MILTON GLASER
A Mind Full of Brilliant Ideas
1
Sources for all graphics on interior pages are as follows:
Page 1: Axel Dupeux for The Wall Street Journal. “Milton Glaser’s Designs for Life.” The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones & Company, 16 Mar. 2018, www.wsj.com/articles/milton-glasers-designs-forlife-1521217208.
Page 2, 3, 4, 5: “In Remembrance: Milton Glaser (1929 – 2020).” SVA, sva.edu/features/in-remembrance-milton-glaser-1929-2020.
Milton Glaser, www.miltonglaser.com/. “Milton Glaser: Graphic Designer.” Area of Design, 10 July 2020, areaofdesign.com/milton-glaser/.
This booklet about Milton Glaser was designed and produced by Van Nguyen in the Fall of 2022 for DSGD 83 (Professor Ragouzeos) at San Jose State University. The front and back cover contains all original work by Van Nguyen.
Sources for all research on the life and significance of Milton Glaser: Axel Dupeux for The Wall Street Journal. “Milton Glaser’s Designs for Life.” The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones & Company, 16 Mar. 2018, www.wsj.com/articles/milton-glasers-designs-forlife-1521217208.
Author Deeksha Kamath Deeksha Kamath is a fresh graduate from Manipal School of Architecture and Planning, et al. “Milton Glaser: Philosophy and Ideology - RTF: Rethinking the Future.” RTF | Rethinking The Future, 19 Nov. 2021, www. re-thinkingthefuture.com/art/a3936-milton-glaser-philosophy-and-ideology/.
Rosen, Miss. “Graphic Design Icon Milton Glaser on His Legendary Posters.” AnOther, AnOther Magazine, 19 Mar. 2018, www.anothermag.com/ design-living/10685/graphic-design-icon-miltonglaser-on-his-legendary-posters.
Wack, Arianne. “Getting to Know Milton Glaser, the Godfather of Modern Design.” Hyperallergic, 6 Apr. 2014, hyperallergic.com/118140/gettingto-know-milton-glaser-the-godfather-of-moderndesign/.
1
Milton Glaser
A Mind Full of Brilliant Ideas
MMilton Glaser was born in 1929 and died in June 2020 at the age of 91. He was born in the South Bronx, New York City. In 1951, Glaser graduated from the Cooper Union School for the Advancement of Science and Art. He then also went to study aboard in Bologna, Italy, with the painter Giorgio Morandi, one of his influential artists. When coming back from his study abroad, Glasers co-founded Push Pin Studios with his friends from Cooper Union in 1954, and he managed to run the studios seamlessly for twenty years and brought a lot of achievements. He also confounded the New
York Magazine with his friend, Clay Felker. In 1974, he started his own design firm called Milton Glaser Inc. Glaser was known for his consistently great input in illustrating posters and cover albums, for which it is hard to choose which is his best work. Glaser’s works do not fall into any particular style, but every piece showcases his talent for transforming a concept into a work of art that attracts viewers to want to look closer.
2
The significance of this work lies in the bold use of the typeface, which was a condensed style of Windsor. Also, the design is dominated by the use of bright colors and the figure of a woman wearing a floral dress and smoking while the flow of the smoke curves into a treble clef.
Montreux International Jazz Festival Poster (International Jazz Festival), 1976.
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
“I Love NY” logo (New York State), 1977
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
The “I love NY” logo is the most trended logo of the century and even today for its simple but powerful message as a recognition of New York City. The iconic red heart symbol conveys the emotion of love, and the initials NY represent the city where he grew up. The significance of the “I love NY” logo lies in its merging of words and images to send a powerful message. The design of the logo “I heart NY” came out naturally when Glaser was sitting in the back of a taxi to meet with his client, which was New York state officials who hired him to create a logo for tourism. His first sketch had the four characters straight across. Then he stacked the two characters “I love” above the “NY” since he was inspired by the artwork “Love” by Robert Indiana in which the two letters “LO” is on top of the two letters “VE.”
4
Aretha poster (Eye Magazine), 1968
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
Art is Whatever poster (School of Visual Art), 1996
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
Angles in America poster (Tony Kushner), 1966
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
50 Years of Vespa poster (Vespa company), 1996
This poster was a work for Vespa’s 50th anniversary. The work intended to illustrate the smooth moving of this vehicle and the company as a whole; Glaser blurred the stripes so that the viewers can get the idea of the world going by when they are sitting on the Vespa.
XIV Olympic Winter Games (Olympic Winter Games), 1984
Glaser used the original Olympic colors, which are red, yellow, green, and blue, to create an interesting outline border for the poster. He also used his creativity to turn the circle from the Olympic symbol into a ring-toss game.
5
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
Poster for Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits (Columbia Records), 1967 Credit: Milton Glaser Design Study Center and Archives
This poster is a landmark of psychedelic design combined with simplicity to create the silhouette portrait of Dylan, which is subverted by psychedelic tendrils of hair in complementing colors.
Glaser encountered many events that were tied to the rise of money and propaganda-driven markets, such as the Great Depression, the bloom of the Abstract Expressionists, and the attendant excess of the art market, during his upbringing. These left a strong dislike in Glaser for deceptive advertising and industries built on intellectual manipulation. Due to what he saw during his upbringing, Glaser firmly believed in design’s power to do good and create communal bonds. Milton Glaser influenced the world with his imaginative and creative mind to always create things anew and never limit or stop himself from learning. He gave life to every piece of his work; even letters or objects have a strong sense of humanity. Although his art style does not fall into any particular type, it still has the unique aspect of flowing lines, rainbow colors, and strong patterns.
6 G
Book
7 M
Design by Van Nguyen, December 2022 for DSGD 83 at SJSU