Visual Arts Briefs

Cheryl Heller, chair of the newly formed MFA Design for Social Innovation Department, is featured in a recent Huffington Post article that discusses the progressive evolution of design thinking. The pioneering program, which begins in September 2012, is identified in the article as evidence of a burgeoning demand to incorporate “positive social (and environmental) outcomes to the design process.”

“[The program] was developed by Cheryl Heller, who helped Seventh Generation [a company that pioneered the concept of product design as a proponent of social innovation] with some of its toughest design challenges and convinced me that this new discipline at SVA was one I should lend a hand to as an advisor,” writer and Seventh Generation Co-founder Jeffrey Hollender said.

He adds that design for social innovation can act as a counterforce to disheartening recent “news about Europe’s impending disintegration, poverty statistics in America…and worse than expected contamination from the Fukushima nuclear reactor in Japan.”

Heller is also featured in GOOD’s business blog as the second social enterprise leader to be interviewed for a new video series, One Minute Until Impact.

For an interview with Heller about MFA Design for Social Innovation, which is accepting applications for Fall 2012 until January 30, visit Pop!Tech.

Current MFA Design students Lizzy Showman and Kathleen Fitzgerald have created an ideal gift for NYC bus drivers—a customized seat cushion. A video of the students handing out the padded presents to unsuspecting drivers on the M15 line, which runs from East Harlem to South Ferry in Manhattan, was recently featured on CNN iReport and has been making the rounds online. The project, entitled I Heart M15, was conceived by the up-and-coming designers for faculty member Stefan Sagmeister’s course “Can Design Touch Someone’s Heart?”

“Not only is the M15 line the second busiest in the nation, it is also a big part of our own daily commute,” Showman said. “Witnessing the long hours and sometimes hectic atmosphere the M15 bus drivers experience is part of the reason we connected with the bus line and decided to do something to show our appreciation.”

Members of the SVA community were invited to participate in a recent Lands’ End launch party for the clothing brand’s Spring/Summer 2012 Canvas collection. With a soundtrack provided by Boston pop rockers The Wandas inside the walls of the Highline Stages in New York City’s Meatpacking District, MFA Illustration as Visual Essay Department faculty member Carl Titolo, alumnus Daniel Fishel (MFA 2011 Illustration as Visual Essay), and current MFA Illustration as Visual Essay students Keith Negley, John Malta and Cecilia Ruiz captivated the fashion-forward crowd with live painting on one of the walls of the giant space. For highlights from the event and more photos, visit District L or Tineey.

Photo courtesy of Tineey.

2011 was a milestone for Art Basel Miami Beach as the world’s most watched art fair celebrated its 10th anniversary, and SVA alumni and faculty were well represented there. In terms of sheer numbers and attention-grabbing work, this was a banner year for women artists. One of the most popular booths on the Convention Center floor was Miami’s David Castillo Gallery, where a new video by Kate Gilmore (MFA 2002 Fine Arts) attracted a crowd. Buster has Gilmore smashing 200 paint-filled ceramic vessels, which flood the set with purple drips, pools and spatters.

Over at Salon 94, the booth was aglow with gold floor-to-ceiling architectural prints by alumnus Lorna Simpson (BFA 1982 Photography) and a shimmering new painting by Marilyn Minter (faculty member, MFA Fine Arts Department). Across the convention center floor at Galerie Lelong, another showstopper was MFA Fine Arts Department faculty member Petah Coyne’s untitled chandelier made from taxidermy birds and candles—one of those “you have to see it to believe it” works that rewards fairgoers of all stripes.

Striking a more somber note were twin portraits of George Harrison by Elizabeth Peyton (BFA 1987 Fine Arts) at Gavin Brown; a large black-and-white painting by Katherine Bernhardt (MFA 2000 Fine Arts) at CANADA; a pitch-black mirror painting by Liz Deschenes (faculty member, MFA Photography, Video and Related Media Department) at Miguel Abreu; and recent photography by Justine Kurland (BFA 1996 Photography) at Mitchell-Innes & Nash.

SVA also exhibited a selection of work by eight recent alumni at Aqua Art Miami; click here for details.

For more images from Art Basel Miami Beach, or to post photos from your art viewing in Miami, visit SVA’s Facebook page.

Images: (top) Kate Gilmore, Buster, 2011 video still, HD video; (bottom) works by Marilyn Minter (left) and Lorna Simpson (background) at Art Basel Miami Beach.

