Jessica Helfand

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Magazine Without a Name, Brand Without a Promise

The New York Times Business Section today reports a new elite magazine aimed at the exclusive holders of the American Express Centurion Card. The magazine itself consists of five articles, four ads, and no name or indeed, nameplate — …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Under The Microscope

It turns out that microscopy, like most things, has basically gone digital: no surprise there. But what did surprise me was the realization that scientific observation obliges its participants to engage in a kind of resistance to …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Ladislav Sutnar: Mechanical Beauty

Dummy of dust jacket for Arnold Zweig's The Crowning of the King, 1938. Drawing, pencil and tempera paste-up. Last spring, we spent several days in Switzerland en route to Italy — a detour which was largely unremarkable except that …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

An Instrument of Sufficiently Lucid Cogitation

The legendary French photojournalist Henri Cartier-Bresson, who died on Tuesday at his home in the South of France, always carried a sketchbook with him. Today's obituary in The New York Times alleges that he described drawing as …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Graphic Design: The Movie

Above Left: Paul Rand, No Way Out, 1950; Right, production still from The Manchurian Candidate, 2004.Some time ago, I pondered about the future of graphic design as a reality show, but recently I've become convinced that its real future …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Design Gone Mad

Readers of Martha Stewart Living generally fall into two categories: those who take the time to tie each canapé with a single chive, and those who don't. The first category boasts a wide range of personality types, from the …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Ask Not What Your Typeface Can Do For You: Ask What You Can Do For Your Typeface

Photo: James Estrin / The New York TimesAn article in today's New York Times celebrates the suitably-named Gotham for its presence, etched into a 20-ton slab of Adirondack granite, in the Freedom Tower cornerstone. The choice of a …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Take Two Logos and Call Me in the Morning

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Designer by Day, Catwoman by Night

In the upcoming July release of the new movie, Catwoman, Halle Berry plays the title Jekyll-and-Hyde role, whose character is split between a shy, retiring graphic designer and an untamed, feline superhero. Naturally, the superhero is sexy …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Annals of Academia, Part II: Graphic Design and The New Optimism

Though it was not my original intention to open a polemical debate on the role of theory in design education, it appears I have done so, so allow me to try and address this head-on. By way of disclaimer (or apologia) I am speaking for …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Annals of Academia, Part I: What I Didn't Learn In Graduate School

When I was in the ninth grade, I was required to take a class in environmental science. Having then, as now, virtually no scientific aptitide to speak of, I feared the uphill climb of my life. But instead, I was happy to discover that the …

Jessica Helfand|Essays

Time Waits for No Fan

I am, in principle, morally opposed to hero worship, but I'd like to announce that in my next life, I'd like to be Nigella Lawson. Like me, Nigella is a mother of two, a boy and a girl, and she is Jewish. She is my age. She is also …