Eye on Design #4, Worth
Our latest Page 23 is from the fourth edition of US graphic design magazine Eye on Design, and highlights an overlooked story from the design world.
Themed ‘Worth’, the issue goes a step beyond Creative Review’s current ‘Money’ issue but its’s intriguing to see both titles examining value. Money and earnings matter of course, but EoD also looks at other measures of worth including the effects of social media’s empathy economy, the viability of co-op run studios and the inflated claims made by visa applicants to work in US design.
Beautifully designed (this time by David Benski) and produced, the issue is littered with price stickers accounting for elements of the issue’s production – the donated paper is noted as costing $0.00. Page 23 doesn’t have a sticker but is at the heart of a vital story.
The rush of New York graphics talent to silicon valley is a great unspoken tale of our age. In some respects no different to other rushes – magazine publishing in the sixties, music in the eighties – this differs in its anonymity. I can name over a dozen senior magazine creatives who have disappeared into Apple, Facebook et al, as well as many more junior designers.
I say disappeared because all are prevented from discussing their work by heavy duty NDA contracts. Once regulars on the design circuit, I find it sad that such a wealth of design talent is denied a public voice in this way. (UPDATE: as I write, the launch of Apple News+ earlier this week was fronted by the rare sight of one of the missing, Wyatt Mitchell, late of Wired, New Yorker et al).
And what of the work they create behind those NDAs? West coast designer and silicon valley refusenik Lyndsay Ballant declares on page 23, ‘When we look back on this era, the designers who helped shape the image of these tech titans will rightly be treated as if they worked for cigarette brands in the ’60s.’
Other opinions are less caustic in the 10-page feature by James Gady, but whatever your stance it’s great to see this subject aired.
Founder/director: Perrin Drumm
Managing editor: Liz Stinson
Senior editors: Emily Gosling, Meg Miller
Associate editor and art director: Madeleine Morley
Designer: Tala Safie
Design, this issue: David Benski