Bio, David Carson
David Carson is
principal and chief designer of David Carson Design, Inc. with offices
in del mar,california and zurich switzerland.
Carson graduated
with “honors and distinction” from San Diego state university, where he
received a BFA degree in sociology. A former professional surfer, he
was ranked #9 in the world during his college days. Numerous groups
including the New York Type Directors Club, American
Center for Design and I.D. magazine have recognized his studio’s work
with a wide range of clients in both the business and arts worlds.
Carson and his work have been featured in over 180 magazine and
newspaper articles around the world, including a feature in Newsweek
magazine, and a front page article in the new york times .
London-based Creative Review magazine dubbed Carson “Art Director of the
Era.” The American Center for Design (Chicago) called his work on Ray
Gun magazine “the most important work coming out of America.” His work
on Beach Culture magazine won “Best Overall Design” and “Cover of the
Year” from the Society of Publication Designers in New York.
Carson’s first book, with Lewis Blackwell, The End of Print, (forward by
David Byrne) is the top selling graphic design book of all time,
selling over 200,000 copies, and printed in 5 different languages.The
work featured in The End of Print is the subject of various one-man
exhibitions throughout Europe and Latin America,Asia and Australia.
Carson’s other titles include 2nd Sight, Fotografiks (with design
historian Philip Meggs). He has two recently released books, TREK and
The Book of Probes with Marshall McLuhan. David is also art director for
the Mcluhan estate(“the medium is the message”).
Carson
lectures extensively throughout the world, as well as at colleges
throughout the U.S., including Cranbrook, ARTcenter, Notre dame, RISD
and Cal Arts. He has had numerous one man exhibitions of his work
worldwide, and has spoken at over 100professional symposiums, including
“Designer As Editor” at the Design Institute in Amsterdam. He teaches a
week long workshop at the school of visual arts in nyc each summer.
The International Center for Photography (NY) singled out Carson as the
“Designer of the Year” for his use of photography and design. Print
Magazine proclaimed his work “Brilliant,” while USA Today described it
as “visually stunning,” adding that his design of Ray Gun Magazine “may
actually get young people reading again.”
Typography, a title
published by Graphis magazine (NY), lists Carson as a “Master of
Typography.” I.D. magazine chose Carson for their list of “America’s
most innovative designers”. A feature in newsweek magazine said of Carson “he changed the public face of graphic design”. The graphic
design publication Emigre devoted an entire issue to Carson, the only
American designer to be so honored in the magazine’s history. And in
April 2004, London based creative review magazine calls David, “the most
famous graphic designer on the planet”. David recently picked up 4 gold
awards at the Charleston ADDY awards, including a “special judges
award” for “professionalism”.
In the past few years, Carson
has branched out into film and television to direct commercials and
videos. He directed the launch commercials for Lucent technologies and
teamed up with William Burroughs in Carson’s short film, “The End of
Print”. He also collaborated with Harvard Business School professor John
Kao on a documentary entitled “The Art and Discipline of Creativity.”
David designed the worldwide branding campaign for Microsoft, as well as
the worldwide advertising for Giorgio Armani (Milan). He has appeared
in advertisements endorsing Apple Computers, Samsung monitors and
various paper companies. Carson has art directed and designed Surfer,
twSkateboarding, twSnowboarding, Beach Culture, and Ray Gun magazines.
He has an extensive list of international clients: Nine Inch nails,
Toyota, mercedes benz, Bank of montreal, Microsoft, Quiksilver, Meg
Ryan, David Byrne, Bush, Pepsi, and Xerox.
David is featured
in both “The History of Graphic Design” by Philip Meggs, as well as”The
Encylopedia of Surfing” by Matt Warsaw.
He designed a special
issue of Surfing Magazine titled “Explorations” which came out in July
of ’04. He also recently directed a television commercial for the
progressive UMPQUA Bank in Seattle, Washington.
David’s work
continues to be subjective and largely driven by intuition, with an
emphasis on reading material before designing it, and experimenting with
ways to communicate in a variety of mediums. Carson remains a hands on
designer, keeping his studio small and mobile.
http://www.davidcarsondesign.com/t/about/
Carson's work will be helpful in my 2D course because it's an example of the flexibility type has. He shows how words can be beautiful as objects rather than a readable words.
