Blog | Print Magazine

Feb 20, 2019
2 min

Sagmeister & Walsh and the Eye of the Beholder

Last fall, the renowned design team of Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Walsh published their treatise “Beauty” from Phaidon Books. Their premise is that beauty as a concept has been replaced by practicality. According to the authors, Bauhaus, the modernist creed of the grid, functionality, and analytical theory celebrating its 100th anniversary this year, has replaced aesthetics. As noted within, the term today is rarely mentioned in contemporary books on architecture and desig

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Nov 5, 2018
3 min

POZ Takes On the World!

I’ve worked with Peter O. Zierlein as an art director at PRINT and The Nation, where his quirky, conceptually based illustrations never failed to delight. His editorial art has also graced the pages of the NY Times, The Washington Post, Berliner Zeitung, The Boston Globe and myriad others. Over time Peter, who signs his work POZ, has moved onto the streets and into the third dimension, with street installations, many centered in his current state of Massachusetts. Most recent

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Oct 9, 2018
3 min

The Underground Press: Graphics of Outrage, Protest, and Provocation

Way back in the 20th Century, back before one small, viral meme could have more impact and influence than tons of Times op-eds, newspapers still mattered. But it was also a time of severely limited access to communication outlets. As A.J. Liebling noted: “Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” Yet, during the youth counterculture movement from a half-century ago, presses were a pivotal part of bestowing power to the people. And as a reminder of that by

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Jul 6, 2018
3 min

Comics Speak Out

Thankfully firmly rooted in the past, there was a time when serious subjects were antithetical to comic books. All this appeared to change when Maus, Art Spiegelman’s tale of his father’s experiences as a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor, told with animals, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1992, the first graphic novel to do so. Spiegelman had begun publishing these stories in his magazine RAW, back in 1980. Thanks to the newly published We Spoke Out from Yoe Books, we now know th

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May 28, 2018
4 min

Beyond Black Panther: A Celebration of Black Comix Creators

Black Panther the movie has just been released on 4K Ultra HD. Marvel’s new Black Panther: World of Wakanda spin-off series from Marvel just scored this year’s GLAAD Media Outstanding Comic Book Award. And here in real life, multitudes of conventions and exhibitions nationwide are honoring the talents and accomplishments of black comics creators. If you attended the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s BAM Black Comix Expo, the Black Comic Book Festival at Harlem’s Schomburg Center, a

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Feb 22, 2018
2 min

Blazo Kovacevic is Incited

Early-bird pricing for HOW Design Live ends March 15. Register now for your best price. If one were to list the most important social topics facing those of us in the U.S., immigration and surveillance would certainly top the list. As these debates continue to heat up, artists have responded in kind. One such artist is designer Blazo Kovacevic, himself an immigrant from Podgorica, Montenegro, and a professor of art and design at Binghamton University (SUNY). Since 2007 he has

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Dec 31, 2017
10 min

Illustration History Gets the Care and Attention It Deserves

Ten years ago, Rick Poynor pointed out in Print that “One thing illustration has always lacked, compared to graphic design, is a strong critical framework by which to assess it.” He went on to note that, “Apart from Steven Heller … one would be hard pressed to name a single highly active writer, an expert, primarily identified with illustration as a subject.” Well, all that’s about to change, in a major way. Enter the Douglas B. Dowd Modern Graphic History Library. Mac Conner

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Dec 20, 2017
5 min

A Site in A Nite?

A site in a nite? Is it possible? It was a super-tempting offer: The email read: “At this hands-on workshop, we’ll teach you how to use the Squarespace platform to build the functional, beautiful, easy-to-update website you’ve always wanted. Squarespace is a website platform and hosting service that offers beautiful modern aesthetics with easy HTML-based editing and loads of tools to help you with marketing, e-commerce, shipping, and so much more, at a super-affordable cost a

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Dec 14, 2017
4 min

Academic Freedom is Not Black and White

Clashes over the limits of academic freedom and political correctness in the educational sphere have triggered generational debates. Is unconditional free speech guaranteed on campus? And what is the definition of free speech? The American historian Richard Hofstader and my uncle, Walter P. Metzger, traced this essential liberty in The Development of Academic Freedom in the United States (Columbia University Press, December 1955). In 1956 Henry Veatch wrote in his Indiana Mag

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Sep 15, 2017
4 min

Arlen Schumer’s VisuaLectures: Where Comics Scholarship Meets Design Showmanship

[Call for Entries: The International Design Awards] One big factor that sets apart Arlen Schumer’s presentations on comics from the others is his acute understanding of graphic design. His delivery—like the superhero stories he’s discussing—is a dynamic synergy of words and images, of form and function. Mix that together with a heaping helping of contemporary “more is more” postmodernism—more on that in a minute—and voila: “VisuaLectures.” The view from the audience as Arlen

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Jul 15, 2017
2 min

A Brief History of the Color Wheel

The following is an excerpt from one of the newest HOWU courses: Color Theory for Designers led by Rachel Olson. Learn how to make wise color decisions for your future design projects. Gain a better understanding of color and how to apply color that will take your design projects to the next level. The Basics of Color: History of the Color Wheel Artists invented the first pigments – a combination of soil, animal fat, burnt charcoal, and chalk – as early as 40,000 years ago, c

