Paul Rand is responsible for a number of iconic pieces of graphic design (e.g., the classic IBM logo), and this is a nice short film combining examples of his work with short snippets that I assume came from interviews with him. Some great quotes include
A work of art is realized
when form and content are indistinguishable.
When form predominates, meaning is blunted,
but when content predominates, interest lags.
But the genius comes in when both of these things fuse.
and
Don’t try to be original, just try to be good. That might sound naive, but it’s true.
There’s a neat bit where he goes over the “language of form”, listing important concepts like texture, shape, balance, and tension. It would be fun to sift through my photographs and look for a good examples of each of these. And probably revealing as well, since I strongly suspect some of his terms would be much better represented in my images than others.
Tip o’ the cap to Panopticist for the pointer via 37Signals.
