Alvin Lustig

Last updated
Alvin Lustig
BornFebruary 8, 1915
Denver, Colorado, US
DiedDecember 5, 1955(1955-12-05) (aged 40)
New York City, US
Occupation(s) Graphic designer, Interior designer, typographer
Spouse Elaine Lustig Cohen (m.1948)

Alvin Lustig (February 8, 1915 - December 5, 1955) was an American book designer, [1] graphic designer and typeface designer. Lustig has been honored by the American Institute of Graphic Arts and the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame for his significant contributions to American design.

Contents


Biography

He was born on February 8, 1915, to Harry Lustig and Jeanette Schamus in Denver, Colorado.

Lustig studied design at Los Angeles City College, Art Center College of Design, but did not obtain a degree. [2] [3] In 1935, he spent three months studying independently with architect Frank Lloyd Wright at his Taliesin studio. The next year, he worked with French painter Jean Charlot. [4] He began his career designing book jackets in 1937 in Los Angeles, California. In 1944 he became Director of Visual Research for Look Magazine. He also designed for Fortune, and Girl Scouts of the United States. [5]

He appeared in filmmaker Maya Deren's At Land (1944), a 15-minute silent experimental film. Lustig's character is a man playing chess against himself.

In addition to his many contributions to graphic design, Lustig was an accomplished interior and architectural designer. In 1949, he designed what has become known as the "Lustig Chair" for Paramount Furniture in Beverly Hills, CA. [6] His original design continues to inspire modern interiors and replications of the chair are still in production. Lustig's interior design work also influenced younger designers like Paul Tuttle.

Josef Albers invited him to teach graphic design at Black Mountain College in 1945, and again at Yale in 1951. [7] Lustig taught at Yale through 1953 as a Visiting Critic in graphic arts, and helped shape its graduate program in design, the first such program of its kind. [8] [9]

New Directions

Lustig maintained a successful professional relationship with New Directions Publishing for almost a decade, producing some of his most iconic and innovative work for the independent publishing company. He designed more than seventy dust jackets for the New Classics literary series from 1945 until his death in 1955. His abstract designs incorporated a modern design sensibility with a groundbreaking approach to typeface design and the unconventional dust jacket became a hallmark of New Directions publications. [6] His artwork was featured on the covers of classic works of modernist literature, including the works of James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, William Carlos Williams, and Ezra Pound. Several Tennessee Williams plays were published by New Directions during this period and Lustig's art was included on the first edition covers of these works, including A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof .

Blindness and death

Lustig developed diabetes as a teenager. As a result of diabetes by 1954 he was virtually blind. [10] Ivan Chermayeff apprenticed under Lustig after he had lost his sight, and later recounted that he would essentially dictate a design: "…Indent 12 picas, flush left. Use 10 or 12 point Futura Gothic extended lower case…" [11]

Lustig developed Kimmelstiel-Wilson syndrome, an incurable kidney disease connected to diabetes. He died at the age of 40 of diabetes-related complications on December 4, 1955. [12]

Elaine Lustig Cohen, Lustig's wife and fellow graphic designer, took over his New York City design firm after his death on December 5, 1955. She was awarded an AIGA Medal in 2011 for her contributions to American graphic design. [13]

Legacy

Lustig was inducted into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame in 1986. [4]

In 1993, the American Institute of Graphic Arts awarded Lustig a posthumous AIGA Medal. AIGA awards designers whose work has had "significant impact on the practice of graphic design in the United States." [14]

In 2013, New Directions announced that they will be reissuing a selection of their classic titles with the original Lustig cover designs. In May 2013, New Directions will begin selling a series of postcards and other stationery featuring the artwork of Alvin Lustig. [15]

The collective works of Alvin Lustig and Elaine Lustig Cohen were showcased in a special exhibit at the AIGA National Design Center in New York City from December 2010 to February 2013. The exhibit, titled The Lustigs: A Cover Story, was the first to show the work of Alvin and Elaine Lustig together in the same collection. [16]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Seymour Chwast</span> American graphic designer

Seymour Chwast is an American graphic designer, illustrator, and type designer.

