Category: art

I know it when I see it.

For love of pixels

Baby Yoda pixel illustration by Justin Dauer aka @pseudoroom, icon art O.G.

Sure, watches that tell you when you’re walking unsteadily and pocket computer phones that show you the closest pizzeria are swell, but were you around for ResEdit? That humble yet supremely capable Macintosh resource editing tool is what we used to design pixel art back in the day. (And what day was that? Come August, it will be 30 years since the final release of ResEdit 2.1.3.) Stroll with us down memory lane as we celebrate the pearl anniversary of pixel art creation’s primary progenitor, and some of the many artists and design languages it inspired. Extra credit: When you finish your stroll, consider posting a Comment sharing your appreciation for this nearly forgotten art form and/or sharing links to additional pixel art icon treasures missing from our list below.

Susan Kare website (kare.com) | Susan Kare Apple Macintosh icons (kare.com) | Susan Kare bio (Wikipedia)
Iconfactory Freeware icons feat. decades-old works of genius such as this Copland-inspired Apple desktop collection
The Dead Pixel Society (2014) and founders: “We honor the humble pixel with icon creations designed under 90’s era MacOS constraints: 256 colors, pixel-by-pixel, on a 32 x 32 canvas.”
K10k in 2003 (℅ Web Design Museum); mini-bonus: K10k tag on Dribbble
MOZCO !GARASH! via Wayback Machine ℅ Flickr post by John Rainsford
Introducing Candybar by Panic and Iconfactory ℅ Wayback Machine
Dead Pixel Society interview post (zeldman.com) and podcast (Episode № 121 of The Big Web Show featuring Justin Dauer AKA @pseudoroom, creator of the Baby Yoda icon adorning this post).
Still online, albeit with missing files after many server migrations: this very website’s 1995 “Pardon My Icons” collection.
Semi-related and interesting: “A Pixel Identity Crisis” by Scott Kellum in A List Apart Issue № 342, January 17, 2012

Tags copland, Design, iconfactory, k10k, mozco, mozco !garash!, susan kare, wayback, webdesign

art art direction creativity Design Designers experience Illustration industry New York City NYC people Portfolios Startups Stories Web Design

Looking Back, Looking Ahead: artist Dan Licht

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 2 January 2022

Illustration by Dan Licht: a scary cowboy smoking a stogie and sloshing his drink. His eyes are red and he looks like he's itching for a fight. — Illustration by Dan Licht

In 1999, I had the good fortune to work alongside Dan Licht at an NYC digital startup called SenseNet, RIP. Back then, although still in his early 20s, Dan was already an accomplished art director and digital designer. Today he’s a fantastic comics illustrator, artist, and creative director. Check his recent art on Instagram and his client work at Daniel V. Licht dot com.

A heroic letter carrier is pictured sending letters on their way in this illustration by Dan Licht. The picture has a great deal of energy, and the action is all flying toward you, the viewer. — “Protect the U.S. Postal Service,” a 2020 illustration by Dan Licht.

Tags Design, NYC

art Best practices Career Design glamorous

On practice

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 30 April 2018

Over the decades I’ve used computers, my drawing skill has all but vanished—along with my ability to do calligraphy or even write legibly. Which is why I’ve started forcing myself to sketch again every day. Practice is the best form of hope.

Also published on Medium.

Archiving art art direction arts Big Web Show Culture Design The Big Web Show

Dead Pixel Society

Editing icons 1990s style in ResEdit

FANS OF ICON ART and The Big Web Show, listen up. Tomorrow’s Big Web Show guest is Justin Dauer (AKA @pseudoroom) of The Dead Pixel Society. Justin was a web icon artist in the mid-1990s, back when I also dabbled in the art. Indeed, it was talented folks like Justin and my friends at The Iconfactory who made me realize that specializing in icons was probably not going to be a thing for me, as they were so much better at it.

Ah, for the days when a pixel was a pixel!

To celebrate those times and that body of work, Justin has gathered together some of the best of those 1990s icon artists at The Dead Pixel Society. Its mission: to “honor the humble pixel with desktop icon creations we would’ve designed the past 18 years, via 1996 ResEdit-esque constraints.” The site, although it has not yet officially launched, is now available in preview.

I loved those days of the early web, when progressive enhancement meant making sure it worked in 16 colors as well as 216. So I’m quite excited about my upcoming conversation with Justin. You can listen in to the live taping tomorrow, Thursday October 2nd, from 10:00AM–11:100AM EDT on 5by5.tv. The final, edited show will be posted a few hours later at 5by5.tv/bigwebshow; you can also subscribe via iTunes and/or RSS. Here’s looking at you, pixel!

"Digital Curation" "Found Objects" art Design Women's Studies

Jane – Kafka for Lovers

JANE IS A FAMOUS British comic begun during WWII to improve troop morale. The title character is a plucky English lady who always seems to lose her clothes at inopportune moments. This strange predeliction was enough to keep the fighting men happy and helped inspire them defeat the Gerries back in those horrible yet strangely innocent days. With constant changes of illustration style, the comic persisted into the 1960s. Of course the pill and the sexual revolution made the strange little cartoon irrelevant, and that was the end of Jane.

