Working-Class Heroes

Alan Rickman worked as a graphic designer before becoming an actor. David Bowie studied layout and typesetting before becoming, well, David Bowie. On this episode, Michael and Jessica discuss the British art school tradition and the difference it made for so many.

“Rickman, Bowie, John Lennon, Keith Richards. A whole long list of people were able to go through a trap door and end up in a completely different world.”

Also mentioned:

Simon Frith, Art Into Pop

Mark Banks & Kate Oakley, The Dance Goes On Forever? Art Schools, Class, and UK Higher Education, This Tortoise Could Save a Life

Kiva Confections

White House chief digital officer Jason Goldman on digital strategy for the State of the Union

Join Design Observer for Taste, a symposium on food and visual culture at the Los Angeles Theater Center on February 12.

Subscribe to The Observatory on iTunes or your favorite podcast app, or follow Design Observer on Soundcloud.

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By Michael Bierut & Jessica Helfand

Jessica Helfand, a founding editor of Design Observer, is an award-winning graphic designer and writer and a former contributing editor and columnist for Print, Communications Arts and Eye magazines. A member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale and a recent laureate of the Art Director’s Hall of Fame, Helfand received her B.A. and her M.F.A. from Yale University where she has taught since 1994.

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