Exploring Bob Gill's work

Looking through the Manifesto Project website I came across another interesting one - "Otherwise forget it" written by Bob Gill - an American illustrator and graphic designer and an author of many popular among designers books (i.e. "Forget all the rules you've learned..", "Graphic Design Made Difficult" and etc).

In his manifesto Gill talks about the difficulties of being a designer nowdays, influences of culture, the importance of research and core purposes of design. He succeded to cover the most important topics in a five paragraphs.

1. Designers - are problem solvers. Nowdays anyone can buy a program that allows to create most of desgin-side stuff for an average buisness. What's left for us? We need to do things an average person can't do - solve problems.

2. Forget the culture with it's tricks. If you want to do something original, something a non-designer can't do - do not rely on culture. It tells all of us the same thing.

3. Do Research. Loads of it. Don't ever think that you know enough about subject given to you (assume all you know was supplied by culture). Research as you know nothing about it. And don't stop until you have something interesting/original to say.

4. Boring words - interesting graphics, and vice verse. Do not let words and images to compete with each other, it confuses and distracts from the original meaning.

5. First solution - then appereance. Good design is what communicates best in original way, that says exactly what you want it to say. Not the design that just looks good.

"Most designers are not very interested in problem–solving. They’re more interested in producing work that looks good. That’s like the mathematician who, before knowing the problem, knows that the answer is 128"

The manifesto is easy to read. It is different from the ones I talked before. I really like the manner of Gill's writing. By adding quiestions in it he turned his manifesto into a dialogue or discussion with the reader (and is not necessary to be a designer to understand it), suggesting his views, but not trying to persuade to accept them.

I liked the manifesto so much that I decided to look at his work closer. There was only one of his books in our library available at the moment - "Unspecial Effect for Graphic Designer". It is a 2001 edition, that is an updated version of his earlier "Forget all the rules you've learned about graphic design" book. It covers almost all the points that are in his manifesto, providing designs he made, with brief comments.

I've looked through it several times, picked up some pieces I loved the most and to sum up I want to say that even though the majority of his work is older than me, the principles he uses are still relevant nowdays. He has the ability to find original and interesting solutions to and ordinary and sometimes even borning processes, he don't overcomplicate his design and make them with just right amount of humor.

#research #BobGill #manifesto #graphicdesign #BAGDC