Work by students Sophie Buskin, Jodie Chiou and Niyati Shah, created during the Fall 2023 semester in Graphic Design: Learning from the Masters, our 10-week online course, part of SVA’s Continuing Education Design Program.
Learning from the Masters, Fall 2023
Advanced Type, Fall 2022
Pages from books designed in our Fall 2022 Advanced Type I class at the School of Visual Arts, by BFA students Elaine Zeng, Shida Xu, Renee Yan, Yishuai Zheng, Tian Qin, Zhengyang Rong, Maggie Qian, Morgan Dyer, Olivia Shank, Lucas Engvall & Zihao Dong.
Principles of Visual Language: Form & Color
Designs created by students in the Summer 2021 session of Form & Color. Many thanks to Qimei, Hannah, Zach, Rachel, Lulu, Erik, Shawn, Maya and Amanda, whose work from the class is shown here.
Basic Type Design student work: Fall 2019 revisited
the perfect paragraph, Fall 2019 revisited
Book design projects by students in
Advanced Type: The Perfect Paragraph, Fall 2019
The Elements of Euclid
An original design of The Elements of Euclid, Book 1, Definitions
inspired by the version published in 1847 by Oliver Byrne in London
The Development of Writing
A redesign of The Development of Writing, by Ms. Ed. Meyer
published by Graphis Press Zurich
An Anthology of American Classics
A redesign of An Anthology of American Classics
originally designed by Bradbury Thompson for friends of Westvaco
Basic Graphic Design Student work, Fall 2019 revisited
The Bauhaus
Designs inspired by the work of Herbert Bayer
Abstract type compositions
Designs inspired by the type paintings of Elaine Lustig-Cohen
Opera and film posters
Designs inspired by the work of Armin Hofmann and Saul Bass
Grid systems
Page layouts for design catalogs, inspired by the work of Josef Muller-Brockmann
Learning from the Masters Summer 2020
The final project for students in Learning from the Masters is a catalog of their work from the class. Shown above are pages from catalogs designed by 4 excellent students during our recent summer session: Anne Benkowitz, Kari Dubin, Amy Carroll and Thomas Onik. Many thanks to these dedicated, hardworking students!
Color Workshop: Life Beyond Black White & Red
Work from the recent 5-week online Color Workshop, by students Olivia, Matthew, Elizabeth, Jiahui, Siri, Erana, Sasha, Rachel, Thomas, David, Ryan, Andrea and Nada. Many thanks to you all for making the class a success.
Form & Color: Summer 2020
These designs were created by Derek, Minna, Lucy, Makaela and Ellen, students in our online class Principles of Visual Language: Form & Color, Summer 2020.
In this 12-week online class, students learn and practice two-dimensional design and color theory:
Week 1: black & white
Week 2: primary colors
Week 3: grayscale
Week 4: monochromatic/analogous
Week 5: warm/cool
Week 6: complementary contrast
Week 7: Albers color illusion
Week 8: transparency
Week 9: color systems
Week 10: color expression
Week 11: visual narrative
Week 12: catalog design
The lectures, demonstrations and assignment briefs are presented as asynchronous content, in the form of text, slideshows and videos. Weekly Zoom meetings are dedicated to critiques and discussions of the students’ work.
At the conclusion of the course, each student produces a digital catalog of their work—a mini-portfolio that can be displayed on the web and social media.
Patterns!
Pattern compositions by first-year design students in Principles of Visual Language, inspired by traditional Tapa cloth. All approximately 20 x 30 inches, ink on paper; December 2019.
Scenes from a recent Color Workshop
Life Beyond Black, White & Red
October 26, 2019, School of Visual Arts
Learning from the Masters: Student work from Summer 2019
A Trip to the Moon: The Story of Apollo 11
A stop-motion, cut-paper, collaborative project by students in SVA's Pre-college advertising design workshop, July 2019. Thanks to students Harry, O.J., Julianna, Matt & Melanie. Special thanks to TA Shin!
Scenes from recent Color Workshops
“Pure joy.”
That’s how a designer who took part in our recent on-site color workshop at SYPartners described the experience.
For me, the workshop instructor, hearing this is also pure joy. That’s the effect of playing with color.
