Maira Kalman @ Cooper Union
Recently I went to see a talk with Maira Kalman at The Cooper Union.
My interest in her work was re-awakened through her collaboration with David Byrne on the Broadway musical American Utopia (she designed the opening curtain and accompanying book that illustrates some of the lyrics).
The Cooper Union had just reopened their event/performance space and she, her son Alex, and design journalist Debbie Millman gave a live on-stage interview.
The discussion topics centered largely on Maira's work. But it also touched on Alex's work. And Debbie's new book (Design Matters) as well.
Here are a few of the discussion items that stayed with me ...
1/ Maira and Alex talked about "object journalism." That is, taking material/physical objects and building a story around them. Their very personal example is "Sarah Berman's Closet" a work of homage to Maira's mother that opened as a single-exhibition pop-up "museum" in Soho and went on to grace the American Wing at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
2/ Maira's "make and mail" projects. These are little hand-crafted booklets of illustrations that Maira sells to energize philanthropic efforts that align to her interests. Funds raised to go groups including the ACLU, Action Against Hunger and UNICEF.
3/ The kooky short films Maira makes with Alex in which they channel their attention into little cinematic masterpieces. My favorite is this love letter to her granddaughter Olive called "The Most Wonderful Day". Particularly the part that shows Maira working in her studio, and taking naps to dream-up ideas and conjure inspiration.
Nearly everything they talked about can be found on Maira's website. I'd suggest starting with the films, here.
Not giving anything away here, but I expect there will be several of Kalman's illustrated books exchanged as gifts in the Rittenhouse house over Christmas. Someday, when they are not sold out, I hope we can contribute to the fundraiser projects more directly too.
Thanks Maira! And Alex and Debbie.
...
Some out takes:
The sound engineers were playing the Talking Heads album '77 in Cooper Union’s Great Hall as the audience waited for the interview to start. It was a perfect choice. I think I have listened to "Love - Building on Fire" about 100x since then. I like it better now than when I first heard it as a teenager.
The conversation was centered on artistic production, but there were some smile-raising asides such as ... why "looking" should be considered a language, why the Charlie Brown Christmas Album is the most-uplifting music in the world, why Bard College is the place to go to college if you don't want to go to college, whether a "tassel" or a "pompom" is a better ending for a light pull-string, whether tacking a piece of food to the wall can be considered art, and so on.
You know you come from a design-y family when your child's middle name is "Bodoni" - after the typeface. Maira explained that good parenting is like artistic collaboration. It's about playing and making. Within limits.
The audience got fully involved in the interview at the end, by singing happy birthday to Maira. And eating mini donuts (rather than cake which, along with candles, were not permitted in The Great Hall). Such a nice way to include and engage everyone in the room. And now we can also say that we went to Maira Kalman’s birthday party!
