Author Archives: Chuck Spangler

Limitless Vision: Maggie Hendrie leads Interaction Design

Maggie Hendrie, Art Center's new Chair of Interaction Design. photo by Chuck Spangler

Maggie Hendrie, Art Center's new chair of Interaction Design.

Looking for that “Imagine If” Question: An Interview with Interaction Design Department Chair Maggie Hendrie

This coming Fall Term, as part of the College’s Create Change initiative, Art Center launches a new undergraduate Interaction Design degree program, in which students will learn to think deeply about user experience, apply technology creatively and invent new approaches to interaction and design.

We recently sat down with Interaction Design Department chair Maggie Hendrie and asked her what prospective students should know about the new program.

Dotted Line:  What is Interaction Design?

Maggie Hendrie: People interact with every object or system in their world, whether it’s human-made or natural. Interaction design is the process and craft of how people interact with artifacts, systems and services. We see this everywhere today in mobile apps, electronics, web sites, games, social networks and public spaces. Interaction design focuses on the user experience; how real people think, feel and behave when they use a product, environment or system.

Does Interaction Design go beyond working with technology?

Absolutely. What’s important is that you care about people and their experiences. You need to be able to ask, “What’s valuable and meaningful for people?” And then you need to be able to blueprint, wireframe, sketch or model what a solution to a problem might look like. Continue reading →

Legendary Automotive Illustrator Art Fitzpatrick Visits Campus

Art Fitzpatrick at Art Center College of Design. Photo by Chuck Spangler.

Art Fitzpatrick at Art Center College of Design. Photo: Chuck Spangler

Considered an icon in the milieu of automotive painting and design, Art Fitzpatrick, recently visited Art Center to share his life work and lessons with students.  With a career that stretched over seven decades, Fitzpatrick, is best known for his more than 700 auto advertisements.  His 1959-71 “Wide Track” campaign for Pontiac is considered by many to be the most recognizable, successful and influential auto ad artwork of all time.

Transportation Design faculty member Richard Pietruska is currently working with Fitzpatrick and arranged for him to visit with students.

“He is an amazing illustrator who has influenced many of us in the automotive design world from the 60′s and 70′s up to the present,” said Pietruska.  “His work captures the true essence of what the cars of that era represented and his passion and skill comes across in his brilliant technique.”

Fitzpatrick continues to produce paintings of his favorite cars today but now works mainly on the computer at his home in Carlsbad, California. He is also an honorary member of the Automotive Fine Arts Society who exhibit at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance.

Find out much more and see his beautiful work at www.fitz-art.com

Pasadena City Buses To Get the Ultimate Detailing

Bus riders soon will notice a new look, a new name, and find a fresh mobile phone app for travel around the City of Pasadena. Art Center students are creating a new identity for the Pasadena ARTS transit system that will guide riders throughout the region.

City officials are now choosing which proposed design to implement. Contrary to what you might guess, the ARTS bus is not merely a way to hit the city’s multiple arts and cultural venues. ARTS stands for the Area Rapid Transit System, which transports locals and visitors alike to various spots around town. To address the confusion around the moniker, the design brief also encouraged students to come up with a new name for the transit agency.

In the spirit of local engagement, Art Center’s Dean of Special Programs and Chair of the Graphic Design Department, Nik Hafermaas, suggested that the college’s Educational Partnerships team coordinate the project through an Identity Systems course taught by Gloria Kondrup.

“Our goal is to demonstrate that well conceived design can significantly improve our communities, said Hafermaas. “This is a wonderful chance for our students to make a positive contribution to our own neighborhood.”

In the class, each student developed a new brand name and a design standards manual to guide the implementation of the new identity through its various applications. The manual addressed the use of color, typography and image across many touch points. This includes new bus graphics, signage, bus shelters, the agency’s website and its forthcoming smartphone app.

In April, Mayor Bill Bogaard joined a team of city executives to review final presentations. Once a choice is made, the new brand will be implemented across all city marketing materials.

