Artist Talk: Michael Bierut in Conversation with Steven Heller

Wednesday, October 14, 2015, SVA Theatre

Although having been to a networking event previously, “Everything is design, the work of Paul Rand”, I could not afford to miss the opportunity of attending the talk between Michael Bierut.

 

Michael Bierut is a famous graphic designer in the creative world. He is well known for his very clever corporate designs that we see everyday.  “Bierut has won hundreds of design awards and his work is represented in the permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.”

I have actually never heard of Michael Bierut before attending this event, however I was familiar with his work.  During the talk, Bierut spoke about his early life leading up to his early career until now. It was very interesting and a great learning experience to hear about such a great designer and the steps he took to get to where he is at now.

One of my favorite pieces he spoke about that related to me most was the design of the Saks fifth Ave bag. Since I am interested in working in the fashion industry, this was very relatable to me. He described his concept for this design as seeking something new and fresh. So then he decided to clean up the exciting logo and take the constituent parts of it and make something new out of it without inventing anything new at all. Absolutely loved the simplicity of it and how it lends itself to both new and old, but still unique. Brilliant!

 

It was amazing to see his process of creating designs that would be timeless. After all, isn’t that every graphic designers’ intentions?

The takeaway from this networking event: Mentors are important. It was also very interesting to hear about his experience of working with Massimo Vinelli, who was like a mentor to him. This showed me how important it was for us as graphic designer students to have mentors so they can share their knowledge and help in any direction whether with design or business.  Also, there were a lot of SVA students at this event which I was able to switch business cards with after the talk at the book signing.

You can stream the full talk here: http://www.sva.edu/feed-item/michael-bierut-in-conversation-with-steven-heller-live-stream-10-14