Alex Steinweiss invented the album cover as we know it, and created a new graphic art form. In 1940, as Columbia Records’ young new art director, he pitched an idea: Why not replace the standard plain brown wrapper with an eye-catching illustration? The company took a chance, and within months its record sales increased by over 800 per cent. His covers for Columbia — combining bold typography with modern, elegant illustrations — took the industry by storm and revolutionized the way records were sold.

Over three decades, Steinweiss made thousands of original artworks for classical, jazz, and popular record covers for Columbia, Decca, London, and Everest; as well as logos, labels, advertising material, even his own typeface, the Steinweiss Scrawl. He launched the golden age of album cover design and influenced generations of designers to follow. Less well known — but included here — are his posters for the U.S. Navy; packaging and label design for liquor companies; film title sequences; as well as his fine art. Includes essays by three-time Grammy Award-winning art director/designer Kevin Reagan and graphic design historian Steven Heller; Steinweiss’ personal recollections from an epic career; and extensive ephemera from the Steinweiss archive, most of it never before published.

Hundreds of artists and designers expressed support for the Obama candidacy by designing posters and submitting them to designforobama.org for free download. This selection of the very best - curated by Spike Lee and Aaron Perry-Zucker - is a visual document of the most inspirational U.S. presidential campaign in living history.

From its inception, the Barack Obama campaign was destined to make history. Its message of inclusion and empowerment was spread by thousands of volunteers, a grassroots organization of unprecedented size and enthusiasm. Design for Obama built on this spirit with an online forum where artists, designers and supporters could upload their artworks and download others. Shepard Fairey’s social realist "Hope" poster became 2008’s enduring image, inspiring scores of designs that appeared on the streets, at rallies and registration drives, and in homes and offices around the country.

Edited by designforobama.org founder Aaron Perry-Zucker and filmmaker Spike Lee, this collection showcases over 200 of the best pro-Obama posters. Contributors range from prominent graphic and street artists to young up-and-comers. With essays by Spike Lee, Perry-Zucker, and design historian Steven Heller, this outstanding collection serves as a matchless historical document of the widespread visual creativity that helped spur Obama to victory.

This book is an introduction to what art direction is and what art directors do.

Written by two of the world's leading experts on the subject, it covers the role of art director in numerous environments, including magazines and newspapers, advertising, corporate identity, museums and publishing, to name a few. It also provides an insight into what makes a successful art director, what an art director actually does all day, what makes things go right, and what makes things go wrong.
Alongside perspectives on typography, illustration, photography and more, there are case studies of successful art direction in different spheres, from McSweeney's to Vier5's design for the web. In addition, the authors have invited pre-eminent international art directors to talk about their roles and to create and art direct sections of the book as part of that discussion, resulting in an impressive and enlightening diversity of perspectives and impressive variety of design approaches.
Clearly written and entertaining, including a glossary of handy art director sayings, an 'art director test' and more, Art Direction Explained, At Last! will provide students with insights into the world of art direction and professionals with a bible to the profession.

Steven Heller is co-chair of the Designer as Author program and co-founder of the Design Criticism program at SVA, New York. For 33 years he was an art director at the New York Times. He is editor of AIGA VOICE, contributing editor to Print, Eye, Baseline and I.D., and author of 120 books on design, including Design Literacy and Paul Rand. He received the 1999 AIGA Medal for Lifetime Achievement. Véronique Vienne has worked at a number of US magazines as art director, and is the author of The Art of Doing Nothing and The Art of Imperfection, as well as Something to be Desired. A frequent contributor to Graphis and Metropolis magazines she lives in New York and teaches at SVA on the Graphic Design MFA programme.

Contents:
Section One: What is an Art Director?
Section Two: Creative Tension 101 (What makes Art Direction Work)
Section Three: Auto Art Direction
Section Four: Nuts and Bolts

This unique visual history of the art of illustration, by the foremost historian of graphic design and a well-known illustrator and designer, joins the authors’ previous Graphic Style as an indispensable resource for anyone interested in art, design, and popular culture.

Illustration has long been a significant popular art - and is often more visible, recognizable, and memorable than “higher” arts. Editorial and advertising illustration in all its many forms is so integral to our understanding of news, views, literature, and commerce that it is easily taken for granted. Nonetheless, it has an impressive history and remains a vital influence on visual culture. This book is a rich chronicle, celebration, and survey of well over a century of illustration. It deftly reveals the visual mannerisms, quirks, and tics that characterize drawn, painted, and digitized illustrations in different styles, and places leading illustrators in historical context.

In postwar America, everything pointed to a bright, shiny future. Sheer optimism and opulence informed everything from automobile design to architecture, infusing design with larger-than-life planes and curves. Storefront design of the era is particularly indicative of this phenomenon, incarnated here in an extensive collection of hand-illustrated shop window designs from 1938 to 1950. These spectacular, often grandiose plans for grocery stores, shoe shops, beauty salons, bakeries, and more are reminders of a time when stores were sacred shrines for the congregation of American shoppers - impressive and even slightly intimidating, just like the future itself. Collected for this unique book, the designs viewed in retrospect reveal the mindset of a unique period in history. In addition to an extensive selection of drawings are historical black and white photographs of actual shops built in a similar style. Shop America offers a rare look at mid-century commercial America as it pictured itself.

