CHIP KIDD TALKS WITH MILTON GLASER

"I always say you can tell by the amount of dog shit in the street."


If graphic design has a grand master, then Milton Glaser is Michelangelo. The Dylan poster. The oh-so-ripped-off “I ‘Heart’ NY” logo. The image for Angels in America. New Yorkmagazine. Everything else.

Glaser has worked nonstop for over forty-five years, co-founding the revolutionary Pushpin Studios in 1954, launching New York magazine with Clay Felker in 1968, establishing Milton Glaser, Inc. in 1974, and teaming with Walter Bernard in 1983 to form the publication design firm WBMG. Throughout his career, Glaser has created hundreds of posters and prints, and his artwork has been featured in exhibits worldwide, including one-man shows at both the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

In 1973 he published what is widely regarded as the first graphic design monograph, Milton Glaser: Graphic Design, and in 2000 he published Art Is Work—essentially “Episode II” of his professional life.

We talked on a stifling July afternoon in the small conference room of his adorable, toylike brownstone in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan. Fun fact: Throughout the interview Mr. Glaser held in either hand (and occasionally waved) a bright piggy-pink colored pencil.

—Chip Kidd


Check out the whole interview.