I first learned about The Institute for the Future of the Book while working on a magazine assignment that eventually became this piece for The Millions. In getting to know Bob Stein, his colleagues and the projects they championed I became convinced that concerns about the death of reading and writing were deeply misplaced. What [...]

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In the summer of 2009, the venerable Printed Matter in New York City exhibited “Hungry for Death,” a riot of ephemeral kitsch propaganda created by the Ann Arbor, Michigan, band Destroy All Monsters. I made several visits to the show, interested in how the founding members ? Jim Shaw, Mike Kelley, Cary Loren, Niagra ? [...]

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You’re reading this, so on some level you consider yourself a visual person. On sublime spring afternoons, you sit through long, foreign films; when out to dinner you comment on the design of restaurant menus; you critique the composition of stupid cell phone ads; you make sure your socks always match your suspenders. Me too [...]

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As a student at Central Saint Martins in London, Rana Abou Rjeily devised the font family Mirsaal, which comprises Arabic and Latin alphabets that work together in typographic harmony. Growing up in Lebanon speaking Arabic, French and English, she found Arabic, her first language, the hardest of the three to learn. In her design classes [...]

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On September 14, 1722, Diron d'Artaguiette, inspector general of Louisiana at the time, wrote in his journal, “We are working hard here to repair the damage which the hurricane has caused.” Two days earlier, a hurricane had ravaged the city. Like with any event that attracts the media, Hurricane Katrina dominated our attention as the [...]

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As a topic, “process” is arguably more popular than ever. There are countless books about artists’ sketchbooks and studios; more than one book exists that is dedicated just to Francis Bacon’s studio. But a distinctive artistic vision cannot be taught in a classroom or learned from a book, though it certainly can be honed, refrained [...]

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Damon Murray and Stephen Sorrell comprise the brain trust that is FUEL. As a design house, they have worked for Virgin Records, Diesel, Penguin, and even created the title typography for Lost In Translation. As publishers, they craft bold and informative illustrated books that, on every level, are a pleasure to read. Best known for [...]

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I can’t take credit for “discovering” Noma Bar’s work, but I will take credit for instigating his two books that exposed him to a wider audience. By the time he pitched his first book, Guess Who?, Bar had already worked for high-profile UK clients like The Guardian and Penguin, but since then his work has [...]

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Google “graphic design annuals” and up pops a list of design-related magazines (with Print and How high atop the list), publishers, organizations, and online outlets that sponsor competitions for the year’s best design, divvied up into all sorts of categories and classifications, from regional and age-related rubrics to various disciplines: posters, books, book covers, packaging, [...]

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“Mike, here’s where we are in the scheme of things.” This scrawled message, found in From Here to There, accompanies a hand-drawn map that pinpoints Mike’s final destination of 20 Princess Street. What this map also tells us is that we are in Australia, south Australia, Adelaide to be precise. From a sketch of the [...]

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