If Famous Graphic Artists Were Web Designers…
Styles in design are described and classified in many ways. Sometimes they are given a moniker, like “Web 2.0,” other times they are referred to by their appearance: grungy, minimalist, retro, big type. The people (and brands) to which modern design styles are attributed are as numerous as the styles themselves. Many designers look to a brand such as Apple as an example of great modern design because a designer’s sensibility is infused into everything it does.
Even though many current styles and trends can be connected to recent design pieces, they do not originate there. So much modern design originated before computers and the Web were even a glimmer in the eye of their creators.
Looking back and drawing inspiration from very early graphic and print design is a current trend nowadays, but that is not the beginning of the story. As you go further back, you’ll find groundbreaking design decades, even a century, ago. In this article we’ll explore inspirational paintings and artists who have influenced modern design. In reading this article, you will see some true evolution in design.
Where Art Meets Design
The term “graphic design” was coined in 1922 by one of the first modern designers, William Addison Dwiggins. He described himself as, “[an] individual who brings structural order and visual form to printed communications.” This seems to be where art meets design. Design is for communicating and achieving a specific goal. Today, the goal is often to market and sell products or services through design, whether by packaging a product, building a brand or creating a Web experience.
So, is design today merely art created for the express purpose of generating profit? One could argue that great artists in history created their own art for profit. Michelangelo‘s Scenes from Genesis on the Sistine Chapel and Leonardo da Vinci‘s great work The Last Supper were both commissioned by the church. Today, we regard their work as innovative and embodiments of the Renaissance, but we forget they were also created for profit.
We like to think of great artists as purely motivated individuals who are driven to express themselves or transform our perception of the world. Colors, textures and composition are part of their process of self-discovery and reflect the aesthetics of the time. Modern designers are no different. Even though a particular design may be intended to communicate the message of a corporation, it still reflects the world around us, and the designer has left their mark on it.
Art History Found Today
The best art in history was unprecedented and transcended its time. It sometimes seems as if the artists were conscious of future generations enjoying their work. Their compositions, colors, and styles don’t just hang on gallery walls today. They are all around us, in everything from shoes to album covers.
Piet Mondriaan
Piet Mondriaan, Composition with Red, Yellow, and Blue, 1927
Mondriaan’s influence seen today: Chiasso Windows Vase
Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol, Orange Car Crash Fourteen Times, 1963
Warhol’s influence seen today: Soho Brewery Packaging
Yves Klein
Yves Klein, IKB 191, 1962
Klein’s influence seen today: Chanel Purse in “Klein Bleu”
Robert Irwan
Robert Irwin, Untitled, 1968
Irwin’s influence seen today: ISST Organic Ice Tea Packaging
Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol, Banana, 1966
Warhol’s influence seen today: Royal Elastics’ Andy Warhol Shoes
Frank Stella
Frank Stella, The Marriage of Reason and Squalor, II, 1959
Stella’s influence seen today: ASKUL Branding
Yayoi Kusama
Yayoi Kusama, Infinity Dots H.R.T, 2001
Kusama’s influence seen today: The Killers Album Art
If Famous Painters Were Web Designers
What if these great masters were alive today? What if they were using a mouse instead of a brush, RGB instead of mixed oils and a computer screen instead of linen canvas. If these famous artists were alive now, these are the websites they might have designed.
Yves Klein
Yves Klein, IKB 191, 1962
A website Klein might have designed: Britain Rocks
Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol, Knives, 1981-82
A website Warhol might have designed: Carsonified
David Alfaro Siqueiros
David Alfaro Siqueiros, Collective Suicide, 1936
A website Siqueiros might have designed: Snagt
Lyubov Popova
Lyubov Popova, Painterly Architectonic, 1917
A website Popova might have designed: Douglas Menezes
Claude Monet
Claude Monet, Impression, Sunrise, 1872
A website Monet might have designed: Viget Inspire
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse, La Gerbe, 1953
A website Matisse might have designed: Devia
Paul Klee
Paul Klee, Fish Magic, 1925
A website Klee might have designed: Ali Felski
Basquiat
Basquiat, Pegasus, 1987
A website Basquiat might have designed: Orange Label
Joan Mitchell
Joan Mitchell, Untitled, 1960
A website Mitchell might have designed: Siete De Febrero
Georges Braque
Georges Braque, Fruit Dish, 1908-09
A website Braque might have designed: Belvoir Fruit Farms
Hans Hoffmann
Hans Hoffmann, Bald Eagle, 1950
A website Hoffmann might have designed: Funny Garbage
Basquiat
Basquiat, Beat Bop, 1983
A website Basquiat might have designed: Starbucks Coffee At Home
A Closer Look At Six Great Artists
If asked to name a few great artists, someone might first think of Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol. Many other great artists, though, have shown their influence on modern design. Below are six artists who are unique, innovative and ahead of their time.