SVA and NYU are teaming up for Found in Translation: A Typo-Philharmonic Conference, a one-night-only performance and panel discussion featuring top designers, composers and musicians (Thursday, November 17, 6pm at the SVA Theatre, 333 West 23 Street, New York City). Presented by SVA’s BFA Advertising and Graphic Design Department, the conference sprouted from an assignment in faculty member Olga Mezhibovskaya’s Typography class Visual Music, in which students translated pieces of music into typographic compositions. For “Found in Translation,” a selection of these compositions will be performed by the New York University New Music Ensemble, led by Dr. Esther Lamneck, director of Instrumental Studies and of the Graduate Music Program in Italy for NYU. Joining the panel discussion afterward will be Mezhibovskaya and Lamneck, as well as musicologist and composer Theresa Sauer, motion graphics expert Jakob Trollbäck, and designer and writer Gail Anderson (BFA 1984 Graphic Design). For more information about this event, visit the Found in Translation Web site.

Director Graham Elliott (BFA Advertising and Graphic Design Department faculty member) captures the energy and drive of individuals involved in the motion graphics industry with his new documentary New York in Motion. Fifty interviews with industry bigwigs, including executives from TV networks and top studios, portray the evolution of motion graphics, its current state and its potential for future development. The Briefs caught up with Elliott via email to discuss the project.

Why did you choose this project? What was your goal going into it?
I teach a motion graphics portfolio class at SVA and I realized the discipline had gotten rather murky as to what exactly it was and what was out there for the students. I went to Richard Wilde, the chair of the BFA Advertising and Graphic Design Department. I asked if I could get his and SVA’s backing to make a short documentary about the field and the practitioners. He was very enthusiastic, and President David Rhodes also gave his backing as executive producer.

How did you select who to interview? Did you discover anything new through the interviews?
I asked my students to look up who was doing the best, most innovative work. I also asked Matt Lambert from Motionographer for his selections, and I threw in my faves. We ended up with a list of 52 designers, studios and networks. I emailed them, and 50 replied with full support and enthusiasm. Incidentally the film was originally going to be a web-based, 12-minute piece. I ended up shooting more than 100 hours. The rough cut was three-and-a-half hours.

How do you think this documentary will impact the audience’s understanding of motion graphics?
That’s a great question, and I think it is the biggest revelation I discovered. A quote from the film by Charlie No (BFA 2004 Advertising and Graphic Design), an SVA alum and owner of Alien Kung Fu studios—“My mother doesn’t even know what I do.” I thought the film would be embraced by the design community but didn’t realize that the general public would be so interested in the topic. Putting faces behind the work really brings the field to life. I was recently talking to the New York Center for an Urban Future about proposing the city put some backing behind the industry as it does with sports and fashion. Think “Fashion Week.” Why not a “Motion Graphics Week”? The field is growing every day as the ubiquity of all the delivery mechanisms grows and grows. The explosion of iPods, iPads, giant [TV] screens and the global reach of the Internet is making motion design an essential part of a designer’s repertoire. The fact the film got into the biggest documentary festival in the world [International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam] shows there is a great interest in the subject, even outside of the motion graphics and design industry.

What are some of your upcoming projects to look out for?
I am pitching the idea of The World in Motion as a TV series or short film series, an exposé into the global effect of the industry…I am also interested in resurrecting a project that I think I was too close to when I made it 10 years ago for it to reach its full potential, the documentary Greyhound to Cuba, about life in the back streets of a country in exile. I am also teaching a new motion portfolio class next fall called New York in Motion…The students will be immersed in the industry practices and standards.

Watch the trailer for New York in Motion below.

The popular podcast interview series Design Matters, hosted by MPS Branding Department Chair Debbie Millman, was named the winner of the 2011 People’s Design Award at the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum’s 12th Annual National Design Awards gala on October 20.

“Design Matters began in February of 2005 with an idea and a telephone line,” Millman said. “I thought it would be a great way to ask my heroes everything I wanted to know about their lives and their thoughts and their careers without seeming stalker-y…I realized the opportunity to share the brilliance of my guests with an audience I never expected was the gift of a lifetime.”

To clinch the People’s Choice Award, thousands of votes were cast for Design Matters, which edged out nominees including the High Line, the iPad2 and WordPress software.

