(These opinions may not be the official positions of the Graphic Artists Guild.)
Michael hays asked me to write a little message for our Chicago GAG website, "make it controversial" I think were his exact words. Now, as National President, I don't get to spew as it were, because I represent you all and spewing in our present state of political correctness is frankly forbidden. I will take a slight exception to the rule with this column.
Today I was put on the other side of the fence, you know, the client side, the art director side, the decision making side, the guy that can make our lives as graphic artists a living hell or a pleasurable experience. Was it fun? Not really. I got a whole lot of excuses and a bit of attitude from the person who had precipitated the situation. I of course, had a bit of attitude myself because I was forced to use something that ran against my grain and my artistic sensibilities. In fact, I further had an attitude because the person at fault was getting paid for their efforts and I was fixing what they screwed up and I wasn't getting paid for my efforts.
I'm sure there were hurt feelings all around, but hurt feelings grow back, it isn't fatal to have hurt feelings. What is fatal is the use of something that is bad, and the fact that people are going to have to look at something bad in a spot where there should be something good. Now how could that be fatal you might ask? Follow my logic if you will.
As graphic artists we have a responsibility to put our best efforts out there in front of the public. This is a chore to be sure, what with design by committee, insensitive clients, rampant ignorance, bottom line thinking and of course bad reproduction. This isn't a now and then situation, this is the norm. It's normal to have no time, clients with no brain, and projects with no money behind them. This is the discipline we choose to work within. So why do some of our ranks seem so surprised when confronted with the harsh reality of pleasing a client, especially a client who is knowledgeable and has taste and is well aware of the problems faced by a graphic artist?
We all have a client or two who know more than we do, these are the ones who challenge us, and make us do our best work. I know when I see an unusually good ad or editorial illustration or logo or commercial, or book, it makes me take pause and think, that was one hell of an effort because I know some art director, creative team, client and artist/designer had the good sense to work together to make something really good. Conversely, when I see a steaming pile of dung I'm amazed that no one had the good sense to pull the plug and send that idea to a quiet grave.
We should be vocal critics of what we see. My friend who was an award winning art director at Playboy magazine said in the thirty plus years he worked there, there were very few letters praising the quality of the artwork displayed in the magazine. I suppose you'll say Playboy readers aren't interested in art or that they can't write, perhaps that's the same reason Time magazine used to have beautifully painted portraits of world figures on their covers but doesn't any more, the readers can't write. Obviously the inability of the readers/ public to register their enjoyment or dismay as to the choice of visual stimuli they prefer leads our bottom line oriented business mba types to surmise that a drop in readership or ad effectiveness has little to do with good graphics, it must be caused by market trends, or a shift in demographics, or maybe even global warming. Maybe the fact that all magazines pretty much look alike these days might have something to do with it. And maybe ads that all look alike may not stand out in the crowd, and thus might be less than effective.
Bad stuff in an important place kills. No letters come in saying that the crap that you choose to represent you and your product with will force me to alter my buying habits, the public just moves on. The focus groups will ask why the public moved on and they probably won't ever get the real answer because I don't believe the public is even conscious of what it was that caused them to alter their course. And this all leads back to my little problem of having to do someone else's job because they didn't care or weren't paying attention or thought good enough was better than nothing.
I hope that as graphic artists we have enough sense to figure out which battles are worth fighting. If in the course of doing business we falter, make a mistake, or just do something stupid, at least we should have the good sense to try and fix it. Your job description is graphic artist AND problem fixer. We don't do our careers, our profession, or our clients any good if we make more problems than we cure. If your services are worthy of cash compensation, then take responsibility for making sure that you are doing your job the best that you can, without the crying and the posturing. The job is tougher than ever now because our budgets suck and apathy is rampant. And your feelings will get hurt in the process, but getting a check has a healing affect.
JP Schmelzer
National Guild Prez
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