The Design Observer Twenty





Exposure

Rick Poynor
Exposure: Andy’s Food Mart by Tibor Kalman and M&Co
The virtue of the vernacular


Rick Poynor
Exposure: License Photo Studio by Walker Evans
The building as camera


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Drape (Cavalcade III) by Eva Stenram
Abducted in plain sight


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Mrs. E.N. Todter by Dion & Puett Studio
Art and the Ladies’ Field Club


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Rayograph with Gun by Man Ray
The poetry of the cameraless photo


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Clive Owen in character by Dan Winters
Anatomy of a publicity picture


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Assicurazioni Generali by Tošo Dabac
The textual unconscious of Zagreb


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Motion Efficiency Study by Frank Gilbreth
The ghost in the grid


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Commuter in Tokyo by Michael Wolf
How to cope with compression


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Ford Motor Plant by Charles Sheeler
The cathedral of industry


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Adamanese Man by Maurice Vidal Portman
Photography for anthropologists


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Domestic Interior by Nicole Bachmann
Design for everyday life?


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Cement Sky by Marla Rutherford
A fetish for motels


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Wintery Forest by Yang Yongliang
Building the new China


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Nurse Midwife by W. Eugene Smith
The mystery of birth


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Untitled Film Still #21 by Cindy Sherman
The photographer as performer


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Guts of the Beast by Marcus Nilsson
How to take a food picture


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Woman Mourning by Don McCullin
What are images of suffering for?


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Cabaret de l'Enfer by Harry C. Ellis
The ghoulish cavern in the villa of Ormen


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Chimpanzee by James Mollison
Looking into the face of an ape


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Operating Room by Augustine H. Folsom
Early surgery as public theater


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Francis Bacon by Bill Brandt
Portrait of the artist or photographer?


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Oildale by Rudy VanderLans
The dismal beauty of an oil field


Rick Poynor
Exposure: House #3 by Francesca Woodman
Fabricating a phantom girl


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Copacabana Beach by Thomaz Farkas
A pioneer of Brazilian photography


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Bar in Valparaiso, Chile by Sergio Larrain
The ambiguity of soft focus


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Suburban House at Night by Todd Hido
The pleasure in not knowing


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Man with a Bandaged Head
The aftermath of extreme weather


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Portrait of Space by Lee Miller
Frames within frames in the desert


Rick Poynor
Exposure: H.P. Lovecraft by Lucius B. Truesdell
The master of horror


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Morandi’s Objects by Joel Meyerowitz
The sublime in ordinary things


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Tilda Swinton by Tim Walker
The performance of a picture


Rick Poynor
Exposure: American Hermit by Alec Soth
Alone in the great outdoors


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Pirelli Calendar Model by Peter Lindbergh
The production line of glamor


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Kreuzberg Tower in Berlin by Hélène Binet
The aura of a building


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Marlene Dietrich Billboard by Brassaï
Superhuman mystique of a star


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Crashed Car by Arnold Odermatt
Fast and Furious: a retrofit


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Grace Jones by Jean-Paul Goude
Beauty, androgyny, and threat


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Beauty Salon in Kraków by David Hlynsky
The Surrealism of window displays


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Crime Scene in Paris by Alphonse Bertillon
The killing of a bank messenger


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Children at Play in the City by Shirley Baker
The freedom of the street


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Rossellini and Lynch by Helmut Newton
A primal lovers’ tryst


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Woman Mailing a Letter by Clifton R. Adams
The spell of vintage color


Rick Poynor
Exposure: James Nachtwey by Antonin Kratochvil
Portrait of a war photographer


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Dysturb poster in Paris by Jeanne Frank
Taking photojournalism to the street


Rick Poynor
Exposure: American Family by Ralph Eugene Meatyard
The otherness of other people


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Bookstore in Barcelona by Gabriel Casas
A new vision of the book


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Invisible Man by Gordon Parks
The view from an electric cave


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Kuwait, 1991 by Sophie Ristelhueber
The scars of a desert war


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Newport Baths by Max Dupain
Sun, sea, and disconnection


Rick Poynor
Exposure: The Eiffel Tower by Germaine Krull
A Paris icon made abstract


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Reem-B Robot by Vincent Fournier
The mental life of a machine


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Salvation Army Barracks by Jack London
Down and out in early 20th-century London


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Flypaper and Flies by Jacques-André Boiffard
A cold eye on insect carnage