“Design Matters harnesses the power of online radio to communicate insights about design, great design minds and the lives of designers,” said Bill Moggridge, director of Cooper-Hewitt. “I’m thrilled that the public has chosen to honor it.”

Upcoming guests on Design Matters include architect James Biber (November 11), designer Martin Venezky (November 18), book cover designer Peter Mendelsund (November 25) and designer and MFA Design for Social Innovation Department Chair Cheryl Heller.

New episodes air weekly on Design Observer, which also features the complete archive of past shows. To subscribe to the Design Matters podcast, visit  iTunes.

An idea planted in the mind of MFA Interaction Design Department faculty member Robert Faludi has blossomed into an incredible honor for the telecommunication expert: a permanent spot for one of his projects at the Museum of Modern Art. The Botanicalls Kit, which allows household plants to communicate information about their needs via Twitter, was plucked from the MoMA exhibition “Talk to Me: Design and the Communication between People and Objects” to take root in the museum’s permanent collection. Faludi, who collaborated on Botanicalls, spoke with the Briefs via email about this opportunity.

Where did the concept for Botanicalls come from?
Botanicalls originated as a graduate student project at NYU’s [Interactive Telecommunications Program]. The idea was to produce a personal connection between plants in the student lounge and the people who might care for them. We came up with the idea that they could make a phone call to the lounge phone and request water and light, each in their own species-inspired voice.

How does Botanicalls work?
When the plant’s soil gets dry, a moisture sensor triggers a connection to Twitter over the Internet and posts a request for water. When the plant is watered, the same sensor triggers a connection that posts a thank-you message. Too-frequent or insufficient watering are also detected, and reports are made.

What is the significance of Botanicalls for the average person? And what is its significance from a design perspective?
The main intent of the project is to build the relationship between plants and people. So we specifically avoided creating any kind of automated watering system because we wanted humans to notice and attend to the plants directly, as a way of enhancing their experience of other living things.

I think it’s significant from a design perspective because by focusing on that relationship instead of some mechanical problem, we created a compelling engagement that turned out to grab the imagination of so many who heard about it.

What does its inclusion in the MoMA permanent collection mean to you?
It’s a great honor to be included in the MoMA collection, of course. Beyond that though, it was an instant guarantee that this project would turn out to last longer than I do since everything in the collection is intended to be preserved for the ages. Realizing that was a dizzying moment.

What other projects are you currently working on?
I’m always busy with new things. Right now I’m teaching a graduate course that centers around networking a 28-story, 300-unit apartment building on Central Park South. I’ve also been toying with the creation of a networked breathalyzer that tracks tipsiness in various cities around the world. And recently I’ve begun thinking about the possibilities for networking cars.

The latest edition of SVA’s bi-annual Visual Arts Journal is now available online, and among the many highlights are:

>> An exclusive interview with Joe Quesada (BFA 1984 Media Arts), chief creative officer of Marvel Entertainment, who talks about how he first fell in love with comics, the challenges of translating popular characters from one medium to another, why he never gets tired of drawing Spider-Man, and much more.

>> Profiles of alumni Angela Cappetta (BFA 1992 Photography), Teresa Horgan (BFA 2000 Photography), John Saponara (BFA 2000 Photography) and Daisy Schenk (BFA 1997 Photography), all graduates of the BFA Photography Department at SVA who have found their way to the field of wedding photography.

>> A look at the work of Steven Bindernagel (MFA 2006 Fine Art), whose intricate drawings and paintings simultaneously deal with both creation and destruction.

>> A reflection on the influence of longtime BFA Film, Video and Animation Department faculty member Howard Beckerman by animator Tom Sito (BFA 1977 Media Arts).

Plus more features, interviews, reviews and news from SVA alumni, faculty and students. To browse the full issue and an archive of past Journals, visit sva.edu/journal.

The latest in a series of one-on-one conversations with SVA department chairs.

In September 2012, SVA is launching a pioneering new graduate program, MFA Products of Design. Chaired by Allan Chochinov, editor-in-chief of the oldest established design Web publication, Core77, the MFA is an extensive two-year program that will guide students as they reinvent design systems in ways that are focused on positive, long-term sustainability.

In between talks at the Mayo Clinic, IDSA National, and AIGA National, Chochinov shares, via e-mail, his vision of the program, its mandates and point of view, and some of the experiences students can expect to engage in.

