Burton Kramer (born 1932) is a Canadian

graphic designer A graphic designer is a professional within the graphic design and graphic arts industry who assembles together images, typography, or motion graphics to create a piece of design. A graphic designer creates the graphics primarily for published, ...

and

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, th ...

who lives and works in Toronto.

Early life and education

Kramer was born in 1932 in New York City. He graduated with a BSc From The Institute of Design, Chicago in Visual Communication and an MFA in Graphic Design from Yale University.

Career

Kramer began working in the late 1950s for Will Burtin, then as Assistant Art Director of "The Architectural Record", for Geigy Chemical and Pharmaceuticals In Ardsley, New York, and then as Art Director at the Erwin Halpern advertising agency in Zurich, Switzerland. He moved to Toronto in late 1965 and his work was prominent at Expo 67, where he designed the map - directory system, among other contributions. His work from this period shows the influence of

Op Art Op art, short for optical art, is a style of visual art that uses optical illusions. Op artworks are abstract, with many better-known pieces created in black and white. Typically, they give the viewer the impression of movement, hidden images ...

. He has pieces featured in the Smithsonian Institution and the Library of Congress. He has archives of his work in the collections of the

Royal Ontario Museum The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is a museum of art, world culture and natural history in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is one of the largest museums in North America and the largest in Canada. It attracts more than one million visitors every year ...

, Toronto, and the Vignelli Center at Rochester Institute of Technology. He is well known for designing the distinctive 1974 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation logo, consisting of a stylized letter "C" (for Canada) radiating in all directions, representing broadcasting. In 1966-67, he was Director of Corporate Design for Clairtone, redesigning their logo and many other aspects of their graphic identity. In late 1967 he founded Kramer Design Associates Limited, a multi-media firm specializing in corporate I.D. Programs, signage systems and print. Kramer was a professor at the Ontario College of Art and Design (part-time faculty) for 21 years, lectured at universities in Mexico, Canada, the US and Switzerland. He has been a member of AGI. Alliance Graphique Internationale and an Academician of the

Royal Canadian Academy of Art The Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (RCA) is a Canadian arts-related organization that was founded in 1880. History 1880 to 1890 The title of Royal Canadian Academy of Arts was received from Queen Victoria on 16 July 1880. The Governor General ...

since 1974. He is listed in Who's Who in American Art, Canadian Who's Who, Who's who in The World, and many others. Kramer is currently active as an artist, showing his geometric abstractions at galleries in Canada and abroad.

Honours

Kramer was awarded GDC Fellowship in 1975. He was made a member of the Order of Ontario in 2002, the first graphic designer to be inducted into the order. He received an honorary Doctorate (D.Des.) from the

Ontario College of Art & Design Ontario College of Art & Design University, commonly known as OCAD University or OCAD, is a public art university located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The university's main campus is spread throughout several buildings and facilities within do ...

in 2003. In 2015 he was awarded the Art Directors and Designers of Canada Usherwood Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2018 he received The Order of Canada C.M.

References

External links

Official website

* ttp://www.ccca.ca/artists/artist_info.html?languagePref=en&link_id=1948&artist=Burton+Kramer Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art: Database of Art Work {{DEFAULTSORT:Kramer, Burton 1932 births Canadian graphic designers Living people Members of the Order of Canada Members of the Order of Ontario Artists from Ontario