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Just make it look pretty

FEBRUARY 10, 2010
I, as much as anyone, love to put on my thinking cap and solve an arcane, ethereal problem that can barely be described in words, however, often as not, my assigment is to take a piece of everyday business and do something to make it interesting.
 
I am ever-grateful that we manage to obsess over milestones, anniversaries and accumulations of things that must be represented with numbers and are not that well served by photographs of tender starlets, juicy hunks or tricked out automobiles. Then comes my opportunity to make the image itself a thing of interest and beauty rather than merely a depiction of some beautiful thing.
 
It has been my good forthune to do several annual covers for Pensions & Investments "the International Newspaper of Money Management" and I treat each one as something cherished and precious, use as many cues as possible to stimulate interest including visual, tactile and, perhaps most important of all, stored memory to create an inviting, sensual experience, not just another piece of business.
Leatherette from the cover of a 1930s plumbing supply catalog, "gold leaf" from a mystical combination of Illustrator filters and a badge that might have graced the hood of a 1949 Bulgemobile.
Let's see, how many different ways can we show the number "1000?"
Just to make this one a little more interesting, they asked for a couple of tighter sketches. This poses the problem for me of selling something in schematic form that's not going to even begin to be what it's headed for until after 12 or 20 hours of obsessive noodling.
Topical: For one and all  
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