Montreal, Canada

INDIGO, the International Indigenous Design Network, is proud to announce that Robert L. Peters has been appointed as an INDIGO ambassador. Rob will bring invaluable design and consulting expertise to INDIGO as well as an extensive international network.

Robert L. Peters, Icograda President 2001-2003, is a designer and principal of Circle, a design consultancy he co-founded in 1976. In addition to practice, he has been actively involved in design education, writing, speaking, advocacy, and professional development for most of his career, including leadership roles within the Society of Graphic Designers of Canada (GDC), and the International Council of Graphic Design Associations (Icograda).

As Koopman Chair at the School of Art, University of Hartford, Rob worked with Russell Kennedy in 2006 on INDIGO’s inaugural project, MIX06 (Migrant Indigenous Exchange 2006), developed as a collaboration between Monash University in Melbourne, Australia and the University of Hartford in Connecticut, United States.

Rob is active internationally as a consultant and design strategist, policy advisor, writer, juror, and guest lecturer and is based in Winnipeg, Canada.

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INDIGO Ambassadors are individuals committed to creating an awareness of the network, its projects and promoting engagement with designers, stakeholders and the public at large within their communities. INDIGO Ambassadors support the Secretariat in creating a collaborative environment for the exchange of knowledge and ideas. They offer the network local access and insights, help shape projects and initiatives and serve as resources to the network at large.

(reposted from INDIGO news, here) Photo thanks to Ian McCausland.

Lisbon, Portugal

The May/June 2010 (#374 Illustration Annual 51) issue of Communication Arts magazine contains a feature article entitled “Visual Communication Design in Portugal: Land of Discovery” written by Circle’s principal, Robert L. Peters. The piece investigates Portugal’s unique attributes, history, culture, and current realities in relation to visual communication—the article is accompanied by a selection of design and illustration by Portuguese designers.

Peters visited Lisbon in 2009 as a speaker at OFFF 2009 Oeiras (International Festival For The Post-Digital Creation Culture), an event attended by nearly 4000 enthusiastic participants. He then drew from dozens of attendees who contacted him following his talk to crowd-source opinions on Portuguese design and related issues, as well as suggestions for representative works.

Peters has been contributing in-depth foreign feature articles to Communication Arts magazine since 1994, including pieces on design and design events in Russia, Portugal (the XVI Icograda General Assembly in 1995), Uruguay, Australia, Korea, Japan, Brazil, China, Denmark, Cuba, and New Zealand. Copies of CA issue #374 are available at book stores and major news outlets around the world and may be purchased online from the Communication Arts website.

Read the full feature article (with full creative credits for works shown) or download the entire CA Portugal design feature here (1.1 MB). Note: this feature article from Communication Arts magazine appears with permission by Communication Arts ©2010 Coyne & Blanchard, Inc. All rights reserved.

A special thanks to the numerous Portuguese designers and design educators who enthusiastically contributed their insights, viewpoints, and suggestions regarding works that appear in the article, in particular; Sarah Chaves Brasseur, Carla Carrão, Aurelindo Ceia, António (Tózé) Coelho, António Costa, Ana Farinha, João Cardoso Fernandes, Antero Ferreira, Afonso Figueiredo, Margarida Fonseca, Bruno Franco, António Silveira Gomes, Carla Ponte Júlio, Ana Lopes, Miguel Macedo, Mário Moura, Fernando Oliveira, João Maio Pinto, Rosa Quitério, Luísa Ribas, Catarina da Silva, Paulo Silva, and Patrícia Sobral.

Toronto, Canada

Sorting through some old files at the office this week we chanced across a one-page response Rob had submitted to Applied Arts back in 2001—in answer to the question by Sara Curtis, the magazine’s editor at the time: “What do you keep in your work space to inspire you?” The resulting piece was featured as the last page of the May/June (Vol. 16, No. 3) issue…

“What inspires me most are encounters, experiences, and exchanges with other creative people I meet around the world. When I travel, I collect meaningful mementos, visual artifacts, and small mnemonic objects—steeped in memories, rich in semiotics and ready to trigger recall in an instant. Back in the studio, these tactile little collectibles act as icons for experiences and invite the Muse. Here are some items from my bulletin board and the corners of my office…”

(see the full page as a PDF  [204 K] and read the image captions here).

