Reykjavík Grapevine - 11.03.2011, Blaðsíða 13

12
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 3 — 2011
Words
Haukur S. Magnússon
Photography
Jói Kjartans
TH
E PR
O
FESSO
R
A
N
D
H
IS PIX
EL PR
IN
C
E
G
oddur and Siggi Eggertsson debate design, the w
orld
GODDUR’S STUDIO, 105 REyKjA-
VíK. SATURDAy DECEMBER 18,
THREE PM.
G: ...I first saw Siggi at Gilið in Akureyri
[Akureyri’s ‘art district’] when he was
fifteen or sixteen years old. He had a
little office there, making posters for
[arts society] Gilfélagið and various
events they were staging. I knew his
mother, and she had told me she had
a boy that was making graphics, ask-
ing me to peek over his shoulder and
tell her if he had any future in the field.
That’s the first time we met.
I next saw him a couple of years
later when he was trying to get into LHÍ
[The Icelandic Academy of the Arts] at
far too young an age. He was eighteen
by then, too young, but he managed to
whine his way in. It was a tough deci-
sion. You aren’t always doing people
a favour by admitting them at a young
age; even though they might have
enough talent and the technical ability,
there’s always a question of whether
they’re intellectually developed enough
to practice and fathom the ideological
discourse, writing essays and whatnot.
See, LHÍ is not a technical school
and was never intended to be one. Its
goal is training burgeoning artists and
creatives in practicing discourse about
arts and design, their philosophy, soci-
ology, history.... but we still let him in,
because sometimes you can’t get in
the way of those that obviously pos-
sess what we call ‘magic’. They have
an innate ability to fascinate others,
something we’re always looking for in
the creative fields. In Siggi’s case, we
couldn’t stand in his way. In fact, the
problem was the other way around: he
was far too quick in mastering what we
had to say and teach him. In the end, we
had to set him free... He completed his
studies at the school, but we had taught
him all we could long before he gradu-
ated.
Was that embarrassing for you as
teachers?
G: Yes, it was. [Goddur leaves to an-
swer a phone call].
Is he telling the truth?
Siggi Eggertsson: Uhm. I don’t know...
How did the two of you meet?
SE: Well, it’s as he said. I was working in
Gilið and my mother asked him to look
at one of my posters. Gilfélagið had ad-
vertised for someone to make posters
and graphics, and I applied and got the
job. It was a great job, even though it
didn’t pay very well. A venue for what I
wanted to do, even though it’s far from
what I’m doing these days. I got to play
around all day on the computer, making
posters for jazz concerts and whatever
else was going on. I had 100% creative
freedom, too, which was nice.
[Goddur returns]
I WAS A TEENAGE DESIGNER!
What makes a teenager want to do
graphic design?
SE: I thought about this the other day.
When I was a kid I loved computers and
drawing. Those were my two passions.
One day when I was around thirteen,
a family friend that had just got back
from Thailand came for a visit, bring-
ing with him a pirated WAREZ CD he
had brought from a street vendor. I had
just gotten a brand new Pentium 133
PC, and so installed everything off the
disk, including a graphics programme
called CorelDRAW. It fascinated me,
and through playing around with it I
discovered that there was a profession
that combined my two main interests.
It was around the same time that
design was getting big on the internet.
Designers became internet stars, post-
ing their drawings and sketches, which
were in turn discussed, on forums.
There was a big graphic awakening in
the early days of the internet and I fol-
lowed it closely. I started participating,
and I guess it was an early obsession of
mine, wanting to be the best at what I
did. I don’t see any point in being medi-
ocre, not being the best at what you’re
doing—or even trying to be the best—is
pointless and boring. It’s not for me in
any case.
The internet, is that something that
matters?
SE: I would say that it means every-
thing. It is man’s best invention, ever, I
would say. It gives everyone an equal
chance. It doesn’t matter if you’re a
teenager from Akureyri or a rich kid
in New York, you’ll have just as good a
chance of doing whatever you want to
do on the internet. You put something
out there, and if it’s nice people will
eventually spot it and you’ll get a reac-
tion And if you continue on that path,
then something might happen.