The dawn of consumerism: when ads were works of art

A far cry from the aggressive ads we`ve become used to, American print advertisements from the first two decades of the 20th century were almost shockingly pleasant. Intricately designed and beautifully illustrated, often in the art nouveau style popular at the time, four-color, full-page magazine advertisements were welcome respites from the bland, text-filled pages among which they appeared. Sales pitches were earnest and friendly; beer, for example, was billed as "The Evening Glass of Cheer" and toothpaste was described as "Delicious Ribbon Dental Cream" - perhaps not the catchiest slogans, but they were on to something. The American consumerist boom of the 20th century was just beginning and advertising was getting its sea legs. From motorcars to hair tonics to steamship cruises to Coca-Cola ("After the theatre drink a glass… it relieves fatigue"), America was peddling its wares in style and setting an example of how to advertise in the modern age. This exhaustive compendium of ads from the period - many of which haven`t been seen for over eight decades - is a fascinating reminder of surprisingly simpler times and a rediscovery of a forgotten age in advertising history.

Both eclipsed and influenced by television, American print ads of the 1970s departed from the bold, graphic forms and subtle messages that were typical of their sixties counterparts. More literal, more in-your-face, 70s ads sought to capture the attention of a public accustomed to blaring, to-the-point TV commercials (even VW ads, known for their witty, ironic statements and minimalist designs, lost some of their punch in the 1970s). All was not lost, though; as ads are a sign of the times, racial and ecological awareness crept into everything from cigarette to car advertisements, reminding Americans that everyday products were hip to the modern age. By the end of the decade, print ads had begun to recoup, gaining in originality and creativity as they focused on target audiences through carefully chosen placement in smaller publications.

A fascinating study of mass culture dissemination in a post-hippie, television-obsessed nation, this weighty volume delivers an exhaustive and nostalgic overview of 70s advertising.

With 400 colour illustrations

With the cold war ebbing, crime and inflation at record levels, and movie star-turned-President Ronald Reagan launching a Star Wars of his own, the 1980s did not seem likely to become one of the most outrageous, flamboyant, and prosperous decades of the 20th century. The “greed is good” mantra on Wall Street spawned the power-dressing, exercise-obsessed “Me Generation” of Yuppies—high on cash, cocaine, and Calvins. The art world enjoyed the influx of capital; computers and video games ruled in the office and at home; and the Rubik’s cube craze swept the nation. Leg warmers were big, shoulder pads were bigger and hair was biggest of all. Whether your heart warms nostalgically at the memory of E.T., marathon Trivial Pursuit sessions, and "The Cosby Show"; if you think "Knight Rider," Alf, and break dancing are totally awesome; or Tiffany, baggy acid wash jeans, and Cabbage Patch Kids make you wanna scream, “gag me with a spoon,” this book’s for you. To all those who still hear the echoes of “I want my MTV”: All-American Ads of the 80s will leave you ready to reach out and touch someone. So just do it!

Discofunkalicious: An exhaustive overview of the decade that spawned glam rock and The Brady Bunch. Both eclipsed and influenced by television, American print ads of the 1970s departed from the bold, graphic forms and subtle messages that were typical of their sixties counterparts. More literal, more in-your-face, 70s ads sought to capture the attention of a public accustomed to blaring, to-the-point TV commercials (even VW ads, known for their witty, ironic statements and minimalist designs, lost some of their punch in the 1970s). All was not lost, though; as ads are a sign of the times, racial and ecological awareness crept into everything from cigarette to car advertisements, reminding Americans that everyday products were hip to the modern age. In an attempt to discover how best to communicate with a mass audience, marketing specialists studied focus groups with furious determination, thus producing such dumbed-down gems as “sisters are different from brothers,” the slogan used for an African-American hair product. By the end of the decade, however, print ads had begun to recoup, gaining in originality and creativity as they focused on target audiences through carefully chosen placement in smaller publications. A fascinating study of mass culture dissemination in a post-hippie, television-obsessed nation, this weighty volume delivers an exhaustive and nostalgic overview of 70s advertising.

60s Americana galore! With the consumerist euphoria of the fifties still going strong and the race to the moon at its height, the mood of advertising in the sixties was cheerful, optimistic, and at times, revolutionary. The decade's ads touted perceived progress (such as tang and instant omelets-"just add water") while striving to reinforce good old American values. Stars like Sean Connery, Woody Allen, Salvador Dalí, and Sammy Davis Jr. endorsed everything from bourbon to handmade suits in an attempt by Madison Avenue to urge Americans to open their wallets and participate in one giant consumer binge. Social change at the end of the era brought psychedelic swirls and liberated women and minorities to a newly conscious public. Keep an eye out for some of the more surprising and controversial ads-such as Tupperware billing its storage container as a "wifesaver." From forgotten cars such as the Dodge Dart, to cigarettes ("This Christmas give cartons of Luckies") to food (mmm! TV dinners!) and much more, this colorful collection of print ads explores the wide, wonderful world of 60s Americana.

The Roaring Twenties Prohibition made liquor illegal and all the more fun to drink. Speakeasies, luxury cars, women’s liberation, bathtub gin and a booming economy kept the country’s mood on the up-and-up. Women sheared off their locks and taped their chests, donning flapper dresses and dancing the Charleston until their legs gave out. Gangsters flourished in big cities and gangster movies flourished in Hollywood. It was the roaring twenties in America: a singular time in history, a lull between two world wars and the last gasp before the nation’s descent into the Great Depression. Forging the way into the future like a modern ocean liner in a sea of antiquity, advertising in the 20s sought to bring avant-garde into the mainstream—which it did with great success.