Winnipeg, Canada

A handsome presentation box from Nova Scotia Crystal has arrived at the office… containing the sand-blasted crystal trophy for the Icograda President’s Award presented to Robert L. Peters on 26 October 2009 at the opening ceremonies of the Xin: Icograda World Design Congress 2009 in Beijing. The 35-cm-high piece is now on display in Circle’s forum area—due to logistics complexities (involving the “import of creative works” to China) Peters had been presented only the framed diploma portion of the award at the ceremony in Beijing.

Winnipeg, Canada

We wish you and yours the very best!

Taipei, Taiwan

Circle’s founder, Robert L. Peters, is in Taiwan for a week as part of the three-city 2009 Conference of International Design Competitions lecture tour; Taipei, Taiching, and Tainan. The two other international presenters are Nakanishi Motoo (one of the great corporate identity masters, responsible for creating and/or managing the image of over one hundred top-500 companies worldwide, among them Bridgestone, Kenwood, Mazda, Asics, Kirin beer, etc., etc.), and Hiroshi Tsunoda, a talented young Tokyo-born product designer with a burgeoning practice in Barcelona, Spain. Peters reports that audience response in the packed-out venues has been enthusiastic and warm (and Taiwan temperatures in the high 20s have been a full 50 degrees warmer than back in the ‘Peg).

Images above: Taipei 101 (the world’s tallest skyscraper when it was completed five years ago); delegates with Rodin’s Thinker at Asia University in Taiching; Peters in Tainan.

São Paulo, Brazil

Our talented colleagues at Oz Design (one of our co-design worldwide partners) were featured this week in the leading Brazilian weekly magazine Veja by means of a 10-page article introducing them as the graphic design professionals who “Give the city a face.” A piece of well-deserved recognition, we think, regarding the efforts that Oz has invested over the past 30 years to promote the value of design in Brazil. If you understand Portuguese, read more here.

Keep up the good work!

Beijing, China

Circle’s founder, Robert L. Peters, was honoured today to receive the Icograda President’s Award from outgoing Icograda President Don Ryun Chang of Korea. The presentation took place at the National Centre for the Performing Arts (the ultra-modern opera house also known as “The Egg”) in Beijing, with an audience of several thousand present for the opening day of the Xin: Icograda World Design Congress 2009.

Beginning in 1970, the Icograda President’s Award has been presented on a biennial basis by the Icograda President. The award honors an outstanding contribution to the work of Icograda. A listing of previous recipients is available here.

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The presentation transcript follows:

“Before we start the Adobe Design Achievement Awards, I have the pleasure of announcing the second 2009 Icograda President’s Award and it gives me great pleasure to introduce Rob Peters and to recognize his many contributions—from his distinguished stewardship of our council during his term as President and board member, to his numerous published articles featured in important design publications, but today especially his significant role in nurturing and promoting design in China and Asia.

Raised and schooled in Europe, Robert was educated in Switzerland, Germany, and England. He is a graphic designer, communications strategist, and principal of CIRCLE, an award-winning design consultancy he co-founded in 1976. Robert is active internationally as a design practitioner, advisor, juror and lecturer.

Following the 1991 Icograda World Design Congress in Montreal, Rob was designated as the GDC’s official delegate and liaison, representing Canada to Icograda General Assemblies in Glasgow in 1993, Porto (Portugal) in 1995, Punta del Este (Uruguay) in 1997 (where I first met him), and Sydney in 1999 where he was elected to the Icograda board for a six-year term from 1999 to 2005, serving as President from 2001 to 2003. Significant achievements during Peters’ six years on the Icograda board include: development of our first content-rich portal, rejuvenation of the network ‘Friends of Icograda,’ launch of both the Icograda Design Education Network and the Icograda Design Media Network, co-organization of Icograda congresses in Seoul (‘Oullim’ 2000), Johannesburg, South Africa (‘Continental Shift’ 2001), and as President of our Council in Nagoya, Japan (‘VISUALOGUE’ 2003—with some 3700 delegates from 49 countries in attendance, the world’s largest ever congress of graphic designers). Rob also served as official liaison between Icograda and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) as well as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) from 2001 to 2005.

Peters joined the board of the international humanitarian organization Design for the World (DW) in 2000 and was appointed as a Vice President in 2002; in 2004 he was named an Honorary Member of the Brno Biennale Association; he was also a member of the founding executive of the International Design Alliance (IDA) from 2003 to 2005.

