David Carson
David Carson (born September 8,
1954) is considered by many to be one of the world’s most influential
graphic designers; He has won several awards in the design field and his work
include print media, film, videos, and corporate designs but he is best known
for his innovative magazine design and the use of typography; all of these
disciplines have given him an experience that can be valuable both in the
design community and to the general public.
Whilst
being a designer, and an art director, graphic design was not Carson’s primal
career path. He graduated with a degree in sociology and started teaching while
training to be a professional surfer. He started experimenting with graphic
design in the early 1980′s. With surfing being a general part of Carson’s
life, it has played a great role on his design career. It is one of the reasons
for his motivation and success to direct and design various surfing,
snowboarding and skateboarding magazines, websites, ads and products like
Quiksilver, Burton, SURFportugal, TwSkateboarding, etc.
His
main association was Ray Gun. Ray Gun magazine was an exploration of
typography, layout and visual storytelling that would shift the approach of
many graphic designers. The magazine was founded in 1992 and led by the work of David Carson, who served
as its art director for the first three years of its career, which lasted 7
years and over 70 issues. Ray Guns monumental success over the next three years
is most commonly attributed to David’s incredible design strategy that was
particularly appealing to the youth.
Carson's
style of typographic experimentation influenced the development of the
deconstruction style of design
and a whole new generation of designers. The experiments by Carson and other
Ray Gun designers were chaotic, abstract and distinctive, but sometimes
illegible.
David
Carson is also known to be the godfather of grunge. This particular art movement became more and more popular during the 1990s.
It appeared to be a very messy and chaotic kind of design. Words,
textures, backgrounds that formed posters and ads for various things were
designed in a very interesting and different typography style. A style called
Grunge that became ubiquitous throughout the years and it became the largest,
most widespread movement in recent design history.
He was also known for breaking the rules in the field of
design like the grid system. The grid system can be a helpful starting point,
but isn't always an effective tool for every layout. The foremost purpose of a grid, in graphic design at
least, is to establish a set of guidelines for how elements should be
positioned within a layout. David Carson was one of the
first designers to successfully disregard the grid system by not placing the
images or text in correct form but relying heavily on overlapping text, images
and diagonal lines. His innovative style defined the so-called
"grunge" movement, and Graphic Design USA magazine named him one of
the top five most influential designers of the current era. His ground-breaking
indifference to the grid system shows that the breaking of rules can help fuel
creative expansion.
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