Paul Rand’s name is one that tends to pop up a lot during my time here in IDEA. Yet I still feel like I’m only scratching the surface and this blog finally gives me an opportunity to look into his career more deeply and the story behind him being one of the biggest influencers behind bringing modern design to America.
Now everyone knows about his work at IBM and NeXT, I mean it’s pretty iconic, how could you not? “But how did he get here?” I asked myself after hearing his name pop up for the 50th time finally peaking my curiosity.
After some research I found that when him and his family moved to Brooklyn, He first became inspired by figures on posters and comics and attempted to redraw them, however, drawing figures was against his parents’ beliefs. This resorted to him having to draw at the back of his father’s grocery store in secret and would probably explain why he had to take night classes for art on top of school and even learning art history through a magazine he found in a Macy’s bookstore. His dedication to the craft is truly motivating and inspiring.