Paul Rand: A Designer’s Words

There are many reasons it’s great to get things from Steven Heller. The top reason is that he has great things. The second-top reason is that when we’re lucky, he’s written about an item, and it saves us a lot of work. He’s written about this particular item in Print. Here’s what he had to say on June 14, 2011:

On April 3, 1998 the School of Visual Arts held a Paul Rand Symposium in New York City. To commemorate the event Nathan Garland, Georgette Ballance and I edited a keepsake titled “Paul Rand: A Designer’s Words,” a collection of many Rand quotes from various sources. It was printed by Rand’s favorite printer, Mossberg & Co., typeset by his favorite typesetters, PDR (A Division of AGT), and produced with his favorite paper, Mohawk Superfine. Nathan Garland’s design was true to Rand’s typographic aesthetic.

What is instructive about this thin volume is the critical mass of inspiring ideas and off-hand comments forging a designer’s philosophy. In fact, in the section on “Philosophy” he said: “Design is a way of life, a point of view. It involves the whole complex of visual communications: talent, creative ability, manual skill, and technical knowledge. Aesthetics and economics, technology and psychology are intrinsically related to the process.” (Graphis, 1981)