I recently attended an alumni event for my university. It got me thinking about school and well, here is part 1 of 3:
What was I most influenced by in school? The easy answer is the professors. They were amazing. But there’s more to school than just the classes. Maybe it was the other students, the environment, the non-design-related experiences. Maybe it was myself. It was probably all of those and more. Intangibles. Feelings, thoughts, ideas. Moments.
College was a time of discovery and mind opening. Exploring vast new cultural vistas. I met and befriended all of the types of people whom I couldn’t while growing up in the New Jersey suburbs. The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, as the only university in the country devoted completely to the arts, became the stage on which I grew into an artist and designer. There were musicians and actors and painters and photographers and dancers and too many other classifications of artists to mention. There was no campus. Like so many other city schools, students and the public walked side by side on the way to class and to work.
There are moments from my days as an undergrad that stick out in my head like they happened yesterday. Moments that will also stay with me forever.
I remember in my first drawing class in college, we all had to hang up our first assignment on the big crit wall. The professor asked the class if anyone liked their work or thought they did a good job. Now, things were very competitive, even early on, not to mention this was an obvious setup for criticism. At least 60 seconds of silence followed. No one so much as blinked. I raised my hand to what seemed like half laughter and half horrified gasps. I can picture a fellow student, in slow-motion, silently mouthing, “nooooooo!” like we were sitting in “The Breakfast Club” and I was about to be rack up my 12th Saturday detention. “You mess with the bull, you get the horns.” Nothing bad came of it. I survived and certainly made an impression.
I remember a fellow student calling me over in the computer lab for a, “whadaya think of this?” This student was and still is a close friend of mine and I had to decide whether to tell her it was great or that it was not-so-great. It was really just OK. I said, “Lisa, you’re better than that.” And she was better than that, and she said, “You’re right, I am better than that.” I still tell her that to this day.
I remember having a drawing class for graphic designers with a slightly (extremely) eccentric teacher. She was and is an amazing and passionate artist. We really did learn to draw in that class. It was one of those, “forget everything you know about drawing and pencils and art and life” classes with a master. In between learning to draw and translate objects into graphite, we would have other creative exercises. Every day, for a short while at the beginning of our six-hour class, we would paint abstracts with tempera on newsprint to get out whatever we were feeling that day. One day, as what seemed like an experiment, she read a story, and the class drew whatever came to them. I did not love this activity but went on with it for the time it lasted. The very next class, our teacher asked us to raise our hands if we didn’t want to try this particular exercise again. Let me say, that in the context of the moment, I was sure that we were voting. Well, myself and two other students were the only ones to raise our hands for not wanting to do this exercise again. Our teacher promptly asked us to leave the room while the rest of the class completed the exercise. Excellent.
There were all-nighters, not to finish an assignment, but to make it perfect. Tough critiques leading to self-doubt. In my case, it was my closest friends who were most ruthless. There was serious but friendly competition as we all pushed each other to be better, all striving to live up to designers who came before us. I believe that without the constant critiquing at all hours, one-upsmanship and hands-on encouragement, we wouldn’t be where we are today.
I remember a professor teaching our Typography class about “Cloud Type”. I remember feeding type through the wax machine and the feeling of it as you stuck it to a clean piece of white paper. I remember a professor calling a classmate’s work, “trite.” I remember a professor looking at my first hand painted letters and telling me, “You just don’t see.” I remember being convinced that in the second week of class with one professor, that my semester-long assignment was finished. I remember having an intensive workshop with an outside expert on email interfaces at a time when just about no one in the class had ever used email. I remember a guest critic not wanting me to do my senior project on Coca-Cola because it was too “corporate.” And, I remember a classmate having to have a talk with the Dean after showing off his “Prince Albert” in the studio.
I remember professors bringing their actual work in to class so we could see it in-progress, week by week. We were their apprentices and often learned by watching. Excelling in their classes was the price of entry for gaining employment at their offices.
I remember having an internship that started as a summer but lasted over two years. I remember the day when my title went from “Intern” to “Junior Designer”. Working in that small office, there were moments when I was convinced I had made it, but more times when I was convinced that I knew nothing. I still consider them family.
I remember a professor telling our graduating design class of 22 students that we were about to go on a journey. We now had the necessary tools in our backpack to sustain us and the rest was up to us. Up to our determination and up to our will. I will remember that talk on the steps of the Great Hall forever. This man that we all looked up to and admired, said that while we began the day as students and a professor, we left as colleagues.
That was a moment.
*All names have been changed to “student” and “professor” to protect the innocent (and guilty) and to avoid the appearance of name-dropping. Please do the same with whatever stories you share with us.
yep.
On Mar.15.2005 at 09:48 AM