Three Boys from Pasadena Return Home to Art Center

UPDATE:  You’re invited to the closing party Thursday, Aug. 23 at 7 p.m.
Last chance to see exhibition honoring Helmut Newton

Join the photographers, models and friends for a celebration of this critically praised exhibition featuring the photography of three Art Center alumni who were mentored by Helmut Newton.  Please RSVP to suzanne.valles@artcenter.edu or call 626.396.2368 for more information.

On June 14, a packed house celebrated the Williamson Gallery’s opening reception for Three Boys from Pasadena, an exhibition of work by Art Center photography alums Mark Arbeit, George Holz, and Just Loomis.  The exhibit is accompanied by a tribute to famed fashion photographer Helmut Newton, with whom Mark, George, and Just each maintained a close and lifelong friendship after working for him early in their careers. In June 2010, Three Boys from Pasadena premiered at the Helmut Newton Foundation in Berlin. The companion book, with a foreword by June Newton, was published in France and is available in the Art Center student store. The Williamson Gallery exhibit is an expanded version of the original show, featuring an additional seventy prints, and will continue through August 26, 2012.

This exhibition is a homecoming, arriving back at the site of the first meeting between the Boys and Helmut. The exhibit consists of each photographer’s individual work, as well as several vitrines of memorabilia, consisting of snapshots, handwritten notes, journal pages, contact sheets, and other souvenirs. In the sensual, striking fashion editorial and portraiture by Mark, George and Just, a direct line of influence can be traced from Newton to his apprentices, while at the same time each of the three photographers’ body of work shows a departure from Newton’s strong influence and the development of a unique and independent voice.

Listen to the 3 Boys from Pasadena panel discussion

Art Center College of Design’s “Designmatters” Vice President Honored with Dell Social Innovation Education Award

Mariana Amatullo

Designmatters' Mariana Amatullo

Mariana Amatullo, vice president at Art Center College of Design and co-founder of Designmatters, the College’s social impact initiative, has won the inaugural Dell Social Innovation Education Award.  The honor recognizes outstanding leadership in teaching and supporting student social innovators.

Designmatters engages students, faculty and alumni from across disciplines in an ongoing exploration of the role of art and design in effecting large-scale sustainable change through innovative partnerships locally and around the world.  It is through the impressive outcomes generated by Designmatters that the College became the first design school to receive the United Nations’ Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) status.

“Art Center aspires to redefine and expand the role of the artist and designer into one who is a catalyst for social change and innovation, ” said Lorne M. Buchman, president, Art Center College of Design.  “Designmatters allows us to harness the power of creative imagination to effect that change.

“I’m very proud of what Mariana has created over the last decade and we congratulate her, “ Buchman continued. “We consider this award an endorsement as renewed encouragement to continue our commitment to contribute to, and learn from, our engagement in the social innovation space.”

“I am deeply honored to be selected as the inaugural recipient of this award,” said Amatullo. It has been my personal privilege and joy to be in a position of mobilizing the collective energy and creative talent of the Art Center community with an educational agenda for social impact through Designmatters.

“This award serves as a wonderful tribute to the body of work by our students, faculty, and staff during the last decade, and more broadly speaks of the growing recognition of the value of art and design in effecting consequential societal change,” she explained.

“We had many outstanding nominees for the Social Innovation Education Award,” said Dell  Challenge Executive Director Suzi Sosa, “however, Mariana stood out because of her ability to inspire institutional support for applying design solutions to social problems.”

Amatullo was chosen for her exemplary leadership and holistic approach in building new modes of engagement for art and design education with social impact, promoting broad collaboration through cross-sector partnerships with non-profit organizations, development agencies and industry. The award-winning and social innovation outcomes of Designmatters during the past decade are providing a key foundation for the framework of Media Design Matters, a new course of study in the Graduate Media Design Program at Art Center. Amatullo is co-leading Media Design Matters, which focuses on communication design at the intersection of new technology and social engagement.

She will be honored during the global awards ceremony on June 12th in Austin, Texas.