Piet Mondriaan
Piet Mondriaan (1872-1944) was a Dutch artist known for clean, grid-style paintings. His later compositions, which may initially look simple, took him months to paint. Each element, from the rectangles to the lines, are composed with precision, with careful attention paid to thickness and width. Mondriaan’s work has influenced the design of modern architecture, print layouts, linoleum and, of course, the minimalist style in modern design.
Rhythm of Black Lines, 1935-42
Broadway Boogie Woogie, 1942-43
Basquiat
Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) was an American artist known for graffiti-influenced and early grunge-style paintings. He started out as a graffiti artist in New York City and later sold postcards and the like along with his artwork on the streets. His painting career took off, and he became known for his use of text and images from popular culture, as well as painting on found objects. Basquiat has been credited with bringing the African-American and Latino experience to the art world.
Self-Portrait, 1982
Per Capita, 1983
Yves Klein
Yves Klein (1928-1962) was a French artist known for his minimalist monochromatic paintings, featuring his signature deep blue. He worked with blue extensively in his early career and, in 1958, began to use it as a dominant element, making the color itself the art.
International Klein Blue (IKB) is the deep blue hue first mixed by Yves Klein. It is outside the color gamut of computer displays, so it cannot be shown accurately in digital format.
La Vague, 1957
Joan Miró
Joan Miró (1893-1983) was a Spanish artist known for an abstract, collage-style of painting. He famously declared, “I want to assassinate painting.” Miró wanted to upset the traditional and popular styles of art. He was against art for the sake of propaganda or to give the wealthy a cultural identity. Miró tried not to associate himself with any specific art styles or movements. His bold compositions and fresh thinking have influenced many great modern designers.
Hand Catching a Bird, 1926
L’Oro dell’Azzurro, 1935
El Lissitzky
Lazar Markovich Lissitzky (1890-1941) was a Russian artist known for his geometric and early graphic-design style. He was a versatile artist who worked in close to a dozen fields, from painting to architectural design. He influenced the Bauhaus and De Stijl (Mondriaan) movements. His artwork and production techniques heavily influence commercial art and modern design today.
Beat the White with the Red Wedge, 1919
Self-Portrait, 1914
Gustav Klimt
Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) was an Austrian artist known for his decorative paintings that make heavy use of gold and provocative symbolism. He is one of the founders of the Vienna Art Nouveau (Vienna Secession) movement. He is known for his “Golden Phase,” which is characterized by gold leaves and influences ranging from Byzantine to Egyptian. His compositions have symbolic elements that represent such psychological ideas as the “femme fatal.”
The Kiss, 1907
The Tree of Life, 1909
Stepping Back To Move Forward
Inspiration and examples of well-executed designs fill up galleries, blogs and online sources like Flickr. Leading industry magazines such as HOW and Communication Arts show the best of what modern design offers. Many of us look to these sources for ideas and to find the spark for our next masterpiece.
But many designers do not bother looking to works of art from earlier in history. By stepping back in time and walking through an art museum or reading the bio and studying the works of an artist from the past, we can find new ways to approach today’s design challenges.
Daniel White
August 27th, 2009 2:28 amNice post!
Timbronze
August 27th, 2009 2:31 amHave to agree a very nice post. :o)
Maria
January 10th, 2010 1:17 pmI work for an amazing living artist. Simon Bull is the official artist for Muhammad Ali and his art is amazing! you can see it on our website and on the online museum. http://www.bullart.com or just google his name Simon Bull.
Michi
August 27th, 2009 2:32 amgreat post…
we painted that yellow joan miro pic in fourth grade ^^
Jasmin Halkić
August 27th, 2009 2:46 amVery nice post…
aravind
August 27th, 2009 2:48 amThis author should be a genius!
I cannot even think how many hours it would have been taken to prepare such a great post.
Inspirational, indeed.
indigo
August 27th, 2009 2:59 amThis post immediately got no1 in my favs. Thanks, Francisco and SM
Quakeulf
August 27th, 2009 3:02 amWhy no Katsushika Hokusai? Look at how the scenery in for instance Super Mario World is inspired by his art. He’s probably inspired a lot of other artists too over the years. :’3
Yas V
August 27th, 2009 3:03 amNice to see modern day graphic design related back to traditional art mediums, well done excellent article.