For the last 18 years, I’ve been very lucky to do something I truly love—teaching people how to love color. At the School of Visual Arts, I teach color theory in my foundation classes for advertising & graphic design students. In my typography classes, I encourage students to always consider color. And I lead one-day color workshops in SVA’s Continuing Education program, called Life Beyond Black, White & Red.
And now, I’m very happy to offer on-site color workshops.
The color workshop requires 6 hours—all in one day, or divided into two 3-hour sessions. Ideally, everyone works together in the same room on shared tables. The materials we use are simple: Color-aid paper, mounting boards, scissors and glue.
The color workshops have been a great success. The experience itself is positive—just the act of sorting colors is therapeutic. The lessons learned through hands-on color exercises are engaging, memorable, and useful in profession practice. The take-away is an intense awareness of how we actually perceive color.
SVA CE Info Session 2019
Here is the slideshow from my SVA Continuing Education presentation on 1/9/19. This slideshow includes photos from the color workshop, and pages from portfolio catalogs produced by students in the online classes, Learning from the Masters, and Form and Color.
form + color: student work from the spring session
The designs in this slideshow were created by students Esther, Hana, Hava, Mathilde, Mia, Nefaur and Roger, in the online class Principles of Visual Language: Form and Color, January–April 2017.
In Form and Color, students explore ways to create engaging and memorable two-dimensional design. Using accessible materials and simple techniques, both handmade and digital, they experiment with design principles and color theory, including: figure and ground; unity of form; contrasts (geometric & organic forms, shape, size, direction, texture); unit/super-unit/pattern; visual hierarchy, harmony, rhythm and narrative; the seven color contrasts; color illusion and color expression.
The goal of this course is for each student to develop a creative toolkit of ideas and techniques, to embrace a unique awareness of form and color, and strengthen design skills. The lectures and assignments encourage students to adopt a a disciplined, yet playful, creative process.
Form and Color is led by instructor Richard Mehl. The class is fully online and asynchronous. Students participate in weekly modules according to their own schedule. Assignments are submitted using VoiceThread, a learning platform that allows students to see the work of their classmates, and add voice or text comments. In addition to peer review, students receive weekly detailed comments from the instructor.
Work from the Fall session
The work in this collection was created during the Fall session of the online class Principles of Visual Language: Form & Color. Many thanks to students Khadijah, Mirna, Lizzie, Laura, Lauren, Audrey, Jennifer and Kening for their hard work and dedication—the success of the class belongs to them.
The Fall session was our first using VoiceThread, an interactive platform that gives students the means to upload images with written or voice comments about their own work, and comment on the work of their classmates. The students in the Fall session took full advantage of this new feature, especially voice commenting—by mid-point in the course, they were discussing the work using the language of design. VoiceThread has added great value to the course—we can now more fully embrace Josef Albers' teaching philosophy of practice followed by theory.
SVA PreCollege 2016 class project
Homage to David Bowie, a cut-paper stop motion animation created by students in my SVA PreCollege class Unconventional Advertising, July 2016.
Still frame by student Clara K. "Life on Mars" performed by Seu Jorge. Photographed and lovingly edited by Anthony Carhuayo. Thanks to my dedicated student animators: Clara K, Erica L, Samantha P, Alana G, Riva W, Julie T and Jenny Z for their excellent work!
form + color: recent work by online students
These compositions were recently created by students in the online class Principles of Visual Language: Form and Color. The image grid is arranged in reverse chronological order, beginning with final projects, and concluding with the first assignments of the semester—tangrams.
Many thanks to my talented students—Barney, Alexandra, Molly, Sarah, Ben, Alice, Lily, Jackson, Kris, Daniela, Gabriella, Nancy, Aditi, Mitra, Donald, Helen and Sethi—for their good work and dedication to the study of design!
tape drawing
Tape drawing: a collaborative assignment created in approximately 30 minutes by students in my Wednesday Visual Language class.
The goals of the assignment:
- collaboration—build upon the work of your partners
- unity of form—create a composition entirely of triangular shapes
- contrast of size and shape—create a variety of different triangles...different sizes, different shapes
- color contrast—use colors to create visual hierarchy...lines that appear to emerge and recede
Many thanks to my students—Gisell, Bairu, Rad, Pierre, Steven, Kayla, Cindy, Min, Sarah, Emily, Alice, James, Thomas, Jessica, Sujin, Gaeun, Debbie, Tut, Milaci, Matthew, Sahir, Brandon, Tamara, Woo Jae.