Susan Kirkland (bio)

Designers and professional art directors know there are plenty of career opportunities to take the easy road to complete jobs. It's littered with Google images, online download sites and image banks where one might find a photograph or illustration suitable for a comprehensive or research material for an illustration. It is much easier to ask permission than to use material illegally. Why risk it when you might get famous in the process and end up surrendering half of all your earnings plus punitive damages due the originator of the work you "borrowed"? My advice is don't even think about it. Jeff Koons makes a very good living selling stuff he calls art; though taking a postcard of a group of dogs shot by professional photographer Art Rogers and shipping it off to Italian artisans to have it reproduced as sculpture is not art. That pseudo art sold 3 sculptures at $367,000 each. Rogers, who owned the rights to the photograph used on the postcard, sued and won. The court found "substantial similarity" and that Koons had easy access to the picture; as a result, the sculpture was judged a copy of Rogers' work. Koons attempted to use Fair Use laws as a defense but lost anyway.

Marketing has an advantage over design; they have studies, strategic planning and numbers to back up what they do. Hard facts are handy things when it comes to expenditures and raises—it’s what bean counters understand. They can draw conclusions from marketing research not clearly evident in the subliminal pushes and pulls of design. Marketing people don’t make statements like that’s how I feel when justifying a design decision. The 4 Ps were introduced in the mid-sixties of last century—to update this old but good theory, progressive minds adjusted the Ps to accomodate technological changes in the global marketplace. The 4 Ps can be used in your own business and as an adjunct to the old axiom, knowledge is power. Learn this stuff and how to stand up against the strong winds that blow from marketing. Sometimes it’s a breeze so strong, it could float a hot air balloon. I admit I’ve had more than my share of run-ins with marketing; and am pleased to report I have emerged relatively unscathed. You can, too.

There’s a small town in Ohio where a lot of big advertising takes place. It's also where most of the talent booking takes place, including freelance design and art direction. I only know this because somebody I grew up with is a male actor (very vain, very fickle, very average) who occasionally appears in commercials. I learned the same thing from Barbara Bills, a seasoned professional and highly efficient production manager for more than a few big ad agencies in her time. She said to me once, “I get lots of calls from freelancers who want to show me their portfolios and I’m always glad to give them a few tips when I have time. But sometimes, I am absolutely baffled when they show up with no idea what they’re selling. They aren’t sure what their specialty is; they like doing one thing but have no samples. They want logo work, but they design silly little detailed logos that no one would be able to reproduce. Didn’t anybody tell them that a corporate identity has to work in print as well as on the web?” Before you go out marketing your services, make sure you know what you want to sell.

Every society honors its live conformists and its dead trouble makers.
—M. McLaughlin

Idealism and youth perpetuate risk and adventure. As time passes, wisdom may view risk with trepidation, shelving adventure in favor of security. Choosing the predictable over the unknown buys us comfort and sadly, mediocrity. The side effect is complacency, compromise and a willingness to play nice with others to gain love and acceptance; or stay in favor with the boss and keep our jobs in spite of true feelings. The human physiology is unforgiving to the conscious disservice of self expression—heartburn, acid reflux and even heart disease is the punishment meted out to those who would forsake what they know is right for the path of least resistance. We call it swallowing your pride, but it’s more like erasing a bit of your soul if you are an artist.

Consensus is a necessary evil for politicians; that’s their job, but how much compromise is acceptable in performance as a designer before you’re not doing your job? How much can you compromise your work before you compromise your quality of service? All politics necessitates questionable compliance and it’s a trade off some are unwilling to make; whether it’s for love, money or their loss of integrity. Frankly, I make trouble as often as possible.

Like a football player’s knees, we have our weak points. Carpal tunnel syndrome is the leading cause of artistic demise now that almost everyone is sitting at a keyboard. For those of you who never leave your keyboards, don’t worry, your hands will just disconnect at the wrist one day as you make your way to the kitchen for a bottle of water (or spirits, whichever may be the case). For those of you unfamiliar with dead limb syndrome, the tendon that crosses the two bones at the wrist thickens due to overuse, injury and scarring. This scarring puts pressure on the delicate nerves that run through a small tunnel to the hand. Tissues and nerves become inflamed, and the inflammation fills the tiny space with fluid. This cuts off circulation and causes numbness, tingling and all sorts of pain in those who do not rest and recuperate at the first sign of discomfort. Eventually, the pain may become constant; the fluid permanently trapped. Over the years, it moves up to the shoulder and neck, following the nerve bundle. The worst cases also sometimes exhibit a nasty, golf-ball sized lump on the wrist, not very attractive to an aesthetically pleasing group like art directors and designers. Few people report marked improvement after surgery; and, in fact, the loss of strength will continue with age. Think twice before you let someone cut on the instrument of your art when the risks far outweigh the benefits. Of course, the old cure was a rapid whack on the fluid filled cavity in the doctor's office—to quote Dr. McCoy of the Star Ship Enterprise, “What is this, the dark ages?”

The Critique

There was no escaping it; after every homework assignment, there stood the inevitable public critique. No matter the time spent perfecting technique, no matter how well the goal was explained, no matter how many upper classmen were pestered to find out the solution; still the assignment had to stand up under critique by instructor and class peers. In the beginning, squirm and persuade, explain and delay, excuses flew left and right until the obvious. Nobody accepted excuses when the design didn’t work or was unresolved. We were all in the same boat and until we all got it, no assignment escaped dissection, live dissection with the victim conscious. Of course it hurt. But you won’t find any of us on American Idol puzzled about why we weren’t chosen and arguing with the judges. By the end of the process, we all knew what worked and how to push for resolution in our work.

I think it's about time we voted for senators with breasts. After all, we've been voting for boobs long enough. —Clarie Sargent, Arizona Senatorial Candidate

Over the rooftops of the little buildings that used to make up the Columbus College of Art and Design, looking towards downtown, to the west and above Beaton Hall; and to the north towards Worthington and the parking lot that now holds the new building, that was my CCAD. At first sight, I was disappointed that this conglomeration of little houses held my future in Advertising Design. What I learned was first class design, forget the building. There are lots of fancy buildings where they take your money and show you a good time; hang the education part of the deal. CCAD was tough; that row of quaint houses was a facade that housed six hours of homework for each class and there were no incompletes. No homework assignment meant an F.