Redwaz
August 27th, 2009 3:12 amGreat article, took a lot of time to sort that one out !!
Not in to modern art, think its crap. No skill at all. Failed artists.
erbo
August 27th, 2009 3:12 amvery nice…
Ash
August 27th, 2009 3:19 amOne of the best post ever ! Very original and informative.
Bravo !
Jared Earle
August 27th, 2009 3:23 amI’m sorry, but this post shows a deep lack of understanding of Art History.
Somebody needed to say it.
vic
August 27th, 2009 3:31 amGREAT POST. Well done
I don’t know much about fine arts, this is really something new.
Rolando S. Bouza
August 27th, 2009 3:34 amBeautiful post! Its been a great surprise to find ones of my favourite artists here (Basquiat and Miro)
Caesar Tjalbo
August 27th, 2009 3:39 amWeak.
The Warhol shoes, Chanel purse and the window vase are all obvious, it wouldn’t take much effort to find dozens of similar examples. Mondrian’s paintings from the 1920′s have been used as inspiration for decoration for just about everything. Yes, everything.
The Killers album reminds me more of the tests for color blindness: if you want to put a Japanese name with that I’d choose Ishihara.
The examples by “If Famous Painters Were Web Designers” I find weak too. Yup, I see some (small) similarities but with those painters, there are reasons why their paintings look the way they do and that’s not reflected in the websites. Tell me, what’s kubist about the Belvoir Fruit Farms website? By your example, it looks like Matisse could have designed Google’s website too. Oh and Ebay’s.
(ps. typo: “Robert Irwan”)
Antony
August 27th, 2009 3:39 amNot so much a case of ‘If famous graphic artists were web designers’ more a case of here’s a bunch of websites that have been inspired by graphic artists.
Agree with post above with regard to art history. I would probably go as far as to say lack of understanding web design as well. The two mediums are very different and have very different purposes, in fact you’d be hard pushed to suggest these sites are any more than a pastiche, which there’s nothing wrong with but to suggest it goes any deeper than that would be silly.
oronm
August 27th, 2009 3:42 amwow, great job on this post, very inspiring!
Bald
August 27th, 2009 3:46 amNice post love it.
millkins
August 27th, 2009 4:12 amIt’s great that someone wrote this because a lot of web designers have no clue about modern art history or design history, and really they should. Also great parallels between then and now even though some were just too obvious :) Really love it and hope you’ll make more posts like this SM. Great job.
marc
August 27th, 2009 4:14 amagree with caesar and antony. some of them look similar, but that is where it ends. groundbreaking artists like these were all about rationale and manifestos.
nina
August 27th, 2009 4:26 amAnthony one has already mentioned it, but this article is a great example of pastiche and noting more profound
Greg
August 27th, 2009 4:28 am“The best art in history was unprecedented and transcended its time. It sometimes seems as if the artists were conscious of future generations enjoying their work.”
Really??? I don’t think so….
I have to agree with an above post… this is not a good post regarding Art History 101.
chaitrax
August 27th, 2009 4:34 amDone good research… nice post.
meg
August 27th, 2009 4:36 am((i really enjoyed this article. i absolutely LOATH that tool bar that was on the top of the page when it loaded.. it made it impossible to scroll with the side bar.. just thought you should know. The comparisons, however, were fabulous!
Graeme
August 27th, 2009 4:41 amI’m not convinced by this post, a lot of the examples are very thin and the resemblance is at best fleeting. I mean the brewery packaging doesn’t look anything like the Warhol to me. This article seems to make vast generalisations in order to argue its point.
Quakeulf
August 27th, 2009 4:53 amIn after art history elitists that need to justify their time spent looking at coloured frames in books online.
moabi
August 27th, 2009 4:55 amvery interesting…
Jesse
August 27th, 2009 4:58 amAwesome to the max.
Matt Gavenda
August 27th, 2009 5:00 amMy favorite is the Claude Monet web version…very smooth.
Srecko Bradic
August 27th, 2009 5:03 amI never know before that Lazar Markovich Lissitzky was that important in the sphere of art and design. Thank you very much!!!
Pete
August 27th, 2009 5:03 am“So, is design today merely art created for the express purpose of generating profit?”
Unfortunately, I think that’s the way the majority of my clients see things.
