Lance Wyman (born 1937)Case Study: Lance Wyman
''WebEsteem Art & Design Magazine'', 2004 is an American graphic designer known for his work under

Pedro Ramirez Vazquez Pedro is a masculine given name. Pedro is the Spanish, Portuguese, and Galician name for '' Peter''. Its French equivalent is Pierre while its English and Germanic form is Peter. The counterpart patronymic surname of the name Pedro, meani ...

, design concept and direction in developing applications of the logo for the

1968 Summer Olympics The 1968 Summer Olympics ( es, Juegos Olímpicos de Verano de 1968), officially known as the Games of the XIX Olympiad ( es, Juegos de la XIX Olimpiada) and commonly known as Mexico 1968 ( es, México 1968), were an international multi-sport eve ...

in Ramirez Vazquez's personal office in

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...

Life and career

Wyman, the son of a commercial fisherman and a typist,Dana Hedgpeth,
After more than 30 years, Metro map is being redesigned by creator Lance Wyman
, washingtonpost.com, June 4, 2011; printed as "An icon's midlife facelift: Metro map must be updated, so its creator goes back to the drawing board", ''The Washington Post'', June 5, 2011, p. A1. grew up in

Kearny, New Jersey Kearny ( ) is a town in the western part of Hudson County, New Jersey, United States and a suburb of Newark. As of the 2010 United States Census, the town's population was 40,684, He graduated from the

Pratt Institute Pratt Institute is a private university with its main campus in Brooklyn, New York (state), New York. It has a satellite campus in Manhattan and an extension campus in Utica, New York at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute. The school was ...

with a degree in industrial design in 1960. The subject of

graphic design Graphic design is a profession, academic discipline and applied art whose activity consists in projecting visual communications intended to transmit specific messages to social groups, with specific objectives. Graphic design is an interdiscipli ...

was just being introduced in American universities at the time; when Wyman met a student who studied

logo A logo (abbreviation of logotype; ) is a graphic mark, emblem, or symbol used to aid and promote public identification and recognition. It may be of an abstract or figurative design or include the text of the name it represents as in a wordma ...

design with

Paul Rand Paul Rand (born Peretz Rosenbaum; August 15, 1914 – November 26, 1996) was an American art director and graphic designer, best known for his corporate logo designs, including the logos for IBM, UPS, Enron, Morningstar, Inc., Westinghouse, ...

Yale Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wor ...

, he wanted to design logos. Wyman began his career at

General Motors The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

, where he worked on a packaging system for Delco automotive parts that unified 1,200 different packages. Later, he moved to the office of William Schmidt, where he produced the graphics for the U.S. pavilion at a 1962 trade fair in

Zagreb, Yugoslavia Zagreb ( , , , ) is the capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Croatia#List of cities and towns, largest city of Croatia. It is in the Northern Croatia, northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slop ...

. In 1963, Wyman moved to New York, where he joined the George Nelson firm. He designed the graphics for the

Chrysler Stellantis North America (officially FCA US and formerly Chrysler ()) is one of the " Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It is the American subsidiary of the multinational automoti ...

Pavilion at the New York World's Fair. He later reported that devising a "pointing hand" themed logo and adapting it to the site directional signs convinced him that logos could play a more important role in an overall design program. In December 1966, he traveled to

to work at Pedro Ramirez Vazquez's office, and worked with many other designers in the identity program of the 1968 Summer Olympic Games. Wyman stopped working for the organizing committee in October 1968, he then designed the graphics programs for the

Mexico City Metro The Mexico City Metro ( es, Metro de la Ciudad de México) is a rapid transit system that serves the metropolitan area of Mexico City, including some municipalities in Mexico State. Operated by the Sistema de Transporte Colectivo (STC), it is ...

. After returning to New York, Wyman formed a partnership with Bill Cannan (Wyman & Cannan). In 1979, he established his own firm, Lance Wyman Ltd. He has also taught corporate and wayfinding design at

Parsons School of Design Parsons School of Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is a private art and design college located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. Founded in 1896 after a group of progressive artists broke away from established Manhatt ...

since 1973.

Work

Exposição Design & Utopia dos Jogos (28262053873)

Wyman, who has been described as a "rock star" of graphic arts, made his reputation when he collaborated with Eduardo Terrazas, under the direction of architect

Pedro Ramírez Vázquez Pedro Ramírez Vázquez (April 16, 1919 – April 16, 2013)
Retrieved 2013-04-16. was a

1968 Summer Olympic Games. He has also designed icons for museums and many other institutions, individualized signs for buildings at the National Zoo in Washington D.C., and many other symbols. Stepping outside his usual genre, he designed a poster for the 2008 Barack Obama presidential campaign. Perhaps his most enduring design is the stylized route map he devised for the

Washington Metro The Washington Metro (or simply Metro), formally the Metrorail,Google Books search/preview

in the mid-1970s, prioritizing the clear representation of routes, stations, transfer points, and certain landmarks over showing distances to scale. In 2011, Wyman was called on to design a new Metro map depicting new lines and route orientations, as well as some station names that had been expanded to the point of being cumbersome. It was one of the few occasions in which the original designer has had a chance to revise his own creation. The new map debuted March 19, 2012, and an update was announced on September 12, 2013. Wyman suggested naming the then-under-construction Metro line the Cherry Blossom Line, but it became the Silver Line instead. Wyman's work was the subject of a retrospective exhibition called "Urban Icons" at El

Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo The Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo ("University Museum of Contemporary Art"), also known as MUAC, is a large contemporary art museum located within the main campus of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). It opened in Nove ...

(MUAC) in Mexico City (2014–15). In 2017, he was awarded the

AIGA Medal Following is a list of AIGA medalists who have been awarded the American Institute of Graphic Arts medal. On its website, AIGA says "The medal of the AIGA, the most distinguished in the field, is awarded to individuals in recognition of their exc ...

for his "mastery of visual ecosystems and for setting the standard for the universal, public design experience."

References

External links

Lance Wyman, Ltd.

The Wyman map of the Washington Metro system, slightly changed in updates

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wyman, Lance 1937 births Artists from Newark, New Jersey American graphic designers Pratt Institute alumni Living people AIGA medalists