Stefan G. Bucher is an American writer, graphic designer and illustrator. He works through his design studio, 344 Design.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Institute of Graphic Arts</span> Professional organization for design

The American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) is a professional organization for design. Its members practice all forms of communication design, including graphic design, typography, interaction design, user experience, branding and identity. The organization's aim is to be the standard bearer for professional ethics and practices for the design profession. There are currently over 25,000 members and 72 chapters, and more than 200 student groups around the United States. In 2005, AIGA changed its name to “AIGA, the professional association for design,” dropping the "American Institute of Graphic Arts" to welcome all design disciplines. AIGA aims to further design disciplines as professions, as well as cultural assets. As a whole, AIGA offers opportunities in exchange for creative new ideas, scholarly research, critical analysis, and education advancement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven Heller (design writer)</span> American art historian

Steven Heller is an American art director, journalist, critic, author, and editor who specializes in topics related to graphic design.

Lorraine Wild is a Canadian-born American graphic designer, writer, art historian, and teacher. She is an AIGA Medalist and principal of Green Dragon Office, a design firm that focuses on collaborative work with artists, architects, curators, editors and publishers. Wild is based in Los Angeles, California.

Alexander Isley is an American graphic designer and educator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Patrick Cronan</span> American designer, known for graphics and brand strategy

Michael Patrick Cronan was an American graphic designer, brand strategist, adjunct professor, and fine art painter. He was one of the founders of the San Francisco Bay Area postmodern movement in graphic design, that later became known as the "Pacific Wave".

Katherine McCoy is an American graphic designer and educator, best known for her work as the co-chair of the graduate Design program for Cranbrook Academy of Art.

Alvin Eisenman was an American graphic designer and educator throughout the last half of the 20th century. He was most notable for founding and heading the Yale School of Art's graduate program in graphic design beginning in 1951 — the first graduate program in graphic design in the United States. He remained the director of that program until his retirement in 1990, at which point he was succeeded by Sheila Levrant de Bretteville. Eisenman continued to teach in the program through the 1990s.

Rudolph de Harak, also Rudy de Harak, was an American graphic designer. De Harak was notable as a designer who covered a broad spectrum of applications with a distinctly modernist aesthetic. He was also influential as a professor of design.

Elaine Lustig Cohen was an American graphic designer, artist and archivist. She is best known for her work as a graphic designer during the 1950s and 60s, having created over 150 designs for book covers and museum catalogs. Her work has played a significant role in the evolution of American modernist graphic design, integrating European avant-garde with experimentation to create a distinct visual vocabulary. Cohen later continued her career as a fine artist working in a variety of media. In 2011, she was named an AIGA Medalist for her achievements in graphic design.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deborah Sussman</span> American environmental graphic designer

Deborah Sussman was an American designer and a pioneer in the field of environmental graphic design. Her work incorporated graphic design into architectural and public spaces.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cary Graphic Arts Collection</span>

The Cary Graphic Arts Collection is a library and archive of books, type specimens, manuscripts, documents, and artifacts related to the history of graphical communication. Located in Wallace Library at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), in Henrietta, New York, the Cary Collection contains literate artifacts as old as cuneiform tablets and as recent as computer tablets and e-books, in all comprising some 40,000 volumes in addition to manuscripts, correspondence, printing types and traditional letterpress printing equipment.

