The Education of a Graphic Designer

Revised and updated, this compelling collection of essays, interviews, and course syllabi is the ideal tool to help teachers and students keep up in the rapidly changing field of graphic design. Top designers and educators talk theory, offer proposals, discuss a wide range of educational concerns—such as theory versus practice, art versus commerce, and classicism versus postmodernism—and consider topics such as emerging markets, shifts in conventions, global impact, and social innovation. Building on the foundation of the original book, the new essays address how graphic design has changed into an information-presenting, data-visualization, and storytelling field rooted in art and technology. The forward-thinking course syllabi are designed for the increasingly specialized needs of undergraduate and graduate students. Personal anecdotes from these designers about their own educations, their mentors, and their students make this an entertaining and illuminating idea book.

The book features writing from: Lama Ajeenah, Roy R. Behrens, Andrew Blauvelt, Max Bruinsma, Chuck Byrne, Moira Cullen, Paula J. Curran, Louis Danziger, Liz Danzico, Meredith Davis, Sheila de Bretteville, Carla Diana, Johanna Drucker, Milton Glaser, Rob Giampietro, April Greiman, Sagi Haviv, Lorraine Justice, Jeffery Keedy, Julie Lasky, Warren Lehrer, Ellen Lupton, Victor Margolin, Andrea Marks, Katherine McCoy, Ellen McMahon, J. Abbott Miller, Sharyn O’Mara, Rick Poynor, Chris Pullman, Michael Rock, Katie Salen, Douglass Scott, Steven Skaggs, Virginia Smith, Kerri Steinberg, Gunnar Swanson, Ellen Mazur Thomson, Michael Vanderbyl, Veronique Vienne, Lorraine Wild, Richard Wilde, Judith Wilde, and Michael Worthington.

Allworth Press, an imprint of Skyhorse Publishing, publishes a broad range of books on the visual and performing arts, with emphasis on the business of art. Our titles cover subjects such as graphic design, theater, branding, fine art, photography, interior design, writing, acting, film, how to start careers, business and legal forms, business practices, and more. While we don't aspire to publish a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are deeply committed to quality books that help creative professionals succeed and thrive. We often publish in areas overlooked by other publishers and welcome the author whose expertise can help our audience of readers.

Steven Heller is co-chair of the MFA Design (Designer as Author + Entrepreneur) program at New York’s School of Visual Arts and writes a weekly column for TheAtlantic.com. He is the author, editor, and co-editor of more than 170 books on design and popular culture and in 2011 received a Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum National Design Award. He lives in New York City.