For nearly 30 years, Robert has lived in a low-energy, passive-solar house he designed and built in the woods east of Winnipeg, Manitoba. He is an avid climber (rocks, ice, mountains) and he enjoys nature and human-powered outdoor pursuits. His interests include art, architecture, photography, visual language, and travel, and he has written many important articles for prominent design publications such as Communication Arts (like the memorable article that introduced Chinese design to many readers all over the world).

Rob has been a great role model, a friend to me over the years, and he has given me great advice—it is a special honor for me to recognize his achievements here in China today.

It gives me sincere pleasure to present the 2009 Icograda President’s Award to Robert L. Peters.”

São Paulo, Brazil

Our co-design worldwide partners at Oz Design are celebrating their 30th Anniversary, replete with a move into new offices… here’s a congratulatory toast to our talented southern friends from the great white north…

Cheers!

Vancouver, British Columbia

Our good friends (and co-design worldwide partners) at Ion Branding + Design are celebrating their 20th Anniversary today… wish we could be there to raise a glass with you—but we’ll do so from afar… Cheers!

Ion sent out cool ‘20!’ coasters as their party invitations.

Wanganui, New Zealand

Circle’s Robert L. Peters has just returned from Wanganui, New Zealand, where he has been acting as an external moderator at the Wanganui School of Design. As was the case last year, he was impressed with the outstanding quality of student work (both graduating Bachelors and Masters students)—see a posting on Rob’s personal blog here. In addition, Rob had the opportunity of spending several days in Wellington and Auckland (also meeting several of the designers featured in the Communication Arts feature on New Zealand graphic design that he wrote earlier this year).

Photos: the Sarjeant Gallery in Wanganui; the 328 m high Auckland Sky Tower (tallest free-standing structure in the Southern Hemisphere); Te Papa, New Zealand’s national museum in Wellington.

the Internet

Robert L. Peters was a presenter on Saturday at <head>, billed as “the world’s first virtual conference—interactive, green, and affordable.” While <head> did have ‘meatspace’ hubs where participants could meet in person (Brighton, London and Manchester in the U.K., Fribourg in Switzerland, and San Francisco in the U.S.), the majority of participants from around the world took part from wherever they happened to be (or in the Second Life hub). Peters’ talk on best practices in working and living as a designer was entitled ‘Do the right thing. Do the thing right,’ using Circle’s Maxim/Dictum as a framework.

Feedback by participants on blogs, Twitter, etc. has been fast and effusive, e.g. “Dude, this is the way conference presentations should be. Hella fun. No messy travel plans, No standing in lines at airports, No rental car misadventures with wrong MapQuest printouts. No need to dress up. No consuming bad closest-restaurant-to-hotel food+coffee. No worrying about hooking up the projectors, no worrying about having enough battery power, or being close to an outlet, or being able to read the slides clearly behind the head of the person in front of you, all the while juggling the cup of coffee and danish and laptop in the lap. No trying to rush to get to the session conveniently located the opposite end of the convention center, only to find the room already at capacity. No staying up late nights adding last minute details to presentations… well okay that’s tradition.” (from TroyWorks).

Interactive, real-time, and global, this web-development and design conference saved tons of emissions by attendees not having to fly anywhere. Learn more about <head> here, and about its founder—the impresario/developer/consultant Aral Balkan here.

Winnipeg, Canada

We’ve been delighted this past week to have Lana Wagner Plant working with us—Lana is a visiting Danish designer from Krogh&Co in Copenhagen. At an informal reception yesterday for current and past Circle designers, Lana gave a presentation drawing on her diverse design influences (architecture, ceramics, visual communication), extensive international travels, avocations (Capoeira, Salsa dancing, etc.), life in Copenhagen, and the work that she and her colleagues at Krogh&Co are involved in. It was a pleasure for us to host Lana, and we wish her nothing but the best in her future endeavours…

Auckland, New Zealand

The September/October 2008 (#363 Interactive Annual) issue of Communication Arts magazine contains a feature article entitled “Living on the Edge: Visual Communication Design in New Zealand” written by Circle’s principal, Robert L. Peters. The in-depth piece investigates New Zealand’s unique attributes, history, culture, and current realities in relation to visual communication—the feature is accompanied by a selection of contemporary works by Kiwi designers drawn in large part from recent winners of DINZ awards shows (Designers Institute of New Zealand).

