Episode 123: Closing Doors, Opening Doors

This week, Jessica and Michael celebrate composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim, whose may 90th birthday events have been postponed due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Michael talks about three precepts that guide Sondheim’s creative practice:

The first one is: Less is more.
The second is: Content dictates form.
And the third one is: God is in the details.

If you heard someone had built their practice around those three precepts, would you not think they were a designer? I mean, he really thinks like a designer, which is why he's so appealing to me as an artist.

Also mentioned this week:

Michael Bierut, Tweet on COVID-19 visualization
Juan Delcan and Valentina Izaguirre, Instagram, Safety match
Vox on flattening the curve; curve GIF; cattening the curve
Harry Stevens, Washington Post, Why outbreaks like coronavirus spread exponentially, and how to “flatten the curve”
Alissa Walker, Curbed, Why I didn’t wait for my city to order me to stay home
Open Culture, Ursula K. Le Guin’s Daily Routine
Emma Steinbohel, Twitter thread on Design Observer Studio Session
The Guardian, YouTube, Quarantined Italians sing from balconies to lift spirits
Kaylee Whiteman responds to Laura Benanti’s #SunshineSongs Laura Benanti Twitter thread
Laura Collins-Hughes, New York Times, Where to Celebrate Sondheim in New York,
Broadway.com, Laura Benanti has been in two Sondheim shows
Fresh Air, 2010 interview with Sondheim
92nd Street Y, 75 at 75: Stephen Sondheim’s 1971 Lyrics & Lyricists talk
HBO, Six by Sondheim
Seth Rudetsky - Deconstructs "Opening Doors" from Merrily We Roll Along
Neil Patrick Harris and Theresa McCarthey, Take Me to the World - Evening Primrose
Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters, Evening Primrose Medley: Take Me to the World
Liza Minnelli and the Pet Shop Boys, Losing My Mind
Werner Herzog on Chickens
Nell Zink and Robert Walser, n+1, Thanks for the Underpants

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Michael Bierut studied graphic design at the University of Cincinnati, and has been a partner in the New York office of Pentagram since 1990. Michael is a Senior Critic in Graphic Design at the Yale School of Art.

Jessica Helfand, a founding editor of Design Observer, is an award-winning graphic designer and writer. A former contributing editor and columnist for Print, Eye and Communications Arts magazine, she is a member of Alliance Graphique Internationale and a recent laureate of the Art Director’s Hall of Fame. Jessica received both her BA and MFA from Yale University where she has taught since 1994. In 2013, she won the AIGA medal.

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