Artist Essay

JOHN MAEDA

It is hard to put John Maeda in a box with a label. It seems as if the amount of things he does goes far beyond the title of simply a designer. If we must try to define what Maeda does, we could say that he is an artist, a graphic designer, as well as a computer scientist. He was born on Seattle Washington in 1966. He was originally a software engineering student at MIT. It was there that he became fascinated with the work of Paul Rand and Muriel Cooper, both influential designers. He continued on at MIT to get his Bachelor's and Master's degree. He concluded his education by completing his doctorate in design from Tskuba University in Japan. Needless to say, with and education like the one he has achieved, Maeda is absolutely brilliant not only intellectually but creatively as well. Maeda is currently the president of Rhode Island School of Design, one of the leading art and design schools in the country.

After graduating Maeda worked as a designer, developing projects for brands such as Cartier, Google, Phillips, Reebok and Samsung. Also, in 1996 he became the Associate Director of Research at the MIT Media Lab. There he was responsible for managing multiple research relationships with industrial organizations. Some of his accomplishments include having his early digital media work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Since 2001, he has shown in galleries all around the world and they have all been guarded with high esteem. Maeda has also published multiple books, his most recent being called Laws of Simplicity, a book that discusses the theme of simplicity as it relates to the digital world. He has also been recognized a one of Esquire magazines 21 most important people of the 21st century.

It is hard to describe much of John Maeda's work. Much of it is highly intellectually driven and incorporates his vast knowledge of computer technology rather than just the use of design. It is easy to look at his work and appreciate it for the beauty and concept, but it is hard to get a good grasp on how exactly he went about doing it. Much of his work is typography driven. Upon visiting his website, I saw that he has tons of examples of his work. Some of it is interactive. One example tells you to move the curser around the page and a snowflake appears and transforms as you continue to move. I later realize that this is an interactive calendar.

Much of Maeda's work is like this, seemingly inconsequential little explorations. However, they are beautiful and well composed. His work is certainly relevant to this class because he exploring the digital media platform. The uses a lot of kinetic type to convey concepts. He completed a whole motion calendar series for Shisheido that utilizes moving letters and numbers, which serves as great inspiration for our current project. He also has more whimsical work. For Reebok, he designed a colorful sneaker with hand writing as a graphic. He really pushes the concept of type and how it can be used in motion. His work is very sleek and beautiful. That is what attracted me to his work initially. I find his work extremely compelling and think he has a lot offer the digital media world. He is really utilizing his computer science knowledge and marrying well with a design aesthetic.





Links:
www.maedastudio.com/