Was in Denver a couple weeks ago. The dog and pony show Wednesday nite at the best old hotel in town for the Colorado chapter of AIGA. Great audience, very vocal, most around 25 years old, though a larger than normal number of folks with more grey than me in their hair. A raffle that I didn’t know about having the “winners” have lunch with me the next day. But that worked out very well, as the people were cool, the food was excellent, and I didn’t have to do all the talking.
That day also spent most of it at the Art Center of Colorado, where faculty invited me to take over their classes and shoot from the hip. mostly Q&A, with a bit of time at the white board. More swearing from the guy at the white board than they’ve probably heard from all their faculty put together. it was great being in a room with a bunch of students that WANTED to learn. It’s invigorating.
And the afternoon sessions were packed, as I guess word got out about the mornings shennanigans. Again, plenty of good mojo from the students.
But the best part? Sitting around with three students, at Pita Jungle, a middle eastern hookah cafe, named by the Lebanese owner who figures that Americans like pita bread and know it’s middle eastern, and that Americans like jungles (!) so by combining those names, he’s got a hot spot. What great rationale! What a branding strategy! It’s an Allah-awful name, but the place was great.
Thought I was anywhere but in the U.S… Except for the American gals that were there, (and there were several coeds, not just in my party), like one of my mates, there were Libyans, Egyptians, Arabs, Lebanese, Greeks and more. The music rocked a variety of Arabic sounds, from Moroc to Iran. Apple tobacco in the pipe, mint tea and Turkish coffee.
And the part that made it the best part of the visit: The conversation. I often describe my part-time role as traveling talkmeister as a B-movie version of Lost in Translation. By that I mean, instead of Tokyo, I’m in Omaha or Des Moines. Not to take away anything from the stints in Miami or Seattle or Honolulu, but every locale ain’t a real “destination.” So you find yourself after the judging or self-aggrandizing yack-fest back at the lounge in Cincinnati. Or was it Charlotte?
And maybe you meet someone worth sharing a word or two. Or three. Because in truth much of the rest of those trips are monologues &emdash; as is this thing you are reading now. Hell, I always start my talks by saying the audience HAS to stay to the very end and beyond, as I’ve heard this shit before, and the only thing new to me is the Q&A.
I tell ’em otherwise it’s like bad sex: I give and give and give for two, three hours (yes, the talks are epic) and then I get nothing in return. But for the Q&A. Because then it’s as close to dialogue as I can get. And if you’re on the lecture circuit or teaching, it’s more often than not your own voice you hear. And as my good friend, writer Matt Porter of Communication Arts and STEP Inside Design once said of me, my accent could peel the paint from a boxcar. Of course he’s a writer and hyperbole is fun, but shit, people, how many times can I hear myself say “And here are the four secrets of success…”?
I wanna hear what OTHER people have to say and think and slice and dice ideas and badmouth David Carson along with everyone else. I wanna hear about why Yusef’s dad broke the guy’s nose for looking at his daughter the wrong way. I wanna hear about the fact that Tom has been married since he was 19, has two kids and at 24 is studying in school. I wanna feel the energy of people celebrating Eid, now that Ramadan is over. I wanna TALK about Ramadan. I wanna look across the table at someone that is engaging me on all cylinders and I may very well never see again, so I had best pay attention to the details. I wanna engage, dammit.
Too much of our time is in front of computers or books or films or clients or customers or any number of people that engage us in ways that keep us from really connecting. Which is why I chat up pretty much every waiter or waitress, bellman, grocery bagger, elevator rider or guy with interesting shoes on the airport tram. Like the guy I met yesterday from Sudan. Great shoes. Pumas. Or my seatmate yesterday, who was reading a book saying that Satan is real, as I snuck a glance onto his page. When we ended up talking (I just HAD to see if he was a nut-cake), I was pleasantly surprised to find an articulate Jamaican, born in Birmingham, England, who studied at Duke and works in Miami doing good things for the environment. Our chats about discrimination were enlightening.
Yeah, the best part is the engaging. It’s what keeps us connected to each other, to humanity. It’s about engaging in living and engaging in life. It keeps the mental blade sharp, allows for a chance to wield the rapier wit, or hack through hackneyed ideas. I got goosebumps on my arms when I was sitting there at Pita Jungle, and it wasn’t just the coffee. Hell, I don’t even LIKE coffee. But I drank it anyway.
STEP Inside Design magazine calls Marc English “the Johnny Cash of AIGA.” The 20th anniversary issue of HOW magazine listed him as one of “20 Designers We’d Like to Have a Beer With.” Marc English studied design at Massachusetts College of Art, after a stint at the Berklee College of Music, where he studied composing, harmony and arranging. English began his career in Boston working for a number of studios on projects in communication design for Fortune 500 clients, broadcast design for ABC-TV’s Boston affiliate, and creating museum exhibits for national and international clients, before opening his own studio in 1993. His studio has been featured in many design publicatios. English’s work can also be found in the collections of the Museum f�r Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg, Germany, the Merrill C. Berman Collection, New York, and the Universidad Aut�noma Metropolitano, México City.
English has served as a director of the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA), and as President of both the Boston and Austin chapters of AIGA. He is also a member of the Massachusetts College of Art National Alumni Council and sits on the board of directors of the Austin Film Society. In addition, English has taught at the Massachusetts College of Art, the New England School of Art and Design, Texas State University and Austin Community College. He continues to travel and lecture frequently, and was recently the first U.S. designer to speak at both Guatemala and Tijuana’s premier design conferences.
As they say in Texas, it ain’t braggin’ if it’s true.
marc and i have had beers -- and more -- and you'd better listen to him -- nobody more real and true around -- and speaking of truth -- he's really the richard dawson of the AIGA. just ask 'im.
On Nov.14.2005 at 09:55 PM