G: I want to remark upon the...
SE: Can I just finish here? So, as I said,
I was getting into design at the same
time that it’s getting big on-line. People
are starting to design websites that are
works of art, everyone suddenly has a
platform where they can display their
talents and share what they’re doing
with the world. It was an exciting time,
and it drew me right in. Sorry.
THE BURDEN OF BEING AN ICE-
LANDER
G: I wanted to ask if you’ve ever felt
different for being an Icelander in your
S
iggi on G
oddur
G
oddur is a great thinker, I w
ould say. H
e has given a lot of
thought to a lot of things, and he usually has som
ething to say.
A
nd I usually agree w
ith him
, he has a good view
of the w
orld
.
H
e has also helped m
e a lot. I have m
uch respect for him
.
GODDUR:
Guðmundur Oddur Magnússon, Goddur, is Professor
of Graphic Design at the Icelandic Academy of the
Arts. A dropout who was kicked out of the Icelandic
College of Art and Crafts, Goddur went on to get a
fine education from Fluxus artists. He studied under
Magnús Pálsson, Dieter Roth and Hermann Nitch to
name a few. He went on to study graphic design in
Vancouver, Canada, in the eighties, and was of the
first generation that learned to design in an Apple
Macintosh environment.
Returning from Vancouver (against his will!) in the
early ‘90s, Goddur taught graphic design in Akureyri
for a spell before moving on to managing the graphic
design programme at the College of Art and Crafts
(from which he had been kicked earlier), which would
later turn into The Icelandic Academy of the Arts
(LHÍ). He has been a professor at the school since
2002.
Goddur participated in the Klink & Bank project,
and appeared with Paul McCarthy and Jason Rhodes
at the Pompidou in 2004, in an exhibit entitled ‘Diony-
siac’. He is an avid spokesman of visual literacy and
has written many articles on the subject for the Ice-
landic media. He attends a sweat lodge two times a
month, is “neck-deep in Shamanism” and intends to
“spread polytheism and reclaim humans’ understand-
ing and respect for nature” in the future.
SIGGI:
Renowned graphic designer, typographer and illus-
trator Siggi Eggertsson was born in Akureyri in 1984.
He spent his childhood obsessing about computers
and drawing, and as a teenager learned he could
combine the two in graphic design. He studied the
field at the Icelandic Academy of the Arts, doing in-
ternships with KarlssonWilker in New York and a se-
mester at Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee before
graduating in 2006.
While still in school, Print Magazine named him one
of the twenty brightest design stars under the age of
30. After graduating, Siggi took on a job with London
agency Big Active. He has contributed to publications
like Dazed and Confused and The New York Times
and has done commercial work with Nike, Stüssy and
Coca Cola, to name a few (he has also contributed il-
lustrations to The Reykjavík Grapevine and the ‘Inside
Reykjavík’ guide we published in 2006).
Siggi has received numerous awards throughout
the years, lauded for his unique style and clear vision.
He most recently received an Icelandic Music Award
for creating the cover to Apparat Organ Quartet’s
‘Pólýfónía’, the artwork for which will be on display
at DesignMarch, in Tjarnarbíó. Some of his current
goals, listed on his website are: making furniture,
making an album cover for Björk, designing money,
illustrating children’s books and working with LeBron
James.
GODDUR AND SIGGI
Here’s where it gets interesting. As you might have
surmised, Goddur was Siggi’s professor and mentor
during the latter’s stint at LHÍ. The two have known
each other since Siggi was a teenager. They get along
well but at the same time seem exact opposites, God-
dur being an outspoken motormouth who changes
his mind mid-sentence while Siggi is quiet, firm and
stubborn. What sort of discussion arises when stu-
dent meets master after making his way in the wide
world? Read on to find out!