Tell me about MFA Products of Design.
The MFA in Products of Design is a two-year, immersive graduate program that prepares exceptional practitioners across various disciplines for leadership in the shifting terrain of design. We talk about educating “heads, hearts, and hands” to reinvent systems and catalyze positive change, and we do this through design thinking, design making, and design doing. Throughout the program, students gain fluency in the three fields crucial to the future of design: Making—from the handmade to digital fabrication; Structures—business, research, systems, strategy, user experience and interaction; and Narratives—including video storytelling, history and point of view. Most of the coursework is project-based, and we engage emerging science and materials, social systems, and business savvy to help students develop the skills and fluency to create positive consequence. We navigate the challenges of production, consumption, and sustainability, and keep a keen eye on celebration as well as problem-solving. The department is optimistic and rigorous—those two keep everyone in check!

What kind of students are you expecting will apply?
There are a few different kinds of students who have been attracted to the program: People with strong skills and experience in product and industrial design—disillusioned with the kinds of projects they are working on in their professional lives—who are looking for more meaning in their design work. We’re also welcoming people with deep knowledge and experience in progressive fields who actually ought to be in design; who will be more powerful with strategic and design thinking abilities, able to create positive change through scale. There will be candidates who are comfortable in the world of business, DIY, research, and entrepreneurship who love to “make things;” who understand that the enterprise of design is a team sport requiring multi-disciplinary thinking and fluencies across a vast array of stakeholders.

What are you most looking forward to about starting?
I’ve been teaching graduate and undergraduate design for over 16 years now, and the excitement that comes with new students every September is just as tremendous as it was when I started. But the fall of 2012 will be extra special of course, since my relationship to the MFA Products of Design students will be as teacher, mentor, advocate and air traffic controller (!) in a much more holistic, all-encompassing way. In addition, I will be working with faculty who are some of the most amazing practitioners and thinkers in the world, and the anticipation of creating a safe, nurturing environment for these two groups—students and teachers—to co-create in is indescribable.

What can enrolled students expect from their first year?
A program’s first year students are pioneers, helping to define the inputs and outputs of a program and really making the curriculum their own. We are placing a great deal of emphasis on point of view in this MFA, so students’ individual voices will be honored and celebrated. The first year studio experience will be a whirlwind of endeavor—from soldering arduino boards to working with NGOs; from deep immersion in interaction design to research, systems thinking, and environmental stewardship. Students will be attending classes off campus at New York’s IDEO office, at Material ConneXion, and in various food-related venues. They’ll also be co-mingled with MFA Interaction Design students for two of their classes, and will occupy the Visible Futures Lab—a state of the art making facility stocked with high-tech rapid prototyping machines, low-tech shop tools, and everything in between.

I read somewhere recently that you guys are going to have a pretty impressive kitchen. Care to elaborate?
Sure, this is something we’re very proud of. Food is the ultimate design experience, encompassing extraction, production, distribution, point of purchase, preparation, tools, aesthetics, consumption, waste, composting—it’s really the perfect analog to design. But it’s also the fuel that powers us, and my experience with design students is that they focus solely on their homework and little else, including their wellbeing. We’ve devoted generous space to food storage, preparation, and enjoyment, and will encourage students to treat their eating habits with the rigor and passion that they treat their design work. Many of our faculty are passionate about food and food systems, so there will be curricula around the topic. But we’re not dogmatic about this; we simply want to give students more than a microwave and a water cooler, and to encourage them to spend time in ways that are technology-free, socially vital, fun, and delicious.

What do you hope students will get out of the program by the end of it?
We’re preparing the next generation of people to understand that designers create consequence. We want that consequence to resonate with the students as individuals, and we want it to reflect the principals and values of the department as a whole and of the institution of the School of Visual Arts. Ultimately, we are preparing students with the training, education, and networks to empower them to fill leadership positions at the leading design firms and progressive corporations, to create enterprises, organizations, and businesses of their own, and to become lifelong ambassadors for the power of design. We won’t wait ’til the end for any of this, by the way. It will start the first week.

Anything else you’d like to add?
I feel immensely privileged to be a part of the SVA Graduate Programs, and am grateful to David Rhodes and Steven Heller, who first approached me with the challenge of creating an educational experience around the “next” products of design. Their encouragement for pushing the boundaries of design disciplines, and Anthony Rhodes‘ support of the operational and Arts Abroad components of the program, have made the promise of this MFA unique and powerful. In the end, it’s all about the students of course, and we can’t wait to get started.