For Eye magazine’s summer 2009 “Agenda” section, Steven Heller produced another cult alert. By titling the piece “Cult of the Squiggly,” he obviously meant to invoke his earlier, infamous “Cult of the Ugly” essay. It’s a fair reference: both articles decry and advocate suppression of anti-Modern graphic design phenomena Heller deems disadvantageous to the field. [...]
Kenneth on Authenticity
I will be participating in the the North Carolina State Master of Graphic Design graduate symposium, Design, Community, and the Rhetoric of Authenticity, January 22–23, 2010. I am a member of the panel for “New Kids, Sell Outs and Celebrity Suicides,” with Elliott Earls, Artist in Residence of 2D Design at Cranbrook Academy of Art, [...]
Has design been “Dirty?”
I’ve posted two relatively lengthy responses to a new essay by Steven Heller, “The Decade of Dirty Design,” at Voice: AIGA Journal of Design. I contend that the label doesn’t encompass the entirety of design activity, focusing on a singular but not definitive exponent of design activity. I first offer a deliberately provocative (and arguably [...]
Essays and more in Emigre No. 70
Emigre No.70: The Look Back Issue: Celebrating 25 Years in Graphic Design, the 512-page compendium of the storied magazine has been published by Gingko Press. It includes full reproductions of three of my essays, a handful of quotes on the end papers, and my original letter to the editor in 1996 in a small [...]
