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
Second Life is an online “consensual hallucination” that now involves more than one million players around the globe. It is a visual environment in which players choose virtual avatars or personas to represent them. These avatars carry on a virtual life,… Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
In the State of Michigan and almost twenty other states, it is legal to fire employees for smoking and even to penalize them financially if their insured spouses smoke or chew tobacco. The Weyco Company, a subsidiary of Meritain Health Michigan,… Continue Reading →
Victor Margolin
Throughout history, people of privilege have always believed that they could live as they liked. Whether Emperor Augustus, Louis XIV, or the CEO of a successful dot,com, wealthy folks have viewed the world as a source of goods and services to which they were entitled either by virtue of asymmetric power,… Continue Reading →
Fred Quillin
It’s impossible for me to tell students to “stop playing around on the computer with Photoshop” and get back to their note taking. As I walked into the classroom recently, my class was busy quietly taking notes for the other professor and one student stood up to ask me a question about Photoshop…. Continue Reading →
Fred Quillin
So the director of the FDNC, Justin Silbaugh, is American and had some friends come in for a visit recently from San Fransisco and L.A. I had heard of how one of them works for Sony and does motion graphics for movies such as the Spiderman movies and I was excited to talk to whoever that guy was…. Continue Reading →
Fred Quillin
The most wonderful aspect about the medium of Printmaking is that, unlike most other fine art mediums, it’s a community act, for the most part. Painters own their own brushes and paint. Sculptors own their own clay. Digital artists own their own computer workstations…. Continue Reading →
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