Lois realized in high school that every design and communications problem presented an opportunity to do something unusual, exciting, dramatic, and unique.<br /><br />Question: When did you know you wanted to be a designer?George <br /> Lois: From the time I was three or four years old, I drew all the <br />time. Drew all the time, every second. When I worked in my father's <br />florist, he was a, from the old country, and he was a Greek immigrant, <br />along with my mother, but when I worked, and I worked at his store as a <br />good Greek son always did, I drew all the time and when I was in the <br />store and I wasn't actually working, I was drawing, drawing, drawing, <br />drawing, drawing. I was at the High School of Music and Art, I <br />call it the greatest school of learning since Alexander sat at the feet <br />of Aristotle, but I took design courses among, you know, along with <br />history of art courses and along with academic courses. And I had a <br />flair for it, whatever that means, but at the very beginning of the <br />design courses, they were basically, you know, kind of a retro, you <br />know, Kandinskys and [...] and Paul Klees, and we did designs with <br />circles and then we did a design with circles and triangles, and then <br />with the circles, triangles, and squares, etc., rectangles. And at the <br />end of my very first term, after doing that for a term, you know, along <br />with all my other courses, he, Mr. Patterson gave us a beautiful 18 x 24 <br /> sheet of Strathmore, expensive sheet of Strathmore, must have cost at <br />least a quarter in those days, which was big bucks. And he said, "What <br />we're going to do in the next hour and a half will be one half of your <br />mark for the term." You know, we had dozens and dozens of them. And <br />he said, "And the subject this time is rectangles—period." And <br />everybody started to work and I just sat there for an hour and a half <br />and I didn't move, just kind of looked around the room. And he was <br />furious, you know, you could see him walking around, everyone trying to, <br /> everybody busy as hell cutting out squares and, you know, and doing a <br />shape here, doing Maleviches, you know, red-shape-blue-shape... and I <br />didn't move. And an hour and a half later he said, "Time's up." And he <br /> started to pick up, he was furious, he was turning red, and he came up <br />to me and he went to grab my 18 x 24 sheet and I said, "Hold it just a <br />minute, Mr. Patterson," and I wrote, I stuck my name, my signature in <br />the corner, and I handed him a 18 x 24 rectangle. And he still didn't <br />get it, he was furious. And he tore it away, and I said, "Oh, my God, <br />he didn't get it, oh, boy." And I came in the next morning and there <br />were two or three teachers in the hallway who stopped me and they said, <br />"George, what you did for Mr. Patterson's class was brilliant," he <br />obviously had gone into the locker room or something as they were <br />leaving school and he said, "What's wrong with that George Lois? You <br />know, he's a terrific student and he's, he... he did nothing, he just <br />handed me an 18 x 24... rectangle." Anyway, that was kind of a, <br /> I've always said that was kind of a, my epiphany, my self-induced <br />epiphany, when I realized that, and I made public, over at the High <br />School of Music and Art, that any problem, any design problem, any <br />communications problem, there's a chance to do something unusual, <br />exciting, dramatic, unique. And my whole career is based on the fact <br />that everything I work on, what I have to create, whether it's an <br />advertisement or, you know, a music video, or a magazine cover or <br />promotion piece, that my answer's got to be totally surprising and <br />unique and thrilling.So somehow in that first year at the High <br />School of Music and Art, I knew what I was going to be, some kind of a <br />communicator, a designer—and also, I was really inspired greatly by the <br />work of Paul Rand, who at that time, that was '45, and I was 14 years <br />old, and he must have been like 26 or something, he was a wunderkind, <br />and he was a, he was writing and creating his own advertising for <br />people, for clients like Orbachs, and he was doing IBM logos, etc. And <br />it was thrilling to look at his work, not that my work is anything near <br />what his is, but I was thrilled with the idea that you could work as a <br />communicator, as a designer, as an advertising guy, and create your own <br />work and not be a whore. And not do, you know, awful, terrible work. <br />So that inspired.Recorded April 5, 2010
