Readymag Stories: Dan Friedman

born in Cleveland, Ohio

accepted to the Ulm School of Design

graduates from the Basel School of Design

becomes a professor at Yale University, at the age of 25

Dan Friedman with his Yale class. A group of people holding a flag with the words Graphic Design

Dan Friedman with his Yale Class, 1970–74.

hired as a senior designer at Anspach Grossman Portugal

The Citibank Identification Standards Manual, 1975.

starts working for Pentagram

first solo art exhibition “Mr. D Starts Fresh” at the Fun Gallery

Wisdom 1, 1989. Collection of Loretta Michaelcheck. A golden ladder on a white background

Wisdom 1, 1989. Collection of Loretta Michaelcheck. © Antoine Bootz.

Installation view of 'Dan Friedman: Radical Modernist' exhibition (October 1, 2014–January 9, 2015), National Design Center Gallery at AIGA, the professional association for design in NYC: www.aiga.org/dan-friedman-exhibition. Photo by Steve Haslip, 2014. © AIGA.

Installation view of Dan Friedman: Radical Modernist exhibition. A pink wall with some posters

appointed a professor of graphic design at the Cooper Union

publishes his first book, “Dan Friedman: Radical Modernism”

Interior spread of Dan Friedman: Radical Modernism, Yale University Press, 1994. © Joseph Astor.

Interior spread of Dan Friedman: Radical Modernism. Friedman's head with a ladder attached to it

dies of AIDS at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, New York

be radical. —dan friedman

Dan Friedman in his Postnuclearism installation at Red Studio Gallery, NYC 1984. © Joe Coscia, Jr.

ulm’s breakaway

Dan Friedman was among few Americans who had a chance to receive proper European design education. But legendary Ulm was nothing like he had imagined. The school had a very precise, almost scientific approach to design, with a lot of theory, psychology and even math. What used to be, ten years ago, a cutting-edge way to teach turned into a dusty ghost of Modernism.

Proposed wrappings for Bonwit Teller department store, while with Anspach Grossman Portugal, 1976.

it is a profession which involves a great deal of drudgery and concern about minutiae that can only be measured in quarter points and millimetres. graphic design has always defined its focus in narrow terms—in ways that may stimulate graphic designers into a frenzy but mean nothing to the rest of society.
—dan friedman

Cover for the book of solutions to the Grid Project at Yale. Black grid on a white background

Cover for the book of solutions to the Grid Project at Yale 1993–94.

basel + wolfgang weingart

The Basel School of Design became Friedman’s second attempt to study in Europe, and the difference was mind-blowing: the school was already taken over by rebels and revolutionaries like Wolfgang Weingart who advocated for intuitive, against-the-grid teaching. There Dan Friedman learned all kinds of professional radicalism and was ready to bring it back home.

Dan Friedman, Wolfgang Weingart Speaks to America, poster for a college lecture tour, 1972.

Poster for a college lecture tour. A calendar with a picture of Wolfgang Weingart

Cover, Typograpfishe Monatsblatter. Letters flying in space combined with a night city photo

Magazine cover. Multiple letters N on a white background

Cover, Typograpfishe Monatsblatter, 19717.

Yale Symphony poster, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner. A letter B

Yale Symphony poster, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, 1973. Collection of Tom Strong.

what appealed to me was making things with my own hands, getting dirty, raw and messy. it was the antithesis of working in a clean graphic design environment. —dan friedman