Great post by the way, I think a few people might be missing the point. it’s nice to see how various styles started out before they were filtered and adapted onto different mediums over the years, I wasn’t expecting an in-depth history of Art, there’s plenty of copy written on that subject.
Mike
August 27th, 2009 5:04 amAMAZING POST! THANKS!!!!
dixhuit
August 27th, 2009 5:11 amAwesome post. Full marks.
samoth
August 27th, 2009 5:20 ambe careful, with so many great posts, I can be more and more easily desappointed with the next one :D
Thanks for your great job :D
Kyle
August 27th, 2009 5:20 amWeak post
sandeffect
August 27th, 2009 5:25 amIt’s good to see this topic show up but I have to say the title is deceiving. A lot of the “famous graphic artists” were actually not graphic artists but just straight-up painters. And the web designs they would have done would be different (better) than some of the done-a-thousand-times examples you have featured there. But I guess it’s an important topic that deserves more than just a blog entry.
David
August 27th, 2009 5:33 amA fine example of correlation not proving causation, but still being a lot of fun.
Tom Muller
August 27th, 2009 5:33 amSorry but I have to agree with Caesar Tjalbo’s comments — this is very, very lazy research and just mixing and matching obvious things that have no relation whatsoever (pairing a blue painting and a blue purse and saying the painting inspired the purse design is really stretching credibility). Similarly, the Soho Brewery packaging has nothing in common with the Warhol piece. I could go on, but you get the idea.
The sad thing is that the majority of the comments (and readers) are applauding the article for its “great research” without actually thinking twice about it .
This only propagates bad design education. Honestly, if you must write an article about a link between art and design read a book.
samoth
August 27th, 2009 5:48 am“”The sad thing is that the majority of the comments (and readers) are applauding the article for its “great research” without actually thinking twice about it .”
I’m glad you know exactly how I read this article…and guesses exactly how my mind is made. That deserves a great article in your own best blog ever that has always best articles ever and should be much more read than smashing magazine.
You’re the one Tom!
corey
August 27th, 2009 5:50 amGreat post, I just gave a VERY similar presentation last week. From Goya to Google: Traditional Design Principles at Work On the Web
Pedro Gabriel
August 27th, 2009 5:53 amWhat a horrible post
so pretentious, but dont get it.
I highly agree with tom muller. Go to school or read a book before talking bout art. We can talk about a lot of things, but art, fashion and culture are the most sensible and hard things to understand.
What a poor article, with poor taughts over the artists and poor pairings. If you read at least one book about Warhol, you’ll know tha he was a graphic designer, and his folio is very interesting. And about your idea of pairing, i think warhol would cry and would stop to do web, after he looked at this wave of web “artists” thinking that web 2.0 icons are something more than s**t.
Damn you, and you little brain.
Read more
Silvia
August 27th, 2009 5:54 amBrilliant! Thanks!
rupam
August 27th, 2009 5:56 amGreat collection…
Tom Muller
August 27th, 2009 6:00 am@ Samoth:
I based my comment on the amount of positive comments on this article and made an extrapolation from there.
My problem with this article is that its based on absolutely nothing and disseminates incorrect information.
Felipe
August 27th, 2009 6:14 amAwesome post! Great examples of how art influence commercial creations.
Sara H.
August 27th, 2009 6:15 amHow do you know these web designers got their inspiration from these artists? Did you ask them, or did you just go poking around on the web haphazardly connecting things that might look just slightly similar to each other?
Hannah
August 27th, 2009 6:19 amThis post is so good on so many levels. So many great artists mentioned! It’s really cool to see them relate to design in the 21st century.
Only disappointment… where is Sol Lewitt?
alex
August 27th, 2009 6:20 amFantastic post.
Huhu
August 27th, 2009 6:21 amMe thinks Smashmag staffers smoke too much pot…
Francisco Inchauste
August 27th, 2009 6:21 amThanks for the comments so far. I wanted to respond to a few like the one on “lazy” research. This took a long time to read through modern art books and cross reference modern day styles. The point is not a lesson in art history, but to show the strong influences on design today. The resources from the Museum of Modern Art, Time, and many others talk about these same ideas. No one can say what these artists may or may not have done, or how they would feel about web design today. The “If they were web designers” was just a more interesting way to say “here are some sites with a style/concept they influenced”.
