BIOS OF PROJECT DIRECTORS

JESSICA HELFAND
Previously Adjunct Professor at New York University's graduate program in Interactive Telecommunications, Jessica Helfand is currently Senior Critic at Yale School of Art’s graduate program in graphic design. She is the author of several books, including Screen: Essays on Graphic Design, New Media and Visual Culture (2001) and Reinventing the Wheel (2002), both published by Princeton Architectural Press. Her most recent book, Scrapbooks: An American History (2008: Yale University Press) was named the best coffee-table book of the year by The New York Times. Helfand was appointed to the Citizens Stamp Advisory Commmittee in 2006, where she currently chairs the design subcommittee. She received her B.A. in architectural theory and her M.F.A. in graphic design, both from Yale University. Together with William Drenttel, she will spend the spring of 2010 as the Henry Wolf Fellows in Graphic Design at the American Academy in Rome.

WILLIAM DRENTTEL
William Drenttel is a partner, with Jessica Helfand, at Winterhouse, a design practice in Falls Village, Connecticut, focused on social innovation, publishing and online media, and cultural and educational institutions. He is design director for Teach For All, an international education network, and is currently leading a series of initiatives funded by the Rockefeller Foundation to develop models for design and social change. Drenttel is president emeritus of AIGA, a former trustee of the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, a fellow of the New York Institute of the Humanities at NYU, and a senior faculty fellow at the Yale School of Management. He is a co-founder of Design Observer (the website of design and cultural criticism), the Polling Place Photo Project (an online election documentation initiative), and the AIGA Winterhouse Writing Awards (a $10,000 prize for design writing and cultural criticism). As a publisher, Drenttel has created books under the Winterhouse imprint for University of Chicago Press, Yale University Press and Princeton Architectural Press. He is a graduate of Princeton University.

JOHN BIELENBERG
John Bielenberg is a partner and co-founder of San Francisco-based C2 with Greg Galle and Erik Cox, and the founder and director of Project M, a summer program designed to inspire young designers, writers, photographers and filmmakers by proving that their work can have a positive and significant impact on the world. Bielenberg has won more than 250 design awards, and was recently nominated for two National Design Awards from the Cooper-Hewitt. He has served on AIGA’s national board of directors, taught at California College of the Arts in San Francisco and has written articles on design for Communication Arts and Critique. Bielenberg is vice president and director of the PopTech Institute and is a member of AGI (Alliance Graphique International).

JENNIFER DOWLEY
Since 1999, Jennifer Dowley has served as President of Berkshire Taconic — a rural community foundation covering four counties at the intersections of Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York — where she leads initiatives on everything from affordable housing to support for public education. Previously, Dowley spent five years at the National Endowment of the Arts as Director of Museums and Visual Arts in Washington, DC. She was a spokesperson for the Arts Endowment on national cultural policy issues, and played a key role in shaping policies for American art museums and visual artists. A frequent advisor on issues relating to public art programs, Dowley continues to work with the Andy Warhol Foundation, the Nonprofit Finance Fund, and the Civitella Ranieri Foundation.


BIOS OF VISITING CRITICS

MARC ALT
Marc Alt is principal of Marc Alt + Partners, a design, research and brand strategy agency dedicated to sustainable innovation. Marc is partner in Opportunity Green, a platform for collaboration, education and training to advance clean technology, social entrepreneurship, and sustainable economic and community development. A dedicated advocate for the advancement of sustainable design principles, Marc serves on the advisory boards of the Designers Accord and Design Ignites Change, and was founding co-chair of the AIGA Center for Sustainable Design. He has been honored to be a guest speaker at a variety of design and business innovation conferences, including AIGA, RGD, GDC, CES, PSFK and a number of other three and four letter acronyms. He is an adjunct professor at the School of Visual Arts and has guest lectured at numerous schools, including Yale, NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program and F.I.T.

MICHAEL BIERUT
A partner at Pentagram’s New York office for nearly 20 years, Michael Bierut’s work has received hundreds of design awards, and is included in the permanent collections of several museums including the Metropolitan and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. His commentaries on graphic design have been heard nationally on the Public Radio International program, Studio 360, and his appearance in Helvetica: A Documentary Film is considered by many to be one of the film's funniest moments. In 2006 he was awarded the AIGA medal. A co-founder of Design Observer, Mr. Bierut also writes frequently about design and is the co-editor of the five-volume series Looking Closer: Critical Writings on Graphic Design (Allworth Press). His book, 79 Short Essays on Design, was published in 2007 by Princeton Architectural Press. Additionally, he is a Senior Critic in Graphic Design at the Yale School of Art, and a Senior Faculty Fellow at the Yale School of Management.

ALLAN CHOCHINOV
Allan Chochinov is a partner of Core77, a New York-based design network serving a global community of designers and design enthusiasts. He is editor in chief of Core77.com, Coroflot.com, and Designdirectory.com, and writes and lectures widely on the impact of design on contemporary culture. He teaches in the graduate departments of Pratt Institute and the School of Visual Arts in New York City.

JULIE LASKY
Julie Lasky is an editor at Design Observer, where she is also developing a new site around design and social innovation. Previously Lasky was editor-in-chief of I.D., the award-winning magazine of international design, since 2002. Prior to that, she was editor-in-chief of Interiors and managing editor of Print magazine, which was named a National Magazine Award finalist five times during her tenure. She has contributed to The New York Times, Metropolis, Dwell, Eye, Slate, The National Scholar, and NPR. Lasky was the recipient of a National Arts Journalism Program Fellowship at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and the Richard J. Margolis award for writings on the cultural life of postwar Sarajevo. A frequent lecturer on design, Lasky has taught in the MFA Design program at the School of Visual Arts and recently joined the MFA Design Criticism faculty at SVA.

ALICE TWEMLOW
Previously program director at AIGA, Alice Twemlow is chair of the Design Criticism MFA program at the School of Visual Arts, New York and a PhD candidate in the History of Design program at the V&A Museum and the Royal College of Art in London. She writes about design for publications including Design Observer, Eye and Architect’s Newspaper. Her essays are included in books such as The Barnbrook Bible (Booth Clibborn, 2007,) Elsewhere: Mapping (University of Minnesota Design Institute, 2006) and Looking Closer 5 (Allworth Press, 2007,) and she is the author of What is Graphic Design For? (Rotovision, 2006).

MICHAEL VANDERBYL
Michael Vanderbyl has gained international prominence in the design field as a practitioner, educator, critic and advocate. Since 1973, Vanderbyl Design has evolved into a multidisciplinary studio with expertise in identity, print and digital communications, interiors, showrooms, retail spaces, signage, textiles, fashion apparel, packaging, furniture and product design. Printed work by Vanderbyl has gained recognition in every major design competition in the United States and Europe; his work is part of the permanent collections of several museums and is featured in national and international publications.
  In 1987, Michael was elected a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI). He has served three terms on the board of AIGA National as well as presiding as President during 2003-2005. At the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Michael holds a position on the Design Advisory Board. Michael is the recipient of the AIGA Gold Medal award and presides as Dean of Design at the California College of the Arts.



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