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Paula Scher

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Juan Romero
ART 4900
Professor Klein

Paula Scher has been at the forefront of graphic design for four decades. She has worked on everything from album and magazine covers to corporate and brand identities. She has also taught classes and written books on graphic design and has won countless awards, including a 2001 AIGA Medal. It is an illustrious career that continues to this day. During her time as a graphic designer, Paula has approached her work with the populist viewpoint meaning her designs would mix in popular culture as a way to draw in people. She does not have a specific style though. Her work has ranged from extremely clean-cut to very in your face designs, all depending on what it’s for.

Some of her most famous designs were the designs she made for The Public Theater’s production of Bring in ‘da Noise, Bring in ‘da Funk. This particular design incorporates the musical’s main actor surrounded by blocks of words. All the words are going in various directions to mimic motion, which is meant to represent the dancing from the production. The title of the production, along with the names of other productions at The Public Theater, are presented in a large, bold san serif font. The name of the authors of the productions, and other information, is presented in a very small, red san serif font. All of this is presented against a yellow background, thus making everything on the poster stand out.

This second Paula Scher design is one of her most recognizable. Designed back in 1976, this design has stood the test of time. The design incorporates bright colors over a black backdrop. She used guitars and made them look like spaceships (something I had never noticed until just now) and created contrast between the different elements of the design by using bright reds and blues. She also displays Boston, both the band’s and the album’s name, in a bright yellow stylized font on the center of the top of the cover. At the time, album covers mostly featured a picture of the band so this was a good change of pace and add some mystic to who could be behind the album. Though Scher believes the design to be “mediocre”, it is one of the most iconic album covers ever created.

Ultimately, Paula Scher has done and continues to do a great job of embodying and representing her subjects in her work. She continues to create identities the stand the test of time.

Herb Ritts

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Juan Romero

ART 4900

Professor Klein

Herb Ritts was born in Los Angeles in 1952. Before getting into photography, he went into the family furniture business before going to college for economics and art history. It wasn’t until he and his friend Richard Gere decided to shoot in front of an old Buick that he really became interested in photography and found success. Following this, he soon became a very well known commercial photographer and also became known for directing award-winning music videos.

This photograph exemplifies the style that Ritts would come to be known for in his career. Here Richard Gere stands in front of an old Buick with not much else going on. Portraits are meant to emphasize the subject of the photograph, which he accomplished by going with simple environments. He also mostly kept his photographs in black-and-white, which I feel also helps accomplishes what a portrait is meant to do. Instead of bright colors possibly drawing your focus to something that’s unimportant in the background, you are forced to really look at and examine the photograph before being drawn to the most prominent element. I also feel as though the black-and-white allows for more emotions to come through.

While most of his photographs were of celebrities, Ritts also took photographs like the one above. These were meant to truly emphasize and show off the human physique. The lighting along with the black-and-white creates contrast on their bodies and emphasizes the crevices on their bodies. The detail on their bodies resembles what you would expect when seeing a statue like Michelangelo’s David or other similar Greek statues. This Greek influence probably came from his previous studies in art history.

Overall, I find Herb Ritts’ photography to be very interesting. The lack of color and lack of elaborate environments or props makes it easy to identify what it is that he wants you to look at.