@Tom Muller said “pairing a blue painting and a blue purse.” Tom, It’s not just any random blue color. That purse is actually in International Klein Blue. Klein created his own blue hue and that color became the art when he painted it and saturated the canvas. That specific blue would not exist without Klein. And Chanel brought that exact patented blue into their purse design. So this is not a stretch.
@Caesar Tjalbo Some examples are more direct than others. Like I mentioned, someone using Klein Blue (IKB) in a piece is directly from him. Others were to show the “look” of sites we create today are not fresh and original ideas, but a style that has evolved over the decades in various mediums. For example, Monet seen in the Viget blog when they use an image with an applied filter to give that similar feel. In these examples Chanel was directly influenced and Viget was indirectly influenced by that evolved style.
@Pedro Gabriel That’s the point of the article, get people to find inspiration in art by reading a book or going to a museum.
@Pete Understands the main point “see how various styles started out before they were filtered and adapted onto different mediums over the years”
nihil
August 27th, 2009 6:29 am“A website Klein might have designed: Britain Rocks”
Uh, no…. He would probably have denounced the majority of web “design” as petit-bourgeois tedium, utterly obsessed with the ‘look’ of things. Promoting patronising dross like “Britain Rocks” would have been the last thing on his cultural agenda.
Merman
August 27th, 2009 6:36 amHa. It looks like Francisco just pimp slapped Tom Muller back into 1983.
Rick
August 27th, 2009 6:39 amIf “the best art in history was unprecedented and transcended its time” like you said, then most of these are unoriginal, rip-offs of something that has already been done. Transferring the same techniques to a different medium is definitely not transcending.
@nihil – well said.
Eliza
August 27th, 2009 6:46 amCaesar Tjalbo cannot be satisfied, if the product is directly related to the painting it’s too easy to find, if it shares only vague similarities it is too much of a stretch! haha…
I personally enjoyed this post very much, thanks Smashing!
designiac
August 27th, 2009 7:09 amI thought about influence, inspiration and relatedness in design and art often. The greatest article that I read today. Thank you!
But I think that Andy Warhol would not have designed a website like “Carsonified”.
leigh
August 27th, 2009 7:10 amA lot of these examples are a bit of a reach…
AJ
August 27th, 2009 7:10 amWhile i do appreciate the work the writer put into making it, this article is not accurate at all. To simply claim that a “_ might have designed” is a stretch. a few examples are the Starbucks site (they could have gotten inspiration from ANY restaurant with a chalkboard in it) and Ali Felski’s site even has a walk through of how she created the theme/background.
If the writer had reached out to the web designers and asked what artist had inspired their design, then took samples of their work to compare to the site, it would be more fitting to the title.
Moose
August 27th, 2009 7:16 amWe had to analyze the El Lissitzky Beat the White with the Red Wedge last year in my ID studio. Great post, I think it’s important to understand how art influenced design. :)
Tom Muller
August 27th, 2009 7:20 am@ Francisco Inchauste
Re: IKB — And right you are. I apologize on that point.
As for the rest of the article, having re-read it, it still feels very forced, and quite obvious. To be very blunt: the majority of web design doesn’t even look that far back fro inspiration, if it looks back at all. A lot of the design & site examples you hold up next to a piece of art seem incidental — the Britain Rocks item for example has a brush stroke effect and a shade of blue (not even IBK), similarly for the Monet/Vignet Inspire comparison: yes they’re landscapes – where is the unique link? And comparing the Carsonified design with a Warhol screenprint? There is nothing similar there as far as I see it.
Again, a lot of stretching going on. I can sit down with a book on Rubens and try and find a site that uses vaguely the same colours and say its inspired by his paintings.
Daniel
August 27th, 2009 7:25 amSorry guys but this post it’s really bad, not accurate and the comparisons don’t have any argument.
rodrigo
August 27th, 2009 7:33 amanother fantastic article!
nandorocker
August 27th, 2009 7:35 amSaying a site draws direct inspiration (or even rips off) an artist’s style is completely, TOTALLY different than claiming the artist would’ve designed the site in that manner. This feels a little like web design butt-kissing…
Still, I love the article for references.
Said
August 27th, 2009 7:37 amI wish I could say I enjoyed this post – Interesting work though.
Mark
August 27th, 2009 7:44 amBrilliant! Good to see the earlier art still influencing design today, and not just Moderism either. All of these are great starting points to design – influencing style, mood and character.
mark nold
August 27th, 2009 7:50 amsurely there are innovators and imitators.
nice Warhol trainers though.
