Paula Scher: Exploring Expression

Sources for all research on the life and significance of

[

Scher, Titan of Postmodern Design.” 99designs, https://99designs.com/blog/famous-design/paulascher-titan-of-postmodern-design/.

Eagleson, Jemma. “Paula Scher Essay.” GitHub, GitHub, https://jemmaeagleson.github. io/PAULA-SCHER/Essay. html.

Edson, Gavin. “Paula Scher - Most Influential Designers.” D5 Media, D5 Media, 15 Apr. 2022, https://d5media.co.uk/ blog/design/mostinfluential-designers-paulascher/.

Farr, Sarah A. “Analyzing Paula Scher’s Design Process.” Medium, Medium, 2 Feb. 2021, https://sarahafarr. medium.com/analyzingpaula-schers-design-process9a17cb1bf569.

McGibbon, Jenny. “Art and Design Context.” Medium, Medium, 3 Oct. 2017, https://medium.com/@ jennymcgibbon/art-anddesign-context-fc475517ed80.

“Paula Scher: Biography, Designs and Facts.” Famous Graphic Designers, https://www. famousgraphicdesigners.org/ paula-scher.

“Paula Scher’s Typographic Embodiment of New York City’s Culture.” Graphic Design Theory, 3 Oct. 2019, https://rampages. us/gdtheory/2019/10/03/paulaschers-typographic-embodimentof-new-york-citys-culture/. ]

Sources for all graphics on interior pages are as follows: Page 2: [Gamolina, Julia. “A Life in Her Work: Pentagram’s Paula Scher on Ideas, Invention, and Learning.” Madame Architect, Madame Architect, 15 Oct. 2021, https://www.madamearchitect.org/interviews/2020/7/16/ paula-scher.] Page 3: [Fesson, Jérémie. “Who Is the Popa of the Moma Logo? Thoughts about Contemporary Branding.” Graphéine - Agence De Communication Paris Lyon, 6 Aug. 2019, https:// www.grapheine.com/en/graphic-design-en/who-is-the-popa-of-moma-logo-thoughts-oncontemporary-branding.] Page 4: [Edson, Gavin. “Paula Scher - Most Influential Designers.” D5 Media, D5 Media, 15 Apr. 2022, https://d5media.co.uk/blog/design/most-influential-designerspaula-scher/., Brewer, Jenny. “Pentagram’s Paula Scher Reveals Powerful ‘Anti-Sanitarium’ Identity for the Mental Health Coalition.” It’s Nice That, 20 May 2020, https://www.itsnicethat.com/news/ mental-health-coalition-identity-pentagram-paula-scher-graphic-design-200520., Binlot, Ann. “A La Carte: Paula Scher’s American Maps Chart More than Just Territory.” Wallpaper.com, Wallpaper*, 24 Feb. 2016, https://www.wallpaper.com/art/paula-schers-american-maps-chart-more-than-justterritory.]

Page 5: [Cowan, Katy. “Paula Scher on Falling in Love with Typography, Timeless Identities and What It Takes to Become a Great Designer.” Creative Boom, 31 Oct. 2019, https://www.creativeboom.com/features/paula-scher/., Snoad, Laura. “Pentagram’s Paula Scher Publishes Book to Mark 25 Years of Working with NYC’s The Public Theater.” It’s Nice That, 27 Jan. 2020, https://www.itsnicethat.com/news/paula-scher-pentagram-twenty-five-years-at-the-public-graphic-designpublication-270120.]

Paula Scher:

Bigman, Alex. “Get to Know Paula

This booklet about Paula Scher was designed and produced by Caden Chang in the Fall of 2022 for DSGD 83 (Professor Ragouzeos) at San Jose State University. Front and back cover contains all original work by Caden Chang.

Born on October 6, 1948 in Virginia, Paula Scher spent most of her childhood on the East Coast, growing up in both Washington D.C. and Philadelphia. So it came to no surprise that she would go to the Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia to

get her BFA and move to New York to start her career. Scher started off working at Random House in their children’s book divisions, but would later move to companies like CBS Records and Atlantic Records. She then created her own firm, Koppel and Scher, but after the first Bush recession, the firm would shut down. Eventually, she found work within Pentagram, where she would design some of her most iconic work, like her rebranding of The Public Theater, the Museum of Modern Art, and Tiffany and Co.

What I find interesting about Scher’s design process is that she doesn’t take it too seriously, seeing design as “a state of play”. This shows in both her physical designs as well as her mindset. Scher is all about expression and emotion, disregarding the modern idea of clean and neutral designs. While designing, she isn’t as hard on herself on off days, “some days, I’m just not as talented as other days” and welcomes boredom, describing how she gets her best ideas when she’s bored because there’s nothing blocking her creativity.

M O M A

Looking for a new identity, but still wanting to keep its recognizeability, the MoMA tasked Scher’s firm with this rebrand. Utilizing logo as a recognizable graphic to use as well as a uniform layout and cropping of artwork, they carried MoMA’s identity for the past 13 years.

2009

Swatch

1984

There was a bit of controversy around this piece as Scher parodied a Swiss poster. She wanted to poke fun of the Swiss tourism industry, with this poster as well as still create a good advertisement that fit with the brand.

U.S. Geography and Climate

In her freetime, Scher creates maps of different places. This was made to display the climates for all the different areas in the U.S. and when they occur.

Mental Health Coalition

Designed with the Silence = Death poster in mind, the logo for the Mental Health Coalition was created for the company to be a recognizeable symbol that emphasizes their goal to destigmatize mental health.

The Theater

1994

Scher wanted the new identity for The Public Theater to appeal to a larger audience. She used the aesthetics of street graffiti and bolder text in order to bring in a new crowd and completely changed the way branding and advertisement would be handled in the future.

I’d like to think that in some way, Paula Scher has influenced every graphic designer that has come after her. What make her designs so mesmerizing are that she has always gone against the bland, corporate nature of design at the time.

Her bold branding revolutionized how many institutions branded themselves, and her refreshing take on typography, I feel, has influenced most if not all, graphic designers.

The way that she utilizes a solid, restricted color palette and paired it with bold sans serif fonts to create designs that were instantly recognizable, also brought something interesting to the graphic design community that changed it as a whole.