‘My mouse cursor path over the course of a week’

Designer Gavin Potenza keeps track of his mouse.

Image borrowed from his blog; read more here.

Former student Alice Woodruff posted this list on my Facebook page.

It’s good thoughts and will probably offend some. Turning off one’s ego long enough to connect with others is often difficult. I have to enact #25 before week’s end. A good, unexpected apology for something I didn’t expect to occur will make someone else’s day. Fingers crossed.

[1]    Most people hide their suffering better than you think, you pass dozens of people a day on the street without any idea how well they’re wearing their tragedies.

[2]    People’s names are the sweetest sounds they hear. You should make a point of being good at learning and using them.

[3]    People love to spread their misery around, but not as much as they enjoy being lifted out of it.

[4]    Being young is not in and of itself an achievement. Neither is being beautiful. But people often treat you as if they are.

[5]    For a lot of people, music is a reflection of who they are and their relationship to life. Remember that before insulting someone’s favorite band.

[6]    The Golden Age never existed. People are always trying to get back to a time when things were simpler and better. The world was a far more dangerous place fifty years ago, especially if you were black or a woman or gay or diagnosed with cancer.

[7]    Most people, whatever their choice of profession, feel like complete novices that are about to be found out as frauds and fakers.

[8]    Most people love quite helplessly, despite what they would have you believe.

[9]    Show me the most beautiful woman in the world, and I’ll show you a man who’s bored with taking her to bed. Show me the most devoted husband, and I’ll show you a woman who feels that he’s just not doing enough. A lot of people are never satisfied because…

[10]    Most people have no idea what they want out of life, let alone how to get it. Most others are still waiting for someone to give them permission.

[11]    Whatever it is about yourself that you’re trying to hide, it’s usually the first thing someone else notices about you.

[12]    You should call your mother and tell her you love her. Like most women who decide to marry and have children or help take care of a dying parent, she probably sacrificed a lot of her dreams to be there for you, and she wishes that you appreciated her more for it. Susan Boyle represented this demographic powerfully, but for every one of her, was a woman like your mother who will never get that standing ovation.

[13]    If you tell a man about your problems, he assumes you want some sort of help or advice. If you tell a woman about your problems, she assumes you simply want a shoulder to cry on. Women rarely want to be told what to do about a problem, and men rarely want to be coddled through a hard time.

[14]    Creative people thrive on feedback. You can never give them enough of it, and you will endear yourselves to them mightily if you do it frequently, thoughtfully, and honestly. They understand far better than most think, the value of time.

[15]    For most people religion is a social commitment more than a spiritual one.

[16]    A lot of people who consider themselves intelligent can’t properly label all the states on a map, or all the countries in Europe, let alone Africa or the Middle East. Most couldn’t list off the ten commandments, five pilars, or the amendments of the Constitution, and feel that politics are too complicated to bother with understanding, let alone talking about.

[17]    A lot of Christians have never, and will never, read the Bible. Most of them will conduct their lives exactly as they would if they’d never attended a single church service. It is nearly impossible to tell a Christian from an atheist by their actions alone. Both Christians and atheists will probably find the previous statement offensive.

[18]    For nearly every crazy idea, you can find a fully credentialed scientist who will back it up.

[19]    People are more frequently kind and compassionate than they are fooled by our manipulations or lies.

[20]    Life often works in reverse. People treat strangers more politely than their family or friends. People will ask a friend’s band to play their party for free, will call their best girlfriend to come over and cut their hair without a thought to payment, but would never dream of calling a mechanic they found in the phonebook and asking them to donate their time and labor to fix a broken down car.

[21]    Everyone has done something they would be desperately embarrassed for anyone else to know about.

[22]    Never joke with a man about his sexual performance, and never joke with a woman about her appearance. No matter how much they make fun of these things in themselves, never, never do it for them. They may laugh along with you, but you’ve just driven a tiny needle into their brain.

[23]    Most women get married because they want to have a wedding, most men get married because they are ready to settle down with a woman for the rest of their lives. Women, statistically speaking are more likely to suffer clinical depression if married, and initiate upwards of 80% of all divorces citing irreconcilable differences. People expect a significant other to change their lives and make them happy without any conception of how this change will take place. Sort of like assuming a college degree is going to guarantee you security in life without ever thinking of how this can be practically possible. I call this the ‘If you build it, they will come’ approach to romance and one out of every two times it ends in divorce.

[24]    Most people are worried they’re not having as much fun as they should be. This usually makes men cheat and women nag.