Brandon
August 27th, 2009 7:52 amWow Francisco, you really have a great post here. I really appreciate the effort that went into this. It’s much more than just a smash-up of random inspirational images, but rather why they’re considered inspiration. This is a great post to at least get people to look for inspiration in better, more thorough ways. It really touches on the level of “oh, you like this? tell me why” rather than “where’s a tutorial for that effect?” I vote we need less tutorials on the web, and more of this!
However, I do agree with some of the comments that came before me. A lot of your examples seem to fit earlier designers well, but the Warhol and Carsonified comparison just does not make sense to me. But, this is all really how one interprets the work personally in the end. Plus, I bet Warhol would be a motion graphics guy if he were around today!
Louis
August 27th, 2009 7:53 am@Tom Muller:
He’s not saying that these pieces are inspired directly, necessarily. He’s showing readers how these artists had a such a profound influence that their influence can be spotted today, even indirectly.
@Francisco
Thank you for an awesome post. Truly original. And I’m glad you took the time to respond to the negative comments. Some people just prefer to see another “500 links to CSS tutorials”, I guess. How inspiring is that?
jon
August 27th, 2009 7:56 amha haaaa viget is monet! appropriate im as sick of seeing their site as i am sick of seeing his paintings!
Bob
August 27th, 2009 8:09 amThank you, Francisco, for taking the time to research and put this together. This is a very impressive and comprehensive treatment.
Bob
luke
August 27th, 2009 8:11 amVery Cool!
Mariella
August 27th, 2009 8:12 amOne of my favorite articles from Smashing Mag ever. Provocative, intelligent, inspirational.
Frank Furter
August 27th, 2009 8:16 amYeah, this was quite a stretch. The one that finally got my eyes to roll was the blue purse. Are you kidding me? Now I see why I’d never heard of this site. Damn you Digg!
Pete
August 27th, 2009 8:21 am@Frank Furter
Which blue purse? Do you mean the Klein Blue purse?
You’re right, absolutely no influence going on there…
Paulo Canabarro
August 27th, 2009 8:41 amReally good post, such rich information and sample displays. Awesome job Francisco!
BongoBox
August 27th, 2009 8:47 amThis post is great for starting discussions and debates.
But some of the ideas, like that Basquiat may have designed the Starbucks site, or his style influenced it, are pretty weak.
sal azad
August 27th, 2009 8:48 amalways great as usual! thx sm!
Francisco Inchauste
August 27th, 2009 8:50 am@Tom Muller I appreciate the response and a second read. I guess you are missing the point, which is fine. I’ll explain these last points and the rest is just what people decide to take away from the article.
Re: “the majority of web design doesn’t even look that far back fro inspiration” I disagree. I see so many posts about cool vintage book covers, packaging, posters, etc. These are all older mediums than the web. The point is most of the connection to old art to now is invisible since it has been remixed so many times. Paul Rand was influenced by Miro. And many designers today consider him one of the greats and use his logos, etc as inspiration. If you listen to the podcast MOMA did on Joan Miro you’ll find the deeper exploration of how many modern designers were directly influenced by him. If these artists had not created these paintings the design styles today would be much different.
Re: “Carsonified design with a Warhol screenprint”. The Warhol has a two color print quality similar to Carsonified. They have a post from designer Mike Kus talking about his thoughts on creating the site (http://carsonified.com/blog/design/web-design-is-a-journey/) and he was inspired by “United Colors of Benetton” with their flat two color art in ads. At one point Benetton featured Andy Warhol in an old ad campaign representative as an influence. The influences are not always a direct line, but they are there.
Laura
August 27th, 2009 8:57 amYou left out Barbara Kruger, there’s already a site out that’s an homage to her style see: Resist.
Evan
August 27th, 2009 8:59 amGreat article! Just seeing the comparisons between then and now is very informational.
Zacqary Adam Green
August 27th, 2009 9:07 amHey! Where’s M.C. Escher? His design was very influential to the web! Just look at Perl.
Joe
August 27th, 2009 9:16 amI’ve got to agree with some of the naysayers here. Similarity (and in an obscure way as depicted here) is not correlation. Sure, the blue purse uses the blue, but otherwise has nothing to do with the painting. The Robert Erwan vs. ISST Tea bottles? Are you serious? I mean, you don’t think ISST could have gotten “colored circles” from any other source, or a designer just came up with it on his own since it’s a very simple design? Circles have been around for a long time.
