This campaign is to produce Process Music, my second book collection of writings focused on graphic design. It’ll be a companion piece/sequel to Volume: Writings on Graphic Design, Music, Art, and Culture, published in 2010 by Princeton Architectural Press. The new book gathers over 40 pieces primarily from the past decade, with reprinted works first appearing in forums like Emigre, Eye, Print, Idea, Modes of Criticism, Design Observer, Speak Up, and Voice: AIGA Journal of Graphic Design. Others are texts of lectures and presentations, have appeared on my blog or elsewhere on line, or are original to this collection. Many are unavailable or hard (and expensive) to find. The book will also feature a prelude composed by AIGA Design Medalist and Design Matters host Debbie Millman.
Process Music refers to print media and the intentions behind design activity. It is interested in visual culture, providing deeper readings and close viewings of graphic design artifacts and activity, frequently examined through the lens of music (when I’m not writing explicitly about the medium). While I employ a range of narrative voices in my writing, I always try to combine academic rigor with the accessibility of popular forms like music journalism. Overall, I think of myself as a critical enthusiast, knowledgeable, appreciative and irreverent.
The book is organized in four sections and a coda: “Blues in CMYK” contains short essays that focus on concepts and topics in graphic design, such as the practice, limits, and potential of design criticism; different aspects of design education; the importance of metaphor and cross-disciplinary inspiration; inclusivity and responsibility in design; the proper context of digital technology; authenticity; the influence of religious faith on design activity, and more.
“Interlude with Designers” presents appreciations of famed and upstart individuals in the discipline, including Barney Bubbles, Paul Rand, William Addison Dwiggins, Jacqueline Casey, Paula Scher, Vaughan Oliver, Martin Venezky, illustrator Mark Andresen, and design activist Andrew Breitenberg.
“Omnigraphy” has expanded reviews and studies on graphic design and music works, performers and practitioners. Figures covered include Josef-Müller Brockmann, Rudy VanderLans and Zuzana Licko/Emigre, Elliott Earls, Stefan Sagmeister, Hipgnosis, Fuel, and the musicians Van Dyke Parks, and British band Cornershop. Artifacts examined include books, interactive projects, typefaces, independent and mass market magazines, posters, albums.
“My Back Pages” offers short memoirs and stories that take a personal perspective on creativity, visual culture and communication. Lastly, “(extended play)” offers a short fiction.
Physically, the book is planned to be a 5.5″ x 8.5″ paperback of 360+ pages. Like Volume, Process Music will feature a design orchestrated by fellow design educator and writer Jiwon Lee, an Assistant Professor of Design at Kookmin University in Seoul Korea. It will be an attractive, reader-friendly volume that forgoes flash for economy—but will still offer a formal surprise or three.
I’ve been writing and lecturing about, teaching, curating and performing design for 25 years. In addition to my previous book and the forums mentioned above, I’ve been featured/published/collected in anthologies like The Graphic Design Reader, Culture Is Not Always Popular: Fifteen Years of Design Observer, Total Armageddon: A Slanted Reader on Design, Emigre no. 70: The Look Back Issue, Graphic Design and Reading, and The Education of a Graphic Designer volume 2. Please visit my Ephemeral States web site for career details, read some samples, and what’s been said about my writing.
As an artist, my work has been exhibited in a number of venues nationally, is in a variety of private and corporate collections (primarily in New England and New York), and a series of my artist books are included in the Franklin Furnace/Museum of Modern Art/Artists Books collection.
The manuscript is ready and the design determined. Funding will allow hiring professional editing, and indexing of the texts which will then be set by Jiwon into his layout. Followed by printing and distribution! Process Music will be offered commercially if funded at $25 (plus shipping), so all pre-orders will be at a discount.
For your support, you can receive a variety of unique handmade artworks, most specially created for this campaign, with connections to or making use of print design materials. Plus there’s rare copies of other self-produced, limited edition design artifacts. Most have a relationship to or are products of the 4-color offset lithography process.
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I am self publishing since there is a limited market for books of critical design writing, so I’m unsure about the demand. In regard to the rewards, most (Holed Records, prints, drawings) will be handmade, so may take some weeks or months to make. Fortunately, I love being in the studio and making things.