Peters visited New Zealand in late 2007, touring design offices in Auckland and Wellington (in conjunction with DINZ lectures in both cities) and acting as an external moderator for students graduating from the Wanganui School of Design. He has been contributing foreign feature articles to Communication Arts magazine since 1994, including pieces on design and design events in Russia, Portugal, Uruguay, Australia, Korea, Japan, Brazil, China, Denmark, and Cuba. Copies of CA issue #363 are available at book stores and major news outlets around the world and may be purchased online from the Communication Arts website.

“To foreigners, New Zealand is an exotically bucolic, clean green land of extraordinary natural beauty—a pristine playground-destination for thrill-seekers, and a place apart from the rest of the world—a view effectively reinforced by the tourism slogan “100% Pure New Zealand.”

To the country’s quietly self-reliant inhabitants, New Zealand offers a peaceful, friendly, egalitarian and multi-cultural haven for individualists who find themselves surrounded by a moat known as the Pacific Ocean. Blessed with a temperate climate, the island nation enjoys a relaxed lifestyle imbued with a love of the outdoors and the waters surrounding it, and an enviable quality of life.

Less known abroad (under the radar, some might quip) is the wellspring of talent, innovation and design prowess emerging from the NZ creative community—it’s at the forefront of this wave that the candidly fresh and vibrant vernacular of New Zealand’s visual communication design finds itself…”

Read more of the article (with full creative credits for works shown) or download the entire CA New Zealand design feature here (1.2 MB).

Note: this feature article from the Communication Arts magazine September/October 2008 Interactive Annual appears with permission by Communication Arts ©2008 Coyne & Blanchard, Inc. All rights reserved.

(from DT&G Magazine)

“Thoughtfully written, concisely edited, beautifully designed…”

There is more to being a designer than using tools to re-form and regurgitate our thoughts. There is more to design than balancing concept with execution. Design is intent: the process of understanding relationships and making choices based on that knowledge. We make our thoughts real when we put them into the world, and they give us back the world we live in. Worldwide Identity, Inspired Design from Forty Countries is thoughtfully written and concisely edited by Robert L. Peters, beautifully designed by his team at Circle (Winnipeg, Canada), and published by Rockport in partnership with Icograda (the International Council of Graphic Design Associations).

Rob is very concerned about how we make our thoughts real in the world—as he should be, with the depth and breadth of his background. Rob is a renaissance designer. Founder of Circle, a former president of Icograda, an internationally respected teacher, juror and speaker; mountain climber and solar home-builder; he has more than smarts and experience—he has passion and he has vision. He ventures into the world and the world sends him back with questions about our future. He entreats, “Aware of the advancing threat of monoculture, can the world’s identity designers help conserve and revive those things that make human culture distinct and unique?”

The opening pages are written with an urgent intelligence, and give an integrated overview at where we now stand as a species from a designer’s point of view. As designers in a globally connected world, it is our responsibility to contribute towards a shift in this place we find ourselves, and Rob drives that point home. As he has said, design is a verb and not a noun—a gestalt, not a thing.

As with most design books the verbal content is brief, but is well written and informative. The first few pages of preface and introduction are worth the price of admission alone. They make you think instead of react: something we all need to do more of. The visual content has a museum quality of wayfinding in 2 dimensions: each country’s opening section is displayed as a keyed demographical brief, describing the conditions through which the designs were conceived and birthed. It is not only a quick reference, it allows cultural comparisons of design produced within various countries in an accessible way, something of interest to all of us in today’s technologically connected world. The identities are collected both as encapsulations with background briefs, and fuller histories as case studies. Many are culturally flavoured, a reminder of how wonderful and necessary distinction is in the face of the “emergence of nonplaces (uniform airports, generic shopping malls), and the advancement of what some theorists are calling ‘serial monotony.’” He also points out that more than half of the world’s top economies are no longer countries, but now belong to the corporations. This explains a lot, doesn’t it?

The book opens with “Identity lies at the very core of culture, and it is the key to our understanding of self.” This is a book to remind you of that and it should be on every thinking designer’s bookshelf. Better design leads to better choices, and better choices lead to better design.

–Maggie Macnab, author of Decoding Design, principal of Macnab Design. Read more reviews of Worldwide Identity here.

Chicago, Illinois

Circle’s founder, Robert L. Peters, spent the weekend in Chicago with his girlfriend Ev in advance of speaking at FITC’s Design & Technology Event there. Trip highlights included a lengthy visit to the Art Institute (even though much of the main gallery is under construction, and a sizable portion of the permanent collection is on tour), and an incredible solstice evening at Olive Park beach on Lakeshore Drive (Lake Michigan). Read more about Rob’s Chicago sortie here and here.

