Jaymi: Milton Glaser 1960's

Milton Glaser is an American graphic designer, illustrator and cofounder of Push Pin Studio, a leading edge design firm in New York. The Pushpin Studios were at the forefront of graphic design in the 60’s. Glaser studied in New York and Italy and was the Director of Design at the School of Visual Arts in New York.

The 60’s were a time when technology like television and photography was altering the graphic design industry and illustration was declining as a technique in mass media. Glaser and the Pushpin designers instead focused on illustration and drew inspiration from their childhood love of comic books, modern art, and the art of non-Western cultures creating an innovative, avant-garde approach to graphic design. These designers expressed ideas about the subject through simplified images that functioned as signs and symbols.

Glaser focused on design for pop culture especially graphics for the music industry. He captured the imagination of a generation with his poster (1967) for folk-rock musician Bob Dylan. Glaser took inspiration from a range of places at the time he was interested in Islamic miniatures and the psychedelic images emerging from the West Coast. He worked from a photograph he’d taken of a sign in Mexico to design the “Babyteeth” typeface used on the poster. The poster features Dylan's silhouette in black with flowing Technicolor locks has become one of the icons of the Sixties.