[25]    When you insult or offend someone, always admit it and apologize promptly, even if it wasn’t your intention or you had no idea. It is always better to be a penitent villain than to appear so socially inept as to not recognize when you’ve hurt the people around you. An evil genius is someone to bring to your side, a blundering fool is someone to keep as far away from you as possible.

Sketches by Alice Woodruff

‘Émilie Vast’s third Herbarium is dedicated to plants that find the strength to creep into our urban space, into the joints of gutters and pavements, in the wall’s cracks, at the bottom of the trees, the park’s grass, on the roofs  . . .  just like their cousins from the woods, they have a history, uses and mythology.’

Cool find. This ‘wild plants in the city’ edition also features my Jeanne Moderno fonts.

Found via Iconoclastic and le lièvre de mars

From 1985.

Found via tout ceci est magnifique

‘I just like the typography, honest.’ -wkd

Found via whatkatiedoes

Found via hiphopoposterous

Film for the New Zealand Book Council, produced by Colenso BBDO and animated by Andersen M Studio.

And you can snag a copy of Maurice Gee’s Going West here.

Found via Daniel Will-Harris

The graffiti of Jerm IX.

Found via LOUDreams

‘On one occasion, referring to Benguiat as a ‘printer,’ Allen asked him what a good typeface was. Benguiat had an affinity for Windsor and suggested it to him that morning. He’s used it in every film since.’

Woody Allen and the Windsor typeface. Since 1977. Story here.

‘from Alphabets 1964, edited by R. S. Hutchings’

Image found by the great Steve Matteson – who was recently interviewed by Mashable.

‘Great design. Straight from designers.’

Here’s some picks from the Supermarket this year.

Thank you card in progress. The work of Brian Hurst.

The work of alexandraferguson.

Found via Nina Moon

As more of the world finds itself occupied, additional visuals are showing up on the interwebs.

Above, OCCUPY U poster created by an anonymous designer friend, whose name is left off for fear of losing another job (click to download printable PDF).

Below, statistical poster from new website Occupy Design. And at bottom, Shepard Fairey does his thang.

Click on images to download and/or jump to respective websites.

Occupy Design found via GOOD

Just like BofA and Wells Fargo.

Found via Cecilia Motwani

‘I’ve been doing posters for tons of cities across America’

In the past few weeks, one of my former students has found herself cast as the visual heart of the Occupy movement. Raina Dayne started with offering to do a poster and it’s blossomed into something much bigger.

Raina’s images can be downloaded for use at the Occupy Together website. Facebook page here, shirts here.

‘From Leerstof Tekenen, a collection of assignments and exercises for graphic design students   . . .   Rescued from the Gerrit Rietveld Academy library in Amsterdam’

Found via Freaky Fauna

New track (below) from Annie Erin Clark (above), performing as St. Vincent. From the album Strange Mercy.

St. Vincent: Cheerleader

‘A pure, bland, unscented, soothing cleaning cream and lubricant’

Another vintage find: Albolene cold cream container.

For the past 15 or so years, we’ve had this little can perched in whatever bathroom was part of our nest.

We found this on our honeymoon back in 1995.

We’d picked up a bunch of trinkets in Seattle and needed an extra piece of luggage – so a few hours before our trip home, we ran across this luxuriously lined Lady Baltimore display model in a small shop.

Been a part of the family ever since.

‘It didn’t last long; true-blue Shadow fans (and, apparently, the owners of The Shadow trademark) didn’t care for Helfer and Baker’s smart-ass approach, especially when they killed the character off and resurrected him as a killer cyborg. It’s not surprising that happened to also be their final issue.’ –Robot 6

The Shadow (1987-89) was my favorite comic book series.

It was a sequel to a Howard Chaykin-penned 1986 update to the classic radio program, pulp novel character The Shadow, ‘What evil lurks in the hearts of men  . . .  The Shadow knows!’

Chaykin had brought the character into the 1980s, with uzis instead of .45s, ‘for mature readers’ emblazoned on the cover. And unlike the rest of his crew (Margo Lane and others had aged), Shadow alter-ego Lamont Cranston was still a rather youngish, dapper guy – ready to take on the New York of the Miami Vice era.

A monthly series followed – and after a few artist changes, writer Andy Helfer and artist Kyle Baker made it something else entirely.

Helfer and Baker’s take on The Shadow became a crazy whirlwind tour of Sopranos-like mobsters, wickedly dark humor, extreme violence, unexpected plot twists and in issue 13, they killed off the main character. Then his sons lost his body and with every successive chapter, one could not predict what would happen next.

digging a bit
In 1989, I found myself at a comic book convention (supposedly) talking to Andy Helfer about the cancellation of his title. But Helfer couldn’t tell me much. Turned out the guy with the ‘Andy Helfer’ name badge was actually his assistant. ‘Andy doesn’t like to fly’ I was told.