Art: Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate (110 tons of polished stainless steel); Jaume Plensa’s Crown Fountain; Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges-Pierre Seurat; Nighthawks by Edward Hopper; Ev wonders “Where did Van Gogh go?”

Winnipeg, Canada

We wish you hope, peace, fulfillment, and the very best for 2008…

Menlo Park, California

The September/October 2007 (#355) issue of Communication Arts magazine contains a feature article entitled “Design down under: graphic design in the Land of Oz” written by Circle’s principal, Robert L. Peters. The in-depth piece explores Australia’s unique attributes, history, culture, and current realities in relation to visual communication. The feature is accompanied by a selection of historical brands and contemporary works compiled by Peters and drawn from recent winners of AGDA competitions (Australian Graphic Design Association).

Peters has visited Australia several times in recent years—in 2006 he spent a month as designer in residence with the Faculty of Art & Design, Monash University, Melbourne. He has been contributing foreign feature articles to Communication Arts magazine for over a decade, including pieces on design and design events in Russia, Portugal, Uruguay, Australia, Korea, Japan, Brazil, China, Denmark, and Cuba. Copies of CA issue #355 are available at book stores and major news outlets around the world and may be purchased online from the Communication Arts website.

Read or download the feature article here (2.5 MB).

actionSHIFT international is a simple initiative that collects and sends used computers from Canada to Nicaragua. Begun as an outreach pilot program in 2006 by volunteers from Evangel Chapel in Winnipeg, in collaboration with Centro Cristiano Emmanual in the Nicaraguan capital of Managua, the initiative is now focused on sending full container-loads of reconditioned computers (approximately 800 at a time) to Central America.

Circle recently took on actionSHIFT as a pro bono project, creating the initiative’s name, designing a visual identity, writing texts, and developing initial communication tools. More information is available at www.actionshift.ca

Toronto, Ontario

Popular Canadian music icons Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, Anne Murray, and Paul Anka have been honoured with a set of commemorative stamps released here today. As stated in a press release issued by Canada Post: “These four stars established themselves on the world stage in an era when the Canadian music industry struggled to compete with its American counterpart, and paved the way for the opportunity – and phenomenal success – experienced by our stars of today… Before 1960, almost all records sold in Canada were by foreign performers. Not so today. Not only have Canadians focused their attention on the stars in their own backyard, but Canadian performers are also capturing the spotlight on the international stage.”

“Creating these stamps is Canada Post’s way of giving something back to these very talented artists, who have given so much to Canadians,” says Liz Wong, manager of Stamp Design and Production at Canada Post. Wong adds that the four stamps are only the second Canada Post issue to honour living Canadians, the first being Oscar Peterson in 2005. “Trivia buffs may notice that living Canadians honoured on a postage stamp have something in common—they’ve all received the Order of Canada,” says Wong.

The CD-shaped Canadian Recording Artists booklets will also put a new spin on this type of collectible. There are four different booklets, with each cover featuring the image of one of the recording artists. Inside, the stamps are arranged in one of four different orders, with the singer featured on the cover appearing in the top-left position. The booklets also include envelope seals and information about the featured artist. In addition, a souvenir sheet, official first day cover, and postcards are available.

The design team at Circle was very enthusiastic about working with “living legends” while they developed the Canadian Recording Artists issue. “We tried to portray the distinctive personality of each performer,” Peters explains. “And, we wanted to depict them at a significant moment in their careers.” Inspired by album covers, each stamp is square in format and features a photo of the artist along with distinctively styled fonts appropriate to the era.

To reflect the glamour and prestige of the recording artists, the designers incorporated a distinctive MetalFX® process. “The MetalFX process involves under-printing in metallic silver ink, then over-printing with other colours,” says Peters. “The result gives a lustrous sheen to the artists’ portraits and lends a ‘platinum album’ feel to the shiny, disc-shaped stamp booklets and souvenir sheet.”

These limited edition stamps are now available through post offices across the country, can be ordered online by following the links at Canada Post’s website www.canadapost.ca, or by calling toll-free: 1-800-565-4362 (Canada and the United States), or 902-863-6550 (from other countries). Read the feature article published in Canada’s Stamp Details (Vol. XVl No. 3; July to September 2007) here. View the various philatelic collectibles (including postcards) here.

For more information about the stamps’ design, call Robert L. Peters at +1 204 943 3693.