JOHN FINNERTY DESIGN DOT COM

I recently was drawn to the work of Jen Stark through her mesmerizing animated Twitter avatar (stupid, but it worked!). Many of you know I am a sucker for anyone who uses exorbitant amounts of color. What is really interesting about Jen is that she manages to stretch her aesthetic over a variety of mediums, maintaining a relatively cohesive body of work.

Recently I was asked to be a part of a very cool thing called the Keds Collective. Keds asked an incredibly elclectic group of artists, designers, musicians, and more to express themselves via the sneaker. The results are pretty interesting. Check out my store here.

I watched Soul Power this morning. The movie was really good and it reminded me that some sweet, chunky design came out of the 70s. The logo below was used for the three-day music festival documented by the film. I also love how everything was orange in the 70s. It was like the white of the era. People used a lot of different colors, but orange often fulfilled any kind of generic color need like folding chairs, towels, and  tickets.

While working at my favorite an adequate independent coffee shop today, I saw these: Direct TV’s shameless coffee sleeves. Seriously. Barf. I honestly wouldn’t mind if they had some kind of clever campaign that integrated well into the context of a coffee cup, but this is just a bunch of logos yelling in your face; and the morning was going so well!

I am now realizing that since I have opened up this channel of hatred, I will start seeing obscene coffee sleeves everywhere. This is the burden of a designer, just as these terrible images will make a photographer’s skin crawl. Taken on my iSight…

Going through my never-ending bookmarks folder today, I revisited the amazing work of James Joyce. Each of his pieces is entirely stripped down to its most satisfying conclusion. I am constantly inspired by people who are able to do this. I really believe that the world would be a much nicer place if every one took this kind of care to be as clear and direct as they can. A complicated message isn’t necessarily clever or meaningful.

I’m seriously loving Eli “Paperboy” Reed right now.

Last week I met with the guys from Inksie and I feel I should mention them. Inksie is a new brand based out of Portland that is currently taking shape as an excellent “Journal of Design & Culture”. The site features intelligent writing and original content concerning all of things I am interested in. They are growing at a rapid rate and there’s a good chance the site will feature a contribution or two by yours truly, so you should probably pay attention. And note: their fantastic typographic logo was designed by Portland’s own Color Cubic, whose work is definitely worth digging.

Also: Have you ever seen something that is so visually inspiring that you just want to eat it? I mean physically ingest it so it becomes a part of you and brings you one step closer to being an unstoppable creative juggernaut? I may be insane, but that’s how I feel when I look at the illustration work of Alex Trochut.

Happy MLK day. Here’s a picture of the reverend. I can’t find a bad picture of the guy. He’s extremely photogenic.

Something I should have mentioned a while ago: I HAVE AN ART SHOW. FOR REALSIES. That’s right, my good friend and colleague Chris Bodven and I have a show up in the Higgins Gallery at Pacific Northwest College of Art. It’s called THEYEARTWOTHOUSAND and it is an exploration of design through revisiting the naïve mediums of desktop publishing, which sparked our evolution as visual artists. The show will be open through the end of the month so check it out. Here are some photos taken by my girl, who’s about to lap me on the blogging track.

I will use one of these to do it. Click it…

Maybe I should just start a blog of awesome things I find at the grocery store. It seems to be a trend. How can I help myself when I find something like this that combines two of my favorite things: chocolate milk and things that make me feel like a giant.

These new stickers chiquita is making are amazing. I found myself choosing my banana based on which one I liked best. It was the Luchador, of course.