Monday, September 27, 2010

40 years of New York Times Op-Ed Illustration


A great retrospective of illustration from the pages of the New York Times. The Op-Ed page is 40 years old and with it this look back at some of the best political illustration ever done.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Monday, September 13, 2010

Throwing good money after bad

In an earlier post, I had written about the careless re-design of the quarter. I’ve, since, found these interesting pieces of U.S. currency designed by Dowling Duncan merely as an exploration. I think they’re terrific, even though they tend to be a bit like the Swiss notes that were done back in the nineties.

What do you think?


Thursday, September 9, 2010

My talented neighborhood

Recently, my friend and neighbor Kenn Berry invited me into his wife Judy’s floral design studio, Sahana, to see a project that she was working on. It was a series of centerpieces for a young ladie’s Bat Mitzvah. Her assignment was to do something cool with shoes. I was stunned by the creations and struck that when the flowers died, so would these lovely pieces of art. I suggested that we shoot them quickly and do a poster or blurb book. So, Kenn, retired superstar photographer, rigged a make shift seamless set and soon we had the images. A little time in Photoshop and we had some very terrific images. Shortly after that, we had this poster.

But back to my talented neighborhood. In addition to a photographer, Kenn is an expert illustrator of historical objects, specifically WW2 fighters and weaponry. Across the street from Kenn and Judy lives Arie Van Selm, an internationally acclaimed painter and delightful human. His wife Jutta is a professor of languages and equally fascinating. A couple of doors down from Kenn lives Chris Thurman, collector and dealer of extraordinary mid-century modern furniture and objects. And, of course my very talented wife Shari who is a couture quilt designer and blogger extraordinaire. She lives really close to me.

And that’s just what’s going on two houses away from me. Lucky, don’t you think?