Graphic Design Bitterness and Rambling

• May 23rd, 2005 • • graphic design, meandering •

A few years back, before I became a printmaker, I was on the road to being a graphic designer. That semester in college was one of the worst times in my life. On average, I got about two hours of sleep a night. My tolerance for caffeine was killed by the twelve-pack-of-Dr.-Pepper-a-week habit on top of the Red Bull and No-Doz. The professors were no help, demanding an inordinate amount of work to be produced in such a small amount of time: 200 thumbnails in one night, each one to be more creative and astonishing than the next. Friends I knew in the program who were very creative dropped out because of unreasonable work demands. (I don’t exaggerate; one of the guys I knew? The profs begged him to stay. He oozed creative juice wherever he went.) Eventually I developed a strong “Screw You!” (that’s the polite version) attitude and stopped caring. Our final portfolios were to be laid out on a black cloth, everything neatly matted and positioned in an orderly manner on an assigned table; I tromped in and unceremoniously hucked my piles of notebooks and whatnot on a bare, ugly table and left.

Needless to say after that ordeal, I floated home, gleeful of no longer having to produce 8 billion thumbnails for an imaginary company, only to be told by a cold voice, “You need to learn how to draw. How did you get this far without knowing how to draw?”

That was about three, four years ago? I still have all of my unceremonious piles of sketches, thumbnails and a CD full of work. These piles have not been sorted through or looked at; they just follow me in a bitter collection. Four residences later, and I can’t bring myself to throw them out!

Don’t misunderstand; I love graphic design. It influences my printmaking body of work very much. It behaves the way lines in a coloring book do: they keep the color and pattern from making an utter mess about the page. In some ways I cannot understand the proverbial divide between art and design. Even with all of the obvious baggage I have attatched to design, it steadfastly remains a “must” in my art. Most of the influcence however, stems from readings on graphic design rather than the hours of toil on design-y thumbnails.

Now really, I wonder why I can’t outright burn that pile of graphic design molding away in my closet…

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