He spoke about Helfer’s approach – and how he had little respect for purist interpretations of classics and decided to take The Shadow to a whole different place – darker, funnier and just plain strange. I was hooked and saddened to see it vanish. Because, frankly, comic books at that time were becoming rather boring. Same old shit, different month.

A two issue Justice Inc. kept the magic going a little bit longer but that was it. The Shadow held my interest for three years – and when it ended, I stopped buying comic books.

Not dramatically, but slowly. Just couldn’t find much to hold interest. The Shadow was a hard act to follow. Only thing I’ve really enjoyed as much since has been Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Strikes Again (2001-2), which really leaves purists sitting on the curb.

finding the shadow
There is no trade paperback of this odd series. But the 1980s Shadow can be found cheap with a little digging – here’s a list; best to start with Chaykin’s version tho, then work one’s way thru Sienkiewicz to the Helfer/Baker issues. And keep in mind there is no ending (final issue pictured below), a cliffhanger never to be completed.

ever since: the team
‘It’s funny, everybody thought Conde Nast shut us down, but it was just that we weren’t making any money. When you work on a licensed book, the owner of the license gets half the royalty check. Andy and I, on one of the later issues, ended up splitting a $20 royalty check, and we decided it was time to go.’ –Kyle Baker

After the series ended, writer Andy Helfer became an editor at DC Comics where he headed up the Paradox Press imprint. Paradox specialized in alternative titles, Road to Perdition and A History of Violence among them.

Kyle Baker – who went on to pen Why I Hate Saturn – has been bouncing around the comicsverse ever since. Some of his wares include updates of Captain America and Plastic Man; most of his work contains brilliant social criticism: His Special Forces was called by the NY Times, ‘the harshest, most serrated satire of the Iraq War.’

Baker’s website can be found here, blog here.

And here’s a great review of the Helfer/Baker Shadow – otherwise, more highlights below.

Art Nouveau meets Russian Constructivism. Motion design by Matt Duplessie.

‘A superhero’s eating habit is so different from that of an ordinary person’

Photographer Sacha Goldberger figured out just the trick to cheer up his 91-year-old grandmother: A cape, tights and a camera.

Hungarian-born Frederika (hero name: ‘Super Mamika’) is a hero already, during World War II she risked her life to help Jewish friends evade capture – before having to flee her homeland. As of late, had just been sitting at home feeling lonely; the photos, which got a lot of attention on the Interwebs, changed all that.

After the viral success of Super Mamika, Goldberger’s continued to use Frederika as a go-to model. More delights abound at his official website.

Found via EzineMark, My Modern Met

‘Underneath they wrote: ‘Keeping Up with the Times.”

From June: The redecorated Monument of the Soviet Army in Sofia, capital of Bulgaria.

‘Unfortunately, the art survived for only a day – very early the next morning, the die-hard worshipers of communism’s corpse washed away the paint.’

Story here.

‘In her 2010 documentary about the Berlin cabaret scene of the interwar period, Fabienne Rousso-Lenoir includes archival material, excerpts from German cinema classics, rediscovered promotional and institutional films, rare modern art experiments as well as documentaries of the time – all restored in high-definition.’

Above, the first five minutes of Fabienne Rousso-Lenoir’s Cabaret-Berlin: Die wilde Bühne (The Wild Stage) 1919-33. This 2010 documentary is loaded with incredible images from an era that went away in the 1930s.

Watch the entire untranslated film here. (Note: Veoh player download required)

‘She is adamant that she will continue to photograph until she is blind from age’

The work of 18-year-old, London-based photographer Charlotte Bibby.

Website here. Flickr sets here.

Found via the first issue of the magazine formerly called ‘Carson’

‘Just a huge fan of this movie. Wanted to make a exciting trailer with a modern feel’

A reimagined trailer for the original TRON (1982). Reedited and updated by DrewboiX.

The real deal. Zoom and pan Van Gogh’s original via The Google Art Project.

Click image to view/jump.

‘does adding the sticker to your loo make it a work of art?’

R. Mutt sticker. A replicate of the signature on Marcel Duchamp’s ‘readymade’ Fountain (1917).

Snag one here.

Found via Switched On Art

Ideas. Tyler Shields.

Even more free wallpapers by Arno Kathollnig  . . .

