PA Spotlight: Keith Haring *Updated

My hometown of Reading, Pennsylvania isn’t home to many famous art types but we can boast of a few. One of those few is Keith Haring, an artist and social activist whose work responded to the street culture of New York City in the 1980′s. Keith studied at the Ivy School of Professional Art in Pittsburgh before moving to New York City where he was inspired by graffiti. He first received recognition through his chalk drawings in the subways using bold lines and vivid colors. They were usually of active figures with strong messages about life and unity, a rising theme in the 80′s. Around 1982 he began forming a high-society social circle including Madonna,…

Memoriam

Canada Type has released Memoriam, originally designed for the New York Times in a tribute issue and now it can be all yours over at myfonts.com. The Memoriam typeface contains a lot of alternates for most characters, so it was divided into three separate fonts for the Postscript and True Type formats. The OpenType version, Memoriam Pro, combines all three fonts in one OT-programmed file, and even contains a few more extras that are not in the legacy format sets — so if you InDesign CS+, Illustrator CS+ or QuarkXpress 7+, Memoriam Pro is the one you want. The talented folks over at Canada Type warn/suggest that you only use Memoriam as a display face,…

Est

This packaging is just gorgeous and thanks to Daily Candy for their consistent emails or else I may have never known about this product. Est is an environmentally-friendly natural soap made in Brazil and are known for their ultra-hydrating effects that leave your skin touchably soft. Can anyone give me a hint as to who designed the packaging? Anyone? Was it an in-house job? Google was no help in finding any information on the designer responsible but if you want a bar of your very own, LAMA is the sole distributor of the fine looking product. And soap bars is not their only product.

Barnumville

Wow is all I can manage to say after seeing these images by Matt Hoyle. This is the kind of circus that I want to see, real characters, real interesting. Barnumville is a collection of intimate portraits of the artists that belong to the circus life by Matt Hoyle who has a proven track record for producing portraits of rich characters and intriguing faces. Do not miss out on this portfolio!

Joe’s Thoughts on IE6

Ha! I got a good laugh out of these confrontational pages for Internet Explorer 6 users by Joe Lifrieri. Take a gander and feel free to laugh out loud as I did. Oh, if you don’t like foul language, DO NOT view these because you probably won’t like them strictly for that reason.

Find Your Niche

I saw a small clip of Clark Little’s photography on NotCot.org and after clicking my breath was taken away. This is a perfect example of finding your niche and working hard at it. Clark puts himself in the right place at the right time and produces amazing images of waves. He has managed to freeze time with his images and many could fool you as being sculptures. On his website you will find over 100 quality images that display the perfection of his craft and I shall name him “The Wave Photographer”. I enjoy the power and beauty of the thick bombs that roll through. Now I can capture some of those heavy moments without…

Design in any economy

Design in any economy should be well, economical. Of course if your client demands elaborate pieces then that is the exception. Pushing any budget is half the battle when it comes to any design and Because Studio got it right for SewSew. Using a custom made rubber stamp, the client has a DIY stationery system and easy to apply stickers for labeling and packaging accompanied by a simple website to display their collection and links to online retailers. This isn’t your typical million dollar company but they have a cohesive identity system that can be easily carried out. This is what I’ve been trying to stress to many of my clients all along and Because…

How Original Can We Really Be?

Original: new: completely new and not copied or derived from something else Designers want to be unique, want to create outstanding designs that are admired by clients and peers. Isn’t the goal of drawing out creativity to draw out something original? We want to explore the new, and be groundbreaking artists. Even our bravest attempts at being original may not be good enough I always wonder if this happens with my work, where did the idea come from? Maybe it’s because from browsing so many visuals in my spare time that something I’ve designed is pleasing only because I’ve mystically recalled it from something I’ve seen. It may not be identical but it may be…

Audi Gets Type

Audi, the german auto manufacture has been showing off a new typeface Audi Type a change from it’s previous typeface Audi Sans. No, they didn’t go hogwild and abandon the sans for for a serif, but they made a subtle change with a big impact. The foundation, or may we call it the “chassis”, is preserved – character width, grey value, metrics – while the bodywork was refined. And this is very elegant, away from the static towards the dynamic, the high-quality. The face, was built by Paul van der Laan and Pieter van Rosmalen. Read more about the redesign on Font Feed.

Rynke Sangers

Rynke is a graphic designer/illustrator/artist based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Her work on Studio Helmich was just too nice to not write about. I love her handwritten projects and the printing method close-ups of them in her portfolio. Nice stuff! Her site is filled with her work and don’t miss her sleek design work listed under books which derails from the majority of her work. Well done!