certificate in graphic design
It started out innocently enough. In 2009, after leaving my position at Accenture but not able to work for a competitor for eighteen months, I found myself with a lot of time on my hands. I started dabbling in digital photography with the camera I purchased with my American Express frequent user points (all those business trips to the west coast finally paid off!).
Soon I was eager to enhance some of those photos in the post-production process but my photoshop skills were nonexistent. What better way to learn photoshop than to take a class? I was interested not only in the mechanics of photoshop but how to get a certain refined aesthetic from it. So I figured I would take a class at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
I showed up one Saturday morning in January 2010, at the SMFA building across the street from the Museum of Fine Art in the Fenway neighborhood of Boston. I was completely ill-at-ease and wondering why – why did I choose to do this here rather than in a place a bit less intimidating? All around me young, budding talents were toiling away with paint and clay and wood and, yes, computers, under the guidance of accomplished artists. After 30 years in the corporate world this place was about as foreign to me as stepping foot on Mars.
The assignment was to capture the essence of an artist or other personality in a portrait composed only of typographical elements.
The assignment was to create a poster illustrating one of the 30 freedoms in the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The assignment was to create a cd cover of a recording.
Graphical Interpretation: beginning with a photo of an animal or thing, create a graphical interpretation that captures the essence of your object in the simplest form.
Digital Collage of Marc Chagall's Violinist in Blue
The assignment was to re-create a masterpiece as a digital collage using photos of objects reshaped and transformed into the elements of the original work. This side: my reinterpretation. Other side (on hover): Marc Chagall’s masterpiece Violinist in Blue.
Slowly the feeling of being a foreigner in a strange land diminished and I began to feel at home — more like the black sheep of the family than the prodigal son to be sure. After the Digital Photography class I took an introductory graphic design class , and after that an intermediate graphic design class, and then a typography class and a digital collage class – and more. It was fun, challenging (for me), liberating, and ultimately a beautiful experience. I tapped into a side of me that had long been malnourished. Soon enough, eighteen months later I had finished the requirements for the certificate in graphic design. Just in time, too, because I was starting a new position at KPMG!
At the SMFA, I learned a great deal about graphic design and composition and color and type and collage. But what I really came to appreciate is the talent found in SMFA’s students and and the beautiful work they create.
Even as my comfort with being at the SMFA grew, my aspirations were tempered by an appropriate degree of humility and humbleness. My work was ok for the most part only occasionally rising to a level that “sings” .
To the woman at the Staples store in Needham MA who asked me if she could have one of the throwaway copies of my Edgar Allan Poe portrait I was printing there the day it was due — bless your heart!
On this page is a sample of the work I did at the SMFA. Be kind!
Notebooks and Presentations
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The assignment involved creating a poster using only type and text for a series of holiday concerts.
CD Cover, Insert and Tray Liner
The assignment was to create a complete CD package design including a four page folded insert with one section serving as the front cover, a tray liner that sits under the CD tray, and the CD disc label.
Four Page Magazine Spread
Using design elements of the Bauhaus period, construct a four page magazine layout that has the design sensibility of that period. The content may be any subject relative to the era. Think about color, shape and form.
Self Portrait
The assignment was to create a non-digital self-portrait using any medium or collage.
acrylic on paper
Collage Studies