I’m not an art critic by any stretch of the imagination, but it sure does take an imagination to see any link between most of the examples provided here. I’ve made plenty of simple designs for web sites, flyers, and other simple materials and you could undoubtedly find hundreds, or perhaps thousands of similarities between what I’ve done and what’s been done before. Especially when you’re talking about a simple color or circles.
And to say IKB “wouldn’t exist” without that artist is absurd. The color has always existed; he just made it into a paint. Beautiful color, no doubt, but just because I paint my car IKB doesn’t mean he influenced the car itself in any way.
I recognize that art is an evolutionary process – artists build on the work of their predecessors. I simply can’t see the connection between Warhol and the beer bottles besides the fact that they’re both red. Was that the only connection? In that case, I’m sure Target got their inspiration from Warhol too, since they also use the color red.
I’m sorry but I’m just not buying it. It was a good try though.
Erin
August 27th, 2009 9:18 amThis post really irritated me. So what exactly are you comparing with the Miro piece? Web “design” or the illustration? Because to me, comparing that work to a layout is like comparing apples to oranges. And if creating an illustration is web design, well I am really confused. Or maybe if I draw a mobile too then I could be compared to Miro? If I draw a sheep and put it in a web page, am I now the next Marc Chagall web designer?
Art history today eh? I thought being inspired by something meant taking bits and pieces of it, expanding it, making a comment on it, making something new with it, presenting it in a new way, etc, etc. But the Andy Warhol example is kinda redundant. I mean, it’s essentially Andy Warhol’s work on a shoe. There’s no inspiration anywhere. The guy’s name is on it.
Don’t even get me started on the Braque comparison.
Harry
August 27th, 2009 9:29 am“That specific blue would not exist without Klein” is not in any way, shape or form even remotely true, and is a shocking thing to read on a design site.
tariqdesign
August 27th, 2009 9:49 amnice idea ….
Francisco Inchauste
August 27th, 2009 9:52 am@Harry “IKB was developed by Klein and chemists to have the same color brightness and intensity as dry pigments, which it achieves by suspending dry pigment in a clear synthetic resin. This new medium was patented by Klein.”
In the context of art and design that specific brightness and intensity of blue did not exist without chemical manipulation & Klein putting it together. How is that shocking?
@Joe Re: “colored circles” and “Target and Warhol” You are stating the obvious in all these pieces which is not the point. Some of the printing techniques that Warhol used are seen today. Yes circles have been around, but not always presented like Irwin. Circles with the translucent effect were what he was known for. This became part of a “light and space movement” in the sixties. I didn’t say any of the modern designers would not have come up with these pieces on their own. It’s hard to deny the influence didn’t evolve into something that inspired ISST to use that effect.
Also, if you painted your car in IKB, then that would mean you were actually inspired by the blue enough to paint your car that color…
greg
August 27th, 2009 9:55 amyeah, very superficial comparisons between small visual motifs in paintings to small visual motifs in websites. if any of those artists were still alive they would all probably roll over in their graves to see the kind of shit you compared them too.
Louis
August 27th, 2009 10:17 amThe reactions to this post are appalling, and clearly lack an understanding of the purpose of the article.
You did a great job, Francisco. Unfortunately, because of the wide-range of readership on SM, those without a true appreciation for art’s direct and sometimes indirect influence are bound to have their ignorant say.
Tom Muller
August 27th, 2009 10:19 am@Francisco —
No, I’m not missing the point. Its clear that the goal of the article is to show that design doesn’t live in a vacuum, and that it therefore (like any other creative medium) draws on what’s come before. The problem I have is that no matter how you look at it, your examples do not add up, are painfully obvious, or inaccurate — and on a site that has over 140K people subscribing to the RSS I would expect something of a higher standard content-wise.
Rick
August 27th, 2009 10:31 am@Louis – Um, no. It would be appalling if every comment would kiss the author’s ass just like you did. How boring would that be? SM’s wide range of readership should be applauded for keeping people honest. I find it hard to believe that anyone with artistic background could think Andy Warhol paintings wrapped around a shoe have any significance in the realm of “artistic influence”. Direct or indirect, it is just lame.
I think everyone appreciates Francisco’s effort but there has got be some criticism here as well as every other post for that matter. This article simply misses the mark.
Francisco Inchauste
August 27th, 2009 10:38 am@Tom Muller – Well if I use one of the examples you stated as one with very weak or poor ties: Carsonified & Warhol and I showed how the web designer stated his “flat two color art” influence was from the Benetton ads and their influence from Warhol. I don’t see how that’s inaccurate.