(I learned about Jane from the Penguin Book of Comics, which I was lucky enough to discover as a boy.)

Kafka For Lovers | jane by gesebel.

art family glamorous The Essentials

And Baby Makes Art

Family, by Ava Zeldman

art

Edward Hopper, Soir Bleu

Edward Hopper 1882-1967, Soir Bleu, 1914. Oil on canvas, Overall: 36 × 72in. (91.4 × 182.9cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Josephine N. Hopper Bequest 70.1208. © Heirs of Josephine N. Hopper, licensed by the Whitney Museum of American Art. Photograph by Sheldan C. Collins

Whitney Museum of American Art | whitney.org

A List Apart art Best practices business Career creativity Design

The glory of the doodle, the grandeur of the sketch, in A List Apart No. 322.

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 25 January 2011

In Issue No. 322 of A List Apart for people who make websites: respect the doodle, honor the sketch—use the power of visual thinking to create and share ideas:

The Miseducation of the Doodle

by Sunni Brown

The teacher who chastised you for “mindless doodling” was wrong on both counts. Far from shutting down the mind, the act of doodling engages the brain in the kind of visual sense-making people have practiced for over 30,000 years. Doodling sharpens concentration, increases retention, and enhances access to the problem solving unconscious. It activates the portions of the visual cortex that allow us to see mental imagery and manipulate concepts, and unifies three major learning modalities—visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. Doodle Revolution leader Sunni Brown introduces strategic doodling and presents the ABCs of our shared visual alphabet.

Sketching: the Visual Thinking Power Tool

by Mike Rohde

You don’t have to be a great singer to write a great song—just ask Bob Dylan. Likewise, you needn’t be a Leonardo to draw your way to more and better ideas. Sketching helps you generate concepts quickly, exploring alternatives rapidly and at no cost of resources. The looseness of a sketch removes inhibitions, granting clients and colleagues permission to consider and challenge the ideas it represents. Mike Rohde outlines the practice, surveys the tools, and shares ways to become confident with this method of brainstorming, regardless of your level of artistic ability.

? Illustration by Kevin Cornell for A List Apart, a publication of Happy Cog.

architecture art arts cities New York City Parks Travel Urbanism

NYC Must-See

People who are coming to New York for the first time always ask me what they should see. So I’ve made a little list. Here are eighteen of my favorite places in New York City.

art Illustration

Xiaoxi (Nancy) Zhang, illustrator

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 9 November 2010

Xiaoxi (Nancy) Zhan

Tags Illustration

art art direction Design experience glamorous The Essentials work writing Zeldman

Pixy Stix | Jason Santa Maria

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 20 October 2010

I wrote a true story of love, obsession, heartbreak, and candy and my friend Jason Santa Maria art directed it. I’m proud of this tiny, fast-reading story, which is like condensed essence of me (and all these years later, nothing has really changed) and I love what Jason’s done with the page. Please enjoy Pixy Stix, the October 19th Candygram.

"Digital Curation" art links

Like it says

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 17 May 2010

Badpaintingsofbarackobama.com contains just that. Some are so bad, they’re good.

Via Coudal.com.

art Culture Design

Hockney and Friends

Circa 1963, Andy Warhol, Henry Geldzahler, David Hockney and David Goodman; photo by Dennis Hopper.

Scads more in “DAVID HOCKNEY | STYLE” at The Selvedge Yard.

art arts creativity Design flickr Ideas Images Layout links photography work

Meshes of the Afternoon

Favorites of the afternoon of April 10, 2009. Part of this complete breakfast.

[tags]flickr, favorites, art, photography, images, image, collections[/tags]

Tags art, collections, favorites, flickr, image, Images, photography

art art direction Blogroll books Community content creativity Design experience Ideas industry people Web Design work writing Zeldman

Around the Word with Web Talent

Post author By L. Jeffrey Zeldman
Post date 3 July 2008
No Comments on Around the Word with Web Talent

My first book didn’t sell very well but it had an effect on people’s hearts. Web designers around the world circulated a single copy of Taking Your Talent to the Web, adding their autographs, drawings, photos, and other verbal and visual messages to every page—even the covers and spine.

While unpacking from the office move, I found this special world-traveled copy of the book and snapped a few pages at random. Some people who signed this book went on to do amazing things on the web. Others lowered their profiles but continued to do work of quality and significance. Still others simply disappeared. (At least they disappeared from the worldwide web design community.) I love every one of them. Thank you all again.

A photo spread on Flickr Around the Word with Web Talent.

[tags]webdesign, community, talent, takingyourtalenttotheweb, newriders, publishing, book, books, zeldman, writing, dreamless[/tags]