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Jun 15, 2017
2 min

Old School/New School: Dr. Dre, Jimmy Iovine & USC Create New Masters Program

Rap mogul Dr. Dre is now a professor, and you can be one of his students. The University of Southern California (USC) has just created a revolutionary and first-of-its-kind cross-disciplinary master’s program with the help of record producer Jimmy Iovine and Andre “Dr. Dre” Young. Founded as a gift from the two entrepreneurs, the USC Jimmy Iovine and Andre Young Academy for the Arts, Technology and the Business of Innovation was created to teach “critical thinking and nurture

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Jun 2, 2017
11 min

Exploring Project Neverland: Playfulness and the Creative Art Process

“I won’t grow up. I don’t want to go to school, just to learn to be a parrot and recite a silly rule.” Graphic designers, creative souls whose livelihoods depend on maintaining a youthful, unfettered imagination, can relate to this song from the 1954 Peter Pan musical starring Mary Martin. Even grumpy old Paul Rand, with all his silly Modernist rules, recognized the value of child’s play. And “Project Neverland,” an art exhibition currently at Burbank’s Center Stage Gallery,

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May 31, 2017
2 min

Inside The New School’s Parsons School for Design’s New State-of-the-Art Computer Lab

Special Advertising Note: The following sponsored content is brought to you courtesy of LG, one of PRINT’s trusted partners. Today’s growing and shifting design industry—combined with a boom in digital innovation—has resulted in a burgeoning market for technology tailored to the needs of creative professionals. It can be a challenge, however, for schools to acquire the latest tech to empower its students to do their best work. Larger, higher-performance monitors, for example,

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Mar 6, 2017
7 min

Will Eisner and the Century of Comics as Art

Cartoonist Will Eisner was such a life force that it’s difficult to believe that he’s not with us to celebrate his 100th birthday on March 6th. For seven decades, he was vitally instrumental in creating and shaping the comic book form, in elevating the quality of its writing and art, in revealing and expanding its graphic potential, in popularizing its respectability on a global scale, and in educating and inspiring generations of aspiring comics artists. And yet he died in e

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Sep 30, 2016
7 min

University Blues: The Challenges of Crafting Identities for Higher Education

Editor’s Note: The following article by Sagi Haviv builds on his HOW Design Live 2016 keynote, which addressed the trials he and other designers face when faced when crafting new identity designs for beloved brands. In this blog series, Sagi Haviv discusses principles of identity design as they manifest in trademarks created by his firm, Chermayeff & Geismar & Haviv. As identity designers, we have avoided focusing on any single industry or type of organization. This keeps it

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Aug 15, 2016
2 min

Election Panic! Political Cartoons from American History

Print magazine has been offering insights and analysis from the design world’s greatest minds for more than 75 years. Subscribe today to experience it all year. As we are in the midst of what appears to be the most divisive—and, frankly, frightening—presidential election in recent times, perhaps we can find solace in the fact that throughout our history, many of the same issues that appear so current actually have their roots decades prior. Indeed, the issues of immigration,

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Jun 30, 2016
11 min

20 Designers, More Than 1600 Years of Inspirational Wisdom

Certain cultures honor and respect its elders for their knowledge and experience. The graphic designer tribe, not so much. What’s new, what’s hot, what’s trending: on it! Regardless, we now have 20 Over 80: Conversations on a Lifetime in Architecture and Design. 20 Over 80 is a collection of new and original interviews with twenty of the most successful and acclaimed post-80 seniors in the visual arts, most of whom continue to be significant movers and shakers, a couple of wh

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Feb 11, 2016
3 min

How the Oxford Rule Led to Rolling Stone

The Oxford rule sounds like article of law, but in reality it is something more mundane: a thick and thin line that sits side by side. Still, this fairly innocuous device has its origins in the earliest printings in recorded history. As far back as c. 950 A.D., a Chinese woodblock illustration of Manjusri—the Buddhist personification of supreme wisdom—is contained within such a border. In 1249, in a woodblock book on Chinese herbal medicine, the ruled lines bring order to the

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Feb 5, 2016
9 min

When Designers Push Printing Presses: An Exhibition

Graphic designers tend to be a tactile bunch. As we spend ever more of our workdays interfacing with plastic screens, the experience of caressing textured, letterpressed, and embossed papers becomes even more precious and valuable. Conversely, the thought of visiting a museum, with all of its glass-encased objects and hovering guards, loses a bit of its appeal. But in the A+D Architecture and Design Museum’s latest show in downtown Los Angeles, touching everything is not only

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Sagmeister & Walsh and the Eye of the Beholder

POZ Takes On the World!

The Underground Press: Graphics of Outrage, Protest, and Provocation

Comics Speak Out

Beyond Black Panther: A Celebration of Black Comix Creators

Blazo Kovacevic is Incited

Illustration History Gets the Care and Attention It Deserves

A Site in A Nite?

Academic Freedom is Not Black and White

Arlen Schumer’s VisuaLectures: Where Comics Scholarship Meets Design Showmanship

A Brief History of the Color Wheel

Old School/New School: Dr. Dre, Jimmy Iovine & USC Create New Masters Program

Exploring Project Neverland: Playfulness and the Creative Art Process

Inside The New School’s Parsons School for Design’s New State-of-the-Art Computer Lab

Will Eisner and the Century of Comics as Art

University Blues: The Challenges of Crafting Identities for Higher Education

Election Panic! Political Cartoons from American History

20 Designers, More Than 1600 Years of Inspirational Wisdom

How the Oxford Rule Led to Rolling Stone

When Designers Push Printing Presses: An Exhibition

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