Michael J. Walsh is an American designer and creative director who has worked or consulted at the School of Visual Arts, Harry N. Abrams, the Walt Disney Company, Time Inc, Turner Broadcasting, Time Warner and The Washington Post Magazine, among others. He has won over 300 awards for design and art direction in American and international awards competitions for digital, video, exhibition design, multimedia projects and print projects.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John T. Hill</span>

John T. Hill is an American artist. His work focuses mainly on design and photography.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Louis Danziger</span> American graphic designer and design educator

Louis Danziger is an American graphic designer and design educator. He is most strongly associated with the late modern movement in graphic design, and with a community of designers from various disciplines working in Southern California in the mid-twentieth century. He is noted for his iconoclastic approach to design, and for introducing the principles of European constructivism to the American advertising vernacular.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rob Roy Kelly</span> American graphic design educator and wood type collector (1925-2004)

Rob Roy Kelly was a design educator who established multiple design programs in the formative years of graphic design education at art schools and universities. Known as a collector and scholar of wood type, Mr. Kelly authored American Wood Type, 1828–1900 (1969). His comprehensive wood type collection now resides at the University of Texas.

Michael Mabry is an American graphic designer, illustrator, and educator, he is the Principal at Michael Mabry Design. He was one of the founders of the San Francisco Bay Area postmodern movement in graphic design, that later became known as the "Pacific Wave".

References

  1. ↑ Hollis, Richard (1994), Graphic Design: A Concise History, p. 102, ISBN   978-0-500-20270-8
  2. ↑ Heller, Steven; Lustig Cohen, Elaine (2010), Born Modern: The Life and Design of Alvin Lustig, p. 25, ISBN   978-0-8118-6127-4
  3. ↑ Kelly, Rob Roy (2001). "The Early Years of Graphic Design at Yale University". Design Issues. 17 (3): 3–14. ISSN   0747-9360 . Retrieved 23 August 2023.
  4. 1 2 "Art Directors Club: 1986 Hall of Fame: Alvin Lustig", Art Directors Club Hall of Fame, 1986, archived from the original on April 18, 2012, retrieved August 23, 2023
  5. ↑ Heller, Steven; Lustig Cohen, Elaine (2010), Born Modern: The Life and Design of Alvin Lustig, ISBN   978-0-8118-6127-4
  6. 1 2 "AIGA Medal: Alvin Lustig", American Institute of Graphic Arts, 1994, retrieved April 15, 2013
  7. ↑ Heller, Steven; Lustig Cohen, Elaine (2010), Born Modern: The Life and Design of Alvin Lustig, pp. 178–180, 185–187, ISBN   978-0-8118-6127-4
  8. ↑ Kelly, Rob Roy (2001). "The Early Years of Graphic Design at Yale University". Design Issues. 17 (3): 3–14. ISSN   0747-9360 . Retrieved 23 August 2023.
  9. ↑ "Alvin Lustig -- Office of the University Printer". printer.yale.edu. Yale University. Retrieved 23 August 2023.
  10. ↑ Heller, Steven (1993), "Born modern: painting is dead, long live the dustjacket. Alvin Lustig brought modern art into American bookshops", Eye Magazine, 10 (3), retrieved January 5, 2013
  11. ↑ Chantry, Art (2015). "Alvin Lustig: A nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse". In Rochester, Monica René (ed.). Art Chantry Speaks: A Heretic's History of 20th Century Graphic Design. Feral House. p. 139. ISBN   978-1-62731-009-3.
  12. ↑ Heller, Steven; Lustig Cohen, Elaine (2010), Born Modern: The Life and Design of Alvin Lustig, p. 11, ISBN   978-0-8118-6127-4
  13. ↑ "AIGA – Elaine Lustig Cohen", American Institute of Graphic Arts, 2011, retrieved April 15, 2013
  14. ↑ "AIGA Medal", American Institute of Graphic Arts, 2013, retrieved April 15, 2013
  15. ↑ "Fun With Alvin Lustig's Designs", New Directions, 2013, archived from the original on 2013-06-07, retrieved April 15, 2013
  16. ↑ "The Lustigs: A Cover Story", American Institute of Graphic Arts, 2013, archived from the original on April 9, 2013, retrieved April 15, 2013
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.