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| You consider yourself as much a business person as you consider yourself a designer. Where did the courage come from to start your own magazine? Did you have financially frustrating moments during the ''evolution'' of Emigre? What is the most exciting side of the business? |
| RVDL: Graphic design always has one of it's feet firmly planted in the world of commerce, so you're always dealing with business people, be it clients, or printers, or publishers, or whatever. If you can't stand the idea of business, perhaps you shouldn't be a graphic designer. Starting the magazine had perhaps more to do with naivete than courage. The old cliché holds true: had we known beforehand what it takes to publish a magazine we would probably never have started it. We've learned everything the hard way, but we've never been in any financially frustrating moments. We've taken great risks creatively, but we never overextended ourselves in regards to our financial resources, or become greedy. It's been a good ride, so far. |
| It was said of your magazine: ''(...) that thing called Emigre magazine. That is a national calamity. It's not a freedom of culture, it's an aberration of culture. One should not confuse freedom with [lack of] responsibility, and that is the problem. They show no responsibility. It's just like freaking out in a sense.'' (Massimo Vignelli, Print Magazine, 14/5, 1992) Emigre was attacked by ''the old guard'' for countless times in countless ways. How was your attitude towards these mostly aggressive but superficial criticism's? |
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RVDL: It's never pleasant to be so blatantly dismissed. But there was something flattering about all the attention we were receiving from such world-renowned designers as Massimo Vignelli. I'm sure their comments made many people curious about our work and take note who may otherwise never have paid much attention to us. Instead of wiping us off the table, he actually made us more intriguing to many people. Things have come full circle when we recently invited Massimo Vignelli to design the promotional poster for the release of Zuzana Licko's typeface Filosofia, a Bodoni interpretation. We paid him a professional design fee and Vignelli was happy to do it. In a letter to us, he even officially declared that the ''War is Over.'' |
| Do you have any ethical concerns which you think Emigre especially sees worth fighting for? |
| RVDL: Fighting is a big word, but Emigre has always veered towards showcasing graphic designers who work for cultural organizations, or who initiate their own projects, or who are teachers, as opposed to showcasing design firms whose resumes read like a Fortune 500 listing. We're interested in designers who have a concern for what their clients stand for, who have a concern for the impact of their work on society beyond sales figures. In addition, Emigre refuses any tobacco or alcohol advertising for its magazine. |
| What is your attitude concerning environmental issues? |
| RVDL: In our last four issues and last two catalogs we have used 100% recycled paper with a 50% post-consumer content. It's costing us a lot of money to use this paper because it's extremely expensive to produce, but we feel it's the least we can do. It's a very direct way to help save the environment. It doesn't just save trees, it actually diminishes the heaps of garbage society produces. |
| In your introduction to Emigre 16 you mention that you ''receive countless numbers of unsolicited printed and recorded material of all kinds.'' The quantity should be even more overwhelming now. Do you have an archive for the ones which survive your selection process? Do you have any future plans for them? |
| RVDL: I have a room in our office which is packed, floor to ceiling, with work that has been sent to us over the past 15 years. It is out of control and my only short term future plans are to one day organize and clean up the mess and see what's worth keeping. |
| Do you believe in the future of the printed word? |
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RVDL: Completely. Nobody has come up with a sensible alternative to replace the printed word. Even after the onslaught of interactive CD-ROMs and the Internet, which are methods of communication that will run parallel to the printed word, it is obvious the printed word is here to stay. I believe that in many ways, due to the hype surrounding interactive CD-ROMs and the Internet and the senseless sloganeering about ''The End of Print,'' people have come to appreciate the printed word even more. |
| What do you think about the current state of graphic design? What is your biggest frustration? What is your biggest hope? |
| RVDL: My biggest frustration with design is the homogenization I mentioned before. My biggest hope is that we'll see a return to design that is infused with local color and personal idiosyncrasies. |
| Do you think that the World Wide Web is going to be the next big thing in graphic design? |
| RVDL: It already is. But designers, as is usually the case when technologies change, are very slow to catch on. By the time designers get on board, the visual language of the web will have been established, and it will have been created by non-designers. |
| Starting with Emigre 50, you will change your focus and stop reflecting on the state of graphic design. ''It's time to put our ideologies to work'', you write in your introduction to Emigre 49. What are your plans for the near future? |
RVDL: ''Putting my ideologies to work'' are my plans for the future. What exactly that means I intend to explore in upcoming issues. I don't have a clear idea about it in my head. These ideas develop over time. |
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