Feature: Visual culture
Reputations: Jean Widmer
‘Signage reflects both the complexity of space and the way a place is organised. And it is very satisfying’
General Idea: Infiltrate, infect and mutate
Ignoring the boundaries between art and design, this Canadian trio worked in both fields with an eclectic mix of language, humour and commercialism
A designer and a one-man band
Cranbrook’s song and dance man goes back to college with a bang
Reputations: Terry Jones
‘I’m a creative director. I work with photographers. Years ago I said design is a piece of piss. Design is something that shouldn’t be complicated.’
Big subject, little pictures
Joe Sacco uses the comics medium to describe the lives of Palestinians
Laptop aesthetics
A crackly, digital approach informs one of three current design trends.
Look away
‘The South’, Seymour Chwast’s special civil rights issue of Push Pin Graphic, was a virtuoso display of graphic design authorship
Reputations: Maira Kalman
‘I was out walking the dear dog and I saw 500 things that made me want to make art.’
Cute culture
The Japanese obsession with cute icons is rooted in cultural tradition
A terrible beauty
The atomic bomb’s mushroom cloud has become the logo of annihilation