Sagmeister & Walsh Rebrand The Jewish Museum, Using Sacred Geometry

FAST COMPANY
By Carey Dunne

New York City-based graphic design firm Sagmeister & Walsh,
famous for posing nude in their promotional photos, know how to engage

NEW YORK---New York City-based graphic design firm Sagmeister & Walsh, infamous for posing nude in promotional photos, know how to engage. That's why The Jewish Museum's director Claudia Gould, appointed in 2011, tapped the irreverent firm to create a branding that was striking and contemporary, but which would still embody its Jewish heritage. The museum turned 110th this year. Their exhibits range from the contemporary to the traditional. In the past year, for example, shows included a retrospective of comic artist Art Spiegelman and Marc Chagall’s fantastical paintings. But the museum has a millennia of Jewish history to showcase, as evidenced in the museum's collection of 30,000 art objects, from a first-century BCE bronze jug to Maira Kalman’s whimsical watercolors. What happens, then, when you try to design a graphic identity for such a place? How do you honor its ancient roots while expressing its continued relevance? [link]