Re: “expect something of a higher standard content-wise” Ouch, that’s pretty harsh. This is a post meant for finding new places for inspiration not a deep conversation about Picasso’s symbolism in his “Blue Period”. I’m sure that would have been too boring. I actually had your site for an example I didn’t end up including.
Hortenze Riddyculie
August 27th, 2009 10:40 amSad really, When working in design WE constantly and knowingly Rip off real practicing fine artists It is wicked gross.
Yo
Paul Rose
August 27th, 2009 11:06 amI think that if you were to take an Art History class of some sort, you would flat out fail. Just like you failed with this article.
This is like saying my the design of my Google Phone is inspired by a blank piece of paper, just because its white.
Mohawk
August 27th, 2009 11:11 amThis post reminds me to look sometimes to the past for influence. Something I haven’t done a lot of recently.
average joe
August 27th, 2009 11:27 amI took exactly one art class in college, and that was about ten years ago. So take this with whatever weight you want to.
First of all, I love this site more than most for one reason. The comments always add another layer of thought (through criticism) that I didn’t get from the post. It’s a fantastic community.
Now, with regard to defining who inspired who, I find it equally ridiculous that the post author can claim that X inspired Y as I do the critics saying X in no way inspired Y. To me, every input (be it visual, tactile, audible, etc.) someone encounters in life “inspires” them to some degree. Whether it’s good or bad, joy or anger, people are certainly changed by the state of their surroundings.
I believe that someone’s inspiration is the sum total of everything they’ve ever experienced. Some elements will be weighted more than others, but the effect is there to some degree. A greater understanding of art history will likely train you to pay closer attention to these relationships and better recognize them, but I can’t assume it makes you better at defining someone’s path of inspiration.
I frankly don’t understand technical art history people who point to historical art and use that to label (mostly in derogatory terms) current art. There’s no right or wrong with art. Everyone has a different definition of it than others, and to presume that you can stand on your definition as better than someone else’s makes me believe that you don’t understand it nearly as much as they’d like to think.
P. Dross
August 27th, 2009 11:35 amWow. Some of you folks are a little uptight. I’m responsible for the “patronising dross” of the Britain Rocks website. Sheesh, lighten up. It’s a website driven by timelines, budgets, clients, and all the other things that influence a project. I have a mortgage and a family to support so I can’t cut off my ear and die penniless at the moment.
The motivators and agenda for a Guernica are a lot different than the ones most of us deal with on a daily basis. To say the various work shown, whether knowingly influenced or not, is “shit” is awfully elitist. I don’t think the projects shown were designed or created with the same result in mind as Klein may have had. His work was constantly misunderstood. That’s not terribly conducive to good client relationship as a day to day practice.
That’s it for my off-topic blab. I’l let Francisco get back to definding his post.
sean steezy
August 27th, 2009 11:37 amthank you! i feel smarter now, like i didn’t need to go to graphic design school anyway!
Eliza
August 27th, 2009 11:48 amWhat the hell, what’s with all the malice directed at this post? I feel like people are taking this way too seriously. I’m not trying to kiss the author’s ass, I’ve said before on Smashing when I didn’t enjoy or agree with a post and that’s totally fine & cool, but the personal insults directed at the author are appalling. I thought only adults read Smashing but I guess I was mistaken.
Erwin Heiser
August 27th, 2009 12:02 pmThe haters are out in full tonight :)
I enjoyed it and if articles like this inspire people to to go check out all the great art of the last century and be inspired by it this article has served a worthy purpose.
Props for mentioning Joni MItchell!
Sergei
August 27th, 2009 12:08 pmGreat article but maybe a bit too much Warhol. “few great artists, someone might first think of Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol.” Really?
Danny Houk
August 27th, 2009 12:15 pmAs an art buff, I thought this post was cute. Though tenuously linking famous artworks to modern web layouts is superficial in every sense of the word. Comparing two different products like a Klein painting and a blue purse is like comparing 50′s big band music to 90′s ska because they both use trumpets.
The only redeeming part of this post is getting to see nice reproductions of great works of art. The other annoying thing is that most art work (except for perhaps Pop Art) has little to nothing to do with utility, practicality, or commerce, whereas much web design is driven by these concerns (I am generalizing). The fine artist and web designer’s concerns seem to be too divergent to truly warrant comparison. That’s not to say there are no interesting intersections between art and web design, but just don’t think this post is not example of it.
Nothing personal to the author, it was entertaining, just not informative.