Rick Poynor
Exposure: The Gamble by Peter Kennard
The clandestine operations of power


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Pages from Fabrik by Jak Tuggener
The dark undercurrents of industry


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Head below Wires by Roger Ballen
Absurdity in the South African outland


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Surface Transit by Eva Fuka
The shock of New York in the sixties


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Rue du Temple, Paris by Gail Albert Halaban
The lure of a lighted window


Rick Poynor
Exposure: J.G. Ballard by Brian Griffin
The science fiction of the ordinary


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Brodsky, the Tie Seller in Paris
Every photograph is an enigma


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Lens bookshop in Sutton by Lloyd Rich
The rediscovery of lost moments


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Luigi Russolo’s Noise Machines
Sonic conjurors of experimental music


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Butlin’s holiday camp by Edmund Nägele
A sixties vacation in glowing color


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Cat and I by Wanda Wulz
Modernity, femininity and the feline


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Restaurant de la Réserve by Jean Gilletta
Wonder and yearning by the sea


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Berlin scene by Wolfgang Zurborn
The hidden order of the random


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Mother and Child by Philip Jones Griffiths
The gendered power relations of war


Rick Poynor
Exposure: The Colossi of Memnon by Francis Bedford
Mysterious emanations from the desert


Rick Poynor
Exposure: The Simulator by Dora Maar
The chamber of Surrealist visions


Rick Poynor
Exposure: El Paso Street by Stephen Shore
The street corner: an uncommon place


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Rise Up You Are Free by Dominic Hawgood
A post-photographic view of exorcism


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Striporama street scene by Vivian Maier
How good was the photographer nanny?


Rick Poynor
Exposure: Viktoria Modesta by Nadav Kander
Changing perceptions of impairment



Observed


Is the future of refugee housing permanence?

It’s Pablo-matic: Picasso According to Hannah Gadsby,” explores Picasso‘s legacy through a feminist lens, asking if, when, and how modern audiences can separate the artist’s work from his infamously misogynistic behavior.

Quite possibly the most fascinating job opportunity in design right now.

Jessica Helfand on using AI as a tool to reverse-engineer a historical narrative.

Rethinking the city.

Rethinking the planet.

The problems of the user interface, one streaming service at a time. More here.

Urban design, with safety in mind. And that includes parks.

Think design thinking is over? Think again.

A museum renames a vegetable still life by Van Gogh that identified the wrong kind of allium.

Graphic design and typography obsessives—look no further!

“The challenge isn’t just that our systems default to keeping the “unlike” out,” notes Jens Martin Skibsted, “but we are, rather, in need of an interconnected worldview that appreciates the existence of other realities and contexts.”

Neville Brody’s new monograph (his THIRD)—covering his work for Nike, Coca-Cola, Tate Modern and Channel 4, as well as various informational graphics and magazine editorials—will be published next month by Thames&Hudson.

Milan Design Week wants to know your most memorable experience. Ours is easily Shaped by Water, an immersive experience exploring water as a source of inspiration for design. Co-created by Ivy Ross and her design team in collaboration with the water, light, and sound artist, Lachlan Turczan. Vote for your favorite here.

Non-profit design advocacy agency Where are the Black Designers? (WATBD?) has announced a year-long partnership with digital product studio Ustwo.

“He was mulling a career in graphic design when, at 17, he saw a searing image that would change the course of his life.” The American photographer Kwame Brathwaite has died. Considered the catalyst fo the “black is beautiful” movement in the 1960s, Braithwaite’s career spanned art, music, and more. He was 85.

The subtley, simplicity, and curious symbolism of the humble serif.

After a career of looking at pictures, she is now making them. George Gendron talks to Kathy Ryan, longtime director of photography at The New York Times Magazine.

COLLINS co-founder and Chief Creative Officer Brian Collins and co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Leland Maschmeyer will speak on branding and creativity at OFFF Barcelona this weekend.

“I can’t imagine any person with a background in graphic design made that thing without a committee of bland politicians sanding away its edges until they felt safe enough to unveil that to the public.” Behold: Logogate!

Black designers, curators, and more.

How do you stop deep-sea trawlers from harming ecosystems? Commission 10-ton marble sculptures and place them on the ocean floor, of course.

For ten years, Matt Needle has reimagined every best picture award nominee by redesigning their posters.

Coca-Cola...and art?



Jobs | June 10