News

Design Writing and Research Summer Intensive

D-Crit is pleased to announce a design writing intensive aimed at those who would like to refine their skills as thinkers, researchers and storytellers. For practicing designers, this is a chance to examine the profession and its impact through projects, articles and blog posts. For journalists and writers, this program offers methods and insights for understanding and writing compellingly about images, objects and spaces. Visit the Summer Intensive website for details!

Eventually Everything: The 2012 D-Crit Conference

The 2012 D-Crit Conference, featuring graduating students of the SVA MFA in Design Criticism, and moderated by Change Observer co-editor Julie Lasky, will take place on May 2, 2012 at the Visual Arts Theatre in New York City. This year’s conference is comprised of four themed panels, each introduced by keynote speakers, including media historian Stuart Ewen; Pentagram partner Michael Bierut; 2×4 founding partner Michael Rock; cultural historian Jeffrey Schnapp; and Interboro partner Daniel D’Oca. Join us for a richly programmed afternoon of provocation, insight, and inspiration.

D-Crit Now Accepting Applications for Fall 2012

D-Crit is accepting applications for Fall 2012 on a rolling basis, as space allows. The MFA in Design Criticism at the School of Visual Arts is a pioneering two-year graduate program that trains students to research, analyze, and evaluate design and its social and environmental implications. Study with some of the best design writers and thinkers of our time, including MoMA’s senior curator of Architecture and Design Paola Antonelli, former editor of I.D. Magazine Ralph Caplan, Metropolis contributing editor Karrie Jacobs, and Change Observer editor Julie Lasky. Learn how to curate an exhibition, produce a radio segment, launch a blog, edit a publication, host a lecture series, and stage a major conference. Understand the forces shaping contemporary design and immerse yourself in the controversies that challenge it; find your personal voice, hone your writing skills, and develop your critical stance. Join D-Crit alumni working as editors, curators, researchers, managers, educators, and bloggers. Apply today and make a stand. Read more ›

D-Crit in the Media

Rick Poynor gets critical about the design critic’s education; Vera Sacchetti tells why, oftentimes, social design as we know it is not good enough; Aileen Kwun explains how D-Crit lived up to her expectations; Steve Heller insists that Google will never replace hands-on involvement (hence his “No Google” research class)… Read on in recent articles about the SVA Design Criticism MFA program, its graduates and its publications:

Time Out NewYork: One-minute lecture: “How to Capture the Culture Zeitgeist” by Carolyn Stanley

Design Bureau: Dialogue: SVA’s D-Crit by Sarah Handelman

BaseNow: Interview with Alice Twemlow (part one and two) by Geoff Cook

étapes: international: Design Criticism Courses by Rick Poynor

Ready Made: Taking Notes: The 2011 D-Crit Conference at SVA by Lily Kane

Visual Arts Journal: Making the Write Decision by Angela Riechers

Core 77: SVA D-Crit Preview Q&As with Avinash Rajagopal, Vera Sacchetti and Molly Heintz

New York Times blog: Our Weekend Reading (and Watching and Listening): Vera Sacchetti, “Design Crusades”

Grafik: Critical Mass featuring Aileen Kwun, Alice Twemlow and others.

Huffington Post: At the High Line: A Different Kind of Book Club Begins by Paul Needham

The Atlantic: Why Google Will Never Beat Old Fashioned Research by Steven Heller

Disegno: Steve Jobs’ wardrobe (In D-Crit Chapbook Dress) by Barbara Eldredge

D-Crit Chapbook Launch: Dress

D-Crit is thrilled to announce the launch of its second Chapbook, Dress.

Untangling the sartorial signifiers and unique style of public figures from various corners of the pop culture circuit—including Julian Schnabel, Dora the Explorer, Steve Jobs and Muammar al-Gadaffi—Dress assembles eleven essays by writers from the School of Visual Arts’ pioneering Design Criticism MFA program, with illustrations by Peter Arkle. Alan Rapp considers Metallica frontman James Hetfield’s bogus descent from metal maverick to Armani-toting sellout; Stephanie Jönsson judges Pope Benedict XVI’s wardrobe more aesthetic than ascetic; and Angela Riechers recalls the moment when Karl Lagerfeld lost the Fan—and the fat. Whether art directed by stylists or left to their own devices, each subject gives ample evidence that even if clothes don’t make the man, they certainly have an impact on the way we perceive the man. Read more ›

Shax Riegler’s “Dish: 813 Colorful, Wonderful Dinner Plates”

“Warning: this book may induce dish mania,” begins D-Crit instructor and House Beautiful editor Shax Riegler’s globe-trotting, century-hopping celebration of the art of the dinner plate. Published by Artisan Press, Dish: 813 Colorful, Wonderful Dinner Plates, is full of useful tips for collecting, repairing, and storing dishes – as well as a lively history of dishes from the 15th century to the present. Read more ›

Published: D-Crit student Julia van den Hout launches CLOG

CLOG is a new publication with a unique focus: each issue explores from multiple viewpoints and through a variety of means, a single subject particularly relevant to architecture now. Co-founded by D-Crit student Julia van den Hout, the first issue is a critical examination of Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), by over 40 diverse contributors. To get the conversation started, Storefront for Art and Architecture, hosted CLOG and Bjarke Ingels in a “Collective Interrogation” on October 7, 2011. View images from the event here. Read more ›

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