As part of the Dell Social Innovation Challenge, several Art Center student projects from the award-winning Safe Agua initiative, a Designmatters partnership with the Innovation Center of Un Techo Para Mi Pais, were named semi-finalists.  The projects focused on innovative design products and systems to overcome water poverty with families of slum-dwellers in Lima, Peru.

About Art Center College of Design

Founded in 1930 and located in Pasadena, California, Art Center College of Design is a global leader in art and design education. Art Center offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in a wide variety of art and design disciplines, as well as public programs for all ages and levels of experience. Renowned for its ties to industry and professional rigor, Art Center is recognized as a United Nations’ Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), providing students with opportunities to create design-based solutions for humanitarian and nonprofit agencies around the world. During the College’s 80-year history, Art Center’s alumni have had a profound impact on popular culture, the way we live, and important issues in our society.

To learn more

facebook.com/dellsocialinnovation

twitter.com/dellsocialinnov

artcenter.edu/designmatters

Space Stories Attracts Full House of Final Frontier Fans

Local Scientists Reveal Behind-the-Scenes Secrets of the Universe

At Art Center, being sandwiched geographically between the experimental and exploratory resources of innovative places like Caltech and Jet Propulsion Laboratory has its advantages – particularly for an ongoing series of exhibitions superimposing the domains of art and science at the college’s Williamson Gallery.

On Tuesday evening, May 1, one of those exhibitions, the Williamson’s landmark The History of Space Photography, took advantage of Art Center’s strong relationship with its nearby neighbors.  Lured from their star-studded light year calculations, exoplanet forays, and search for life-out-there, five space mission veterans interacted with an enthusiastic sold-out audience for SPACE STORIES, an informal meandering walk-around laced with spontaneous anecdotes, hidden facts, behind-the-scenes observations, and insider secrets on the history and future of the Final Frontier.

Introduced to the audience by Art Center Vice President and Williamson Gallery director Stephen Nowlin, were exhibition curator Jay Belloli; Dr. Randall Friedl, Deputy Director for Research, Engineering and Science Directorate, JPL; Dr. Robert Hurt, Spitzer Space Telescope Visualization Specialist, JPL/Caltech; David Doody, Realtime Flight Operations Lead Engineer, Cassini Mission, JPL; Jurrie van der Woude, Image Coordinator, Public Affairs Office, JPL (retired); and Dr. Randii Wessen, Science Systems Engineer and Deputy Manager, Project Formulation, JPL.

From the scientists’ outer-space to the gallery’s 4,600 square-foot inner-space where 150 spectacular photographs are on display, the spirit of exploration and discovery was present throughout as an abundance of tidbits and insights consumed the five roaming islands of rapt questioners and story-tellers.  It was a truly memorable evening, just what one might expect at the intersection of these three renowned art/science institutions in Pasadena.

The History of Space Photography’s premiere engagement began at the Williamson Gallery continues through May 6.  The exhibition is presently scheduled to travel to Florida, New York, and India.

Los Angeles Times’ Art Critic Christopher Knight Raves About History of Space Photography Exhibition

infrared photograph of Helix Nebula

An infrared photograph of Helix Nebula in deep space, part of "The History of Space Photography" at Art Center College. (Art Center College of Design / September 21, 2011)

May 1 “Space Stories” Reception and Tour Open to Public

“Spectacular” is how Los Angeles Times’ Art Critic Christopher Knight describes some of the pictures in the Williamson Gallery exhibition “The History of Space Photography” on campus through May 6.

To create the dazzling collection of images, guest curator Jay Belloli worked with several consultants from the nearby Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL), founded at Caltech and affiliated with NASA. The exhibit features 150 noteworthy images, most from the last 50 years of space exploration plus video projections of various celestial animations.

“The sheer grandeur of these scientific images, the awe inspiring beauty of them, is what reminds us of art,” says Williamson Gallery Director Stephen Nowlin who is featured in an NBC TV news story about the show. Also featured in the piece is Dr. Randii Wessen, a JPL space scientist and an advisor to Belloli who will also be available at the May 1 event.

williamsongallery.net