Back Story

Dan McElhat­tan, desig­ner, ins­truc­tor, busi­ness owner

I met Dan McElhat­tan the 3rd in Cali­for­nia at a cas­ting call for — get this — a rea­lity tele­vi­sion show about graphic desig­ners. He and I were both cho­sen to be semi-finalists, and he ulti­ma­tely being cho­sen as a fina­list in that show whose fate is still to-be-determined.

Recently, I enro­lled in a port­fo­lio review course at the College of Southern Nevada. Ima­gine my sur­prise when Dan roun­ded the cor­ner, ente­red the class­room, and pre­sen­ted him­self as the course ins­truc­tor. As such, Dan brought a lot to the table. We all bene­fi­ted from his long expe­rience in the industry, his enthu­siasm, and espe­cially his pro­fes­sio­nal con­tacts. It was through Dan and his con­nec­tions that I was published twice in as many months in the regio­nal maga­zine 944.

One of the final things that Dan brought about for the class was the oppor­tu­nity to have a senior show, as it were, in the form of a gallery sho­wing. The event was hos­ted by Fra­zee Paint at the Hol­sum Lofts in the Las Vegas down­town arts district.

Pre­pa­ra­tion

as a group we named the show “impression”

Being very exci­ted about the show I jum­ped at the chance to help create awa­re­ness and pro­mo­tio­nal mate­rials for it. I ended up bran­ding the entire show myself — from the post­cards and show pos­ters, to the drink menus, way-finding, and name badges.

In addi­tion to get­ting all of these varied mate­rials orga­ni­zed I had to collect my own items to dis­play. I spent the entire day before the show run­ning to and fro about town collec­ting sundry items and ensu­ring that my mate­rials were prin­ted, trim­med, sco­red, fol­ded, moun­ted and bound as need be. I had to take a day off work the ensure all the work was done. At the end of the event, my dogs were barkin’!

Sho­wing

The main pro­po­nent of the show was a series of pos­ters com­ple­ted by ever­yone in the group. The pos­ters all cen­te­red around the idea or theme of con­flict. The pos­ter I had inten­ded on sho­wing was the Tyler Dur­den quote pos­ter. Unfor­tu­na­tely the dimen­sions were wrong, that pos­ter was slim­mer than the 22”x28” we deci­ded on as a group. so I crea­ted a new one.

my pos­ter entry

This pos­ter was something that I had coo­king for a long while. I wan­ted to know what peo­ple thought about life — in gene­ral terms, what was their pur­pose or goal for the next 80 years or so until they expire. My first idea was to stop peo­ple in the street and ques­tion them directly, but logis­ti­cally it was not pos­si­ble and at any rate no one could/would ans­wer the ques­tion anyhow. I ended up using twit­ter to ‘eaves­drop’ on peo­ples com­ments. Using search terms I was able to find what peo­ple said in their own forums and in their own voice, and the best part — it was already typed up!

Trying not to be selec­tive of con­tent — posi­tive or nega­tive, funny or just plain pathe­tic, its all in there — I set these com­ments, into the let­ter­form out­li­nes of the word ‘life’ and for­med the design around that idea. I think it tur­ned out quite well and the res­ponse was resounding.

one of my tables, show­ca­sing some of my work

In addi­tion to the pos­ters han­ging around the room, we had table space that we were able to fill with our various work sam­ples. I had a num­ber of past pro­jects reprin­ted and pro­du­ced for the show, among them were the H&FJ cata­lo­gue, the CMYK boo­klet, and seve­ral pos­ters that I had crea­ted recently. In addi­tion I crea­ted an enti­rely new mar­ke­ting piece inten­ded to be left behind in mee­tings, or mai­led out to pros­pec­tive clients. This piece was a fol­ding pos­ter that was com­ple­ted by a bellyband.

Res­ponse

Dan invi­ted 30 or so VIP’s to come for the first block of the show, which was a clo­sed, invitation-only por­tion. These VIP’s were given ballots and com­ment cards and were encou­ra­ged to vote for their favo­rite piece and also ove­rall portfolio.

enter­tai­ning the jud­ges and ans­we­ring their ques­tions was the fun­nest part

After they had all cast their ballots Dan pulled us all aside and allo­wed us to choose if we wan­ted to read them or not. I really enjo­yed rea­ding ever­yo­nes com­ments about my work, it was very posi­tive over all. The num­ber of peo­ple who cited my work as the “best of show” was overwhel­ming and I am gra­te­ful for the recog­ni­tion and appreciation.

Sum­mary

What star­ted out as a semes­ter that I was plan­ning on quickly zip­ping up and get­ting done tur­ned out to be one that was full of oppor­tu­nity and exci­te­ment, mostly due the the pas­sion and com­mit­ment that Dan has for the work and his stu­dents. I look for­ward to seeing what Dan’s stu­dents come up with next semes­ter. If they do hold another gallery sho­wing I’ll be very inte­res­ted in atten­ding — pos­sibly in the capa­city of a judge, eh Dan?