Photo Courtesy of Alex Barber

On March 31st AIGA Houston was proud to welcome Ellen Lupton to our fair city where she gave her presentation: “Welcome to Busytown (Or, How to Be a Graphic Designer without Growing Up)” and talked about her upcoming book and recent exhibition “Graphic Design: Now in Production”

The lecture took place on the campus of Rice University within the Duncan Hall/McMurtry Auditorium. Domy Books was on-hand during the book signing to offer copies of most of Lupton’s books and limited edition copies of the letterpress event posters were available courtesy of Workhorse Printmakers.

Photo Courtesy of Alex Barber

During the event Ellen talked about the recent evolution of the design profession and designers themselves from largely invisible creative and production professionals to a more transparent and open access enterprise. Using Richard Scarry’s beloved Busytown as an investigative starting point, “Where everyone has a job and unemployment does not exist” Ellen humorously shows the audience where various designers and creative professionals would fit within this children’s book environment and illustrates how the rapid pace of technology and the increasing public access to professional design tools has changed the creative landscape drastically.

Among the topics covered were:

• Issues facing designers today
• Designer as Author
• Our love affair with smart tablets (illustrated from a woman’s point-of-view)

To view the full photo gallery please visit our Facebook page or view the set on Flickr.

Also many thanks goes out to our volunteers and sponsors without whom these events would not be possible.

For those of you that attended the event. What was your main takeaway from Ellen’s presentation?

Please share your thoughts in the comments section below or on our Facebook or Twitter page.