Jennifer Morla

Last updated
Jennifer Morla
Born1955 (age 68–69)
New York City, U.S.
Awards Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum National Design Award [1] (2017)
AIGA Medal [2] (2010)
Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI) (1998)
Website www.morladesign.com

Jennifer Morla (born 1955, New York City) is an American graphic designer and professor based in San Francisco. [3] She received the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian National Design Award in Communication Design in 2017.

Contents

Early life and education

Morla attended the University of Hartford in Connecticut studying conceptual art [4] before receiving her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Design in 1978 from Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston, Massachusetts. [5] She is also mother of 2 girls. Morla married Nilas de Matran, an architect. [3]

She was influenced to undertake her career as an artist through visits to the MOMA growing up in Manhattan, seeing Charles and Ray Eames' IBM exhibit and films at the 1964 Worlds Fair, and her aunt's career as editor in the art department at Condé Nast. [6]

Career

Design work

After graduation in 1979, Morla was hired at PBS station KQED in San Francisco. Her job consisted of her designing on-air, print graphics and designing animated openings. [7]

In 1981, she was hired as the head of the art department of Levi Strauss & Co. Her job role consisted of designing the store environment, logos, packaging, and labels for the advertising purposes of the brand. [8]

In 1984, she founded Morla Design. Clients include The New York Times , Levi Strauss & Co., Apple Computer, Herman Miller, Stanford University, and Luna Textiles. [9] [10] She has worked extensively with conceptual art venues designing identities, books and posters for The Mexican Museum, SculptureCenter, Capp Street Project, and New Langton Arts. [3] In 1995, she created a poster celebrating the 20th anniversary of the San Francisco Mexican Museum entitled El Museo Mexicano. The piece featured vibrant colors, print and pattern as a way to pay tribute to the Mexican culture. [11]

In 2000, Morla collaborated with Nordstrom creating a new face for the store's credit card to appeal to its consumers. The four holographic cards with vibrant colors and bold patterns reflected a reinvented version of the brand. [12] In 2019, Morla worked with the brand K&M Confections creating the packaging for their milk chocolate to create three different styles of packaging for the types of flavored chocolate featuring the same typeface and foil lettering texture. [13] Morla joined Design Within Reach in 2006 and developed campaigns emphasizing sustainability. [14]

Morla is regularly invited to judge design competitions, for instance the Webby Awards. She is a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI). [15]

Her design work is featured in museums such as the SFMoMA [16] and referenced in books such as Meggs' History of Graphic Design, [17] and was the object of a monography in 2019. [8] It is archived at the San Francisco-based Letterform Archive. [17]

Teaching

Since 1992 she has taught as an adjunct professor at California College of the Arts. [18] [8]

Awards and recognition

Exhibitions and collections

Permanent collections

Solo exhibitions

Group exhibitions

Works in publications

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References

Sources

  1. ↑ Cooper Hewitt Communication Design Award
  2. ↑ AIGA medalist Morla Retrieved 2015-04-14.
  3. 1 2 3 Bishop, Deborah (2018-11-15). "Legendary SF designer Jennifer Morla has something to tell you in big, bold graphics". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 2021-03-10.
  4. ↑ "Success Ideas and Tips from Master Graphic Designer, Jennifer Morla". The Sherwood Group. 2010-10-06. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
  5. ↑ "Jennifer Morla". Smithsonian American Art Museum. Retrieved 2018-03-08.
  6. ↑ Petit, Zachary (2016-01-25). "Jennifer Morla: "Design is Not Solely a Device That Supports Consumerism"". Print Magazine. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
  7. 1 2 3 Helf, Glen. "Jennifer Morla". AIGA | the professional association for design. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  8. 1 2 3 "This Just In: Jennifer Morla". letterformarchive.org. 5 July 2018. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
  9. ↑ "Jennifer Morla". AIGA | the professional association for design. Retrieved 2019-03-02.
  10. ↑ "Jennifer Morla". AIGA | the professional association for design. Retrieved 2019-03-02.
  11. ↑ "A look back at Jennifer Morla: El Museo Mexicano, 1995". Design Observer. Retrieved 2019-11-22.
  12. ↑ "Press Releases - Nordstrom". about.nordstrom.com. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
  13. ↑ "K+M Chocolate Packaging". PaperSpecs. 2019-01-22. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
  14. 1 2 "Design Within Reach". AIGA | the professional association for design. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  15. ↑ "Jennifer Morla, interviewed by Sean Adams: Continuum/Fellows Interview Series (2019)". AIGA San Francisco. 2020-02-24. Retrieved 2021-03-10.
  16. 1 2 Jennifer Morla at San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
  17. 1 2 "This Just In: Jennifer Morla". letterformarchive.org. 5 July 2018. Retrieved 2019-12-05.
  18. ↑ "- California College of the Arts - Portal". portal.cca.edu. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  19. ↑ "Jennifer Morla on The National Design Awards Gallery". ndagallery.cooperhewitt.org. Retrieved 2019-06-19.
  20. ↑ Fox, Amy (2006-10-20). Morla, Jennifer. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.t2021853.
  21. ↑ Jennifer Morla at MoMa
  22. ↑ Jennifer Morla at Smithsonian American Art Museum
  23. ↑ Jennifer Morla at Library of Congress
  24. ↑ The Designer's Dictionary of Color
  25. ↑ Meggs, Philip B.; Purvis, Alston W. (2016-04-14). Meggs' History of Graphic Design. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN   9781119136200.
  26. ↑ Jong, Cees de; Purvis, Alston; Lecoultre, Martiin (October 2010). The Posters: 1,000 Posters from Toulouse-Lautrec to Sagmeister. ISBN   978-0810995888.
  27. ↑ Stewart, Mary (11 April 2014). Launching the Imagination. McGraw-Hill Education. ISBN   9780073379302.
  28. ↑ Glimmer: How Design Can Transform Your Life, Your Business, and Maybe Even the World. Random House Canada. 13 October 2009.
  29. ↑ Women of Design: Influence and Inspiration from the Original Trailblazers to the New Groundbreakers.
  30. ↑ Heller, Steven (September 2003). Teaching Graphic Design: Course Offerings and Class Projects from the Leading Graduate and Undergraduate Programs . Allworth. ISBN   1581153058.
  31. ↑ http://www.number17.com/PressKit.pdf [ bare URL PDF ]
  32. ↑ Jennifer Morla in Graphis
  33. ↑ Graphis Poster 91. the International Annual of Poster Art. ISBN   978-3857093913.
  34. ↑ http://www.commarts.com/Search.aspx?code=morla&c=True&ft=False&dt=i%5B%5D Jennifer Morla in Communication Arts Magazine
  35. ↑ Breuer, Gerda; Meer, Julia (2012). Frauen und Grafik-Design. Jovis. ISBN   978-3868591538.
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