David Carson Research

Today I've been researching David Carson. He is an American graphic designer who uses typography in all his work.

Carson started working for 'Ray Gun Magazine'a music and lifestyle magazine. The magazine got a lot of attention because of Carson's style.

During the period of 1982–1987, Carson worked as a teacher in Torrey Pines High School in San Diego, California. In 1983, Carson started to experiment with graphic design and found himself immersed in the artistic and bohemian culture of Southern California. By the late eighties he had developed his signature style, using "dirty" type and non-mainstream photographic techniques. He would later be dubbed the "father of grunge."

Carson went on to become the art director of Transworld Skateboarding magazine. Among other things, he was also a professional surfer, and in 1989 Carson was qualified as the 9th best surfer in the world.^[2] Steve and Debbee Pezman, publishers of Surfer magazine (and later Surfers Journal) tapped Carson to design Beach Culture, which evolved out of a to-the-trade annual supplement; the new, quarterly publication was called Beach Culture. Though only six quarterly issues were produced, the tabloid-size venue—edited by author Neil Fineman—allowed Carson to make his first significant impact on the world of graphic design and typography—with ideas that were called innovative even by those that were not fond of his work, in which legibility often relied on readers' strict attention (for one feature on a blind surfer, Carson opened with a two-page spread covered in black). A stint at How magazine (a trade magazine aimed at designers) followed, and soon Carson was hired by publisher Marvin Scott Jarrett to design Ray Gun, a magazine of international standards which had music and lifestyle as its subject. Not afraid to break convention, in one issue he usedDingbat as the font for what he considered a rather dull interview with Bryan Ferry.^[3] (However, the whole text was published in a legible font at the back of the same issue of RayGun, complete with a repeat of the asterisk motif). Ray Gun made Carson very well-known and attracted new admirers to his work. In this period, publications such as the New York Times (May 1994) and Newsweek (1996) featured Carson and increased his publicity greatly. In 1995, Carson founded his own studio, David Carson Design, in New York City, and started to attract major clients from all over the United States. During the next three years (1995–1998), Carson was doing work for Pepsi Cola, Ray Ban (orbs project), Nike, Microsoft, Budweiser, Giorgio Armani, NBC, American Airlines and Levi Strauss Jeans, and later worked for a variety of new clients, including AT&T, British Airways, Kodak,Lycra, Packard Bell, Sony, Suzuki, Toyota, Warner Bros., CNN, Cuervo Gold, Johnson AIDS Foundation, MTV Global, Princo, Lotus Software, Fox TV, Nissan, quiksilver, Intel, Mercedes-Benz, MGM Studios and Nine Inch Nails. He designed the "crowfitti" typeface used in the film The Crow: City of Angels. He acted as the original design consultant for the tourism magazine Blue in 1997. Christa Skinner art directed and designed the magazine.

In 2000, Carson opened a new personal studio in Charleston, South Carolina. In 2004, Carson became the Creative Director of Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston and designed the special “Exploration” edition of Surfing Magazine and directed a television commercial for UMPQUA Bank in Seattle, Washington.

Carson became interested in a new school of typography that was being seen in the pages of Emigre magazine, California Institute of the Arts, and Cranbrook Academy of the Arts starting in the mid and late 1980s. His interests included photography-based graphic design similar to that which was seen in 8vo in England. Carson is credited for popularizing the style. It is debated if he inspired many young designers of the 1990s...or stole from them. Many young designers fresh out of Cal Arts worked for him during this time period with little or no credit sited.

Carson claims he is emotionally attached to his creations. Carson's work is considered explorative of thoughts and ideas that become "lost" in the subconscious.

Carson's work is familiar among the generation that grew up with Ray Gun Magazine and its progeny such as huH and xceler8, and in general, the visually savvy MTV generation. He took photography and type and manipulated and twisted them together and on some level confusing the message but in reality he was drawing the eyes of the viewer deeper within the composition itself.

Carson lectures extensively throughout the world, as well as at colleges throughout the U.S., including Cranbrook, Art Center College of Design, University of Notre Dame, RISD and CalArts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Carson_(graphic_designer)

In his work I like the way that all the letters are jumbled together and often hard to read. This makes you really look at the text, which gives you more of a sense of what's been written.

http://www.davidcarsondesign.com/