Projector magazine. Issue #21
The first section features Alexay Brodovich, who got famous in the US, where 1934 to 1958 he worked as the art director of Harper’s Bazaar, an iconic fashion magazine of the XX century. He dramatically changed the approach to magazine design, having turned a fashionable luster into the example of high designer art. The figure of Brodovith is tragic in many ways. «In Portfolio, Brodovich would write about artists, designers, and national design schools. He created incredibly beautiful spreads, combining the works by French poets and bizarre items of street graffiti. It was the mix of all kinds of art. Unfortunately, only three issues came out. Non-profit ideals and the lack of advertising quickly bankrupted the publishers». We must seriously consider the future of Projector!
Next comes a long interview with Stefan Sagmeister, a world celebrity in graphic design, and, perhaps, the most famous designer of the 2000s. The calligrapher, typographer, manmade lettering expert, the winner of all possible professional awards who got his first «big prize» at the Golden Bee in Moscow, 1998. Sagmeister has a little studio in New York. Why doesn’t he extend the business, why does he go to the middle of nowhere every seven years, what’s most important in the design process, what are his ideas of money, work and leisure — read it all in the interview with Stefan.
The first half of the magazine has quite a lettering approach. Section «Lettering» is devoted to another designer-experimenter, Oded Ezer, who is a true wizard. The mind boggles at what he does with with letters. In his lab, they come alive, spread tentacles out, creep away into the corners and behave completely unbridled. Having left the plain sheet of paper, where they are normally supposed to exist, they’ve entered the third dimension and formed a new genre Typo (3D-) graphic design. This is, however, already the closed chapter, as Oded says. The experiment never ends. I’ve spoken to Oded, and here’s the interview.
The LightMusic series, our joint project with Artlight, is going on, and I want to share some new items. For a new lamp, we have chosen a waldhorn (its shape is amazing and beautiful!), but I decided to paint it black, retaining the original copper glow of the inner surface of the bell, where a large lamp is inserted. The black metal evokes blue-finished weapon associations, so it’s obviously a very masculine object. Its glittering bell jaws bear a double function: firstly, they are an aesthetic solution, secondly — the polished copper reflects and scatters light just perfectly.
Another designer object we want to show is the Stone — the screen system by Vertti Kivi studio (the largest design studio in Finland, by the way). For me, the Stone reminds of the beautiful film Play Time by Jacques Tati, created back in 1967. It’s no coincidence the film is considered one of the most designer movies of the XX century. The relationship between a man and the architectural environment of a modern city is given in an ironic and subtle French style. And there’s an interview again. Being at the presentation of the object in Helsinki, I could not miss the opportunity to ask the designer some questions.
Yet another interview, this time collective. All the six co-founders of the Dutch architectural community Collective Amsterdam visited St.Petersburg in the autumn to present a new project on commission of a local real estate company. Dutch design and architecture keep surprising me. This time Collective Amsterdam and I talked about the tactics of a group work, methods of a creative process, and getting new customers — everything in the world, except for the new project. Well, or just a little about it. We’ll talk over it when they’re done.
In this publication, we keep talking about educational environment design. Meet the project Tetris, implemented by the Norwegian multi-tasking designer Bjorn-Kowalski Hansen. I had an opportunity to ask him a few questions. M.K.: You primarily consider yourself an artist — not an architect, a designer or a musician, right? B.-KH.: Yes, this is a pragmatic choice. It’s easier and more convenient — the artists have a great excuse: «That’s the way I see it! , ” and thus don’t have to explain anything at all. If one says they’re an architect, it sounds much more serious than it actually is. There’s a simplier attitude towards the artists. However, it sometimes involves certain arrogance. This is the only thing I don’t like about it».
All over the history of the longest and most consistent section #7 «Photography», we’ve had color pictures by our contributors only a couple of times through two dozens of publications. Monochromatic pics were nothing about a conceptual choice of the editorial board. It came by itself. And that’s why it’s even more joyful to publish the bright, juicy and sunny works by Irina Khorunzhaya in the darkest and dankest time of the year.
In section #8 «School», Sergey Helmyanov goes on talking about famous graduates of the Stieglitz Academy. For this publication, he turned the interview with Valery Semushkin, the designer of Niva, the iconic car of the Soviet car industry, into the direct speech. «We all, and me particularly, understood the notion „industrial designer“ quite literally. At first, I used to be told: do not go here, do not touch it, draw a beautiful thing. Then I responded: ‘“Who are you? A mechanician? And I’m an industrial designer, so do what I say! My job is the essence of the product, not just its style and external shape. And your business is to make it work!»
Mikhail Karasik continues the traditional historical column of section #9 «Books». This time, he talks about the typographic experiments of Igor Terentyev in the late 1910s — early 1920s. «Terentiev had a reputation of the most notorious futurist, „the most left of the left“, more left than his teammates Alexey Kruchennykh and Ilya Zdanevich. When in the early years of the revolution Mayakovsky, as the leader of the Petrograd „komfuts“ (Communists-Futurists), was rearranging Futurism into the new, communist way, far away from the capitals, in Tiflis, his younger „left side“ fellows organized the poetic group 41°.
This is the end of the main body of the magazine, and the beginning of special projects. For example, section #10 «ProArt» is this time dedicated only to Cyberfest. The most entertaining part of this festival — the performances and the exhibition of installations — is located on the fifth floor of Tkachi Creative Space. Artists Marina Koldobskaya and Anna Franz, the people who founded the festival and actively promote the cultural process, answer our questions.
Finally, this edition of Projector closes with the new section I started my review with — «ProFashion». Its pilot edition is dedicated to the International Aurora Fashion Week.
Next comes an exclusive interview with magnificent Valerie Steele — the fashion historian, PhD (Yale University), director and chief curator of the Museum in New York Institute of Fashion Technology. In 1997, she founded the international magazine Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body & Culture, and is still its chief editor. She gas written 17 books; the three-volume Encyclopedia of Clothing and Fashion was published under her editorship. The Washington Post described her as «the most intelligent woman in the world of fashion», and the journalists of The New York Times call he «the heeled historian». Valerie was included into the list of 50 most influential people in the world of fashion according to The New York Daily News.
And at the very end of the section, there’s Skif Fashion — an insane show by the dress-designers Andrey Bartenev, Svetlana Petrova, and Sergey Chernov, the associates of Sergey Kuryokhin and Pop-Mechanic, which cheered Aurora Fashion Week outright!