Franz Kafka Trilogy – featuring my own Chandler 42 fonts (with some pointing hands from Alta California).

‘Before there were photocopiers, scanners and printers, there was the Ditto Machine (a.k.a. spirit duplicator), produced by the Illinois-based Ditto Corporation; originally introduced in 1923.’ -mnn

Clifford the Big Red Dog was supposed to be red. But in the handout I got in kindergarten, he was purple.

So was my introduction to the Ditto Machine – a device used to replicate most of the paperwork I’d used in elementary school.

Some of my earliest experiences as a ‘graphics’ guy was playing with one of these machines – seeing what it could reproduce and what it couldn’t. It couldn’t reproduce much. The copies were so smudgy, Dittos were grunge before grunge was grunge.

And the smell of the purple ink was incredible. Fruity and chemically at the same time! Tho it turns out ink ingredients – isopropanol and methanol – are toxic substances. Who knew?

Cept for a few high school teachers who were holdouts (‘I don’t trust that newfangled photocopier thing’) all the dittos in my life were gone by end of grade 12.

Snag a tee here.

Images found via They Always Come Back, a tree grows in brookline, Zazzle, Jean&Vic

‘My mouse cursor path over the course of a week’

A recording of the work of Gavin Potenza.

Unopened stock from a long-ago closed department store.

Shirt and underwear, but no pants.

Who needs pants anyway?

Control panel from my mother’s Clairol ‘True-To-Light’ makeup mirror.

Still in daily use after all these years. Here’s the original, original commercial.

‘inspiring homes with heart’

Magazines are great sources for inspiration. Not as permanent as a logo – or brand – periodicals have a timer on them. After a few months, they’re gone.

A good newsstand is a treasure trove of the experimental, conservative, international, concise, good, bad, ugly. I drop by whatever I can find – even the Barney Noble chain if one is not nearby – just for a shot in the arm.

Earlier this year I spotted Chandler 42 being used in an Australian interiors pub. Alexendria-based Inside Out is using my typewriter type as a nice accent throughout their pages.

Here’s a few snaps (taken in my new home office – sleepy dog in background).

‘the most modern, complete and efficient portable typewriter in the world’

1955 Royal ‘Futura’ portable typewriter. Available here.

1956 Royal electric typewriter, Westinghouse motor. Wiki history here.

Found via Katnip

1952 IBM electric typewriter. History here.

Found via Jon Williamson

Remington Monarch, photographed by David Gauthier.

‘The building is a work of kinetic architecture a cube that opens expands and morphs according to the building use. The building is potentially different every time someone visits.’

Jorge Fontan’s conceptual design for the Franz Kafka Cultura Centrum in Prague.

Spotted in Soho.

Found via According to G

‘An illegal trip deep Inside NYC’s secret subway tunnels’

Found via Refinery29

Photograph by Devon Cloutier.

‘As you work’

NYC-based Natasha Cooper is Coco Black. And Coco Futura is her site.

Her Futura Mix is music to listen to as you work, sleep, play.

Go here – click, download, share.

‘joining the baroque Serif with the geometric Sans, the formal with the flourish decorative – ARS Novelty is a typeface that tries to make sense of it all’

A hybrid font designed by Angus R. Shamal. Free download here.

Love The Barry Gibb Talk Show.

New one aired tonite. Click to view/jump.

‘it took a week to do it’

For anyone who’s taken an intro to typography course with me – there is a fair amount of stippling involved as part of some really complex letterform studies.

And one of my former students – Freya Kiessling – who dotted her way thru letters – has gone national with her work.

Her color Conan O’Brien pointillism illustration (above) was used as a bumper on Conan’s show, April 11, 2011. The drawing was submitted thru their Coco MoCA page (many, many images abound).

And today – per show request – a print hangs in the show’s green room at Warner Bros. in Burbank.

Below, another Freya-produced Conan piece – from a beginning animation class.

Tonite this link just sort of popped in from former student Campbell BrownKorbel. It’s secrets that every creative – from illustrator (the focus) to designer to comedian to (hell) anarchist – should know.

Phil McAndrew’s Super Obvious Secrets That I Wish They’d Teach In Art School. Read the whole thing here.

Well, I see it this way. I’ve been using my time listening to the greats and nights spent in comedy clubs as part of my teaching ‘act’ for years now. And after reading Steve Martin’s Born Standing Up and all the insane prep he did to do what he did (never realized how neurotically obsessive he was), it all seems to resonate.

Michael Bierut – who had one of the best lines in the Helvetica film – takes a look at the parallels between hard work as a designer and a comedian. Great read for anyone working in a creative field.