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2004 AIGA MEDAL
James Miho has spent a large part of his 50-year career in
focused traveling, collecting the images and impressions that would
inform a remarkable body of work for some of the most
design-conscious clients of the 20th century. During the 1960's and
1970's he worked on the infamous Container Corporation of America's
“Great Ideas of Western Man” campaign with Herbert Bayer and
Charles Coiner (and was responsible for introducing Pop art to the
series,) and art directed a series of themed paper sample brochures
under the umbrella title “Imagination” for Champion Papers.
Miho was born into a wealthy Japanese family in northern
California. With the onset of WWII, he and his family were interned
for four years at Tule Lake on the California-Oregon border.
Upon his return from fighting in the Korean War, Miho enrolled
at Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA. The art and
architecture he had seen during a two-week sojourn in Japan had
inspired him to pursue a career in design. He graduated from Art
Center in 1957 and Edward A. Adams, Art Center's founder, helped
him get his first job at the advertising agency N.W. Ayer & Son
in Philadelphia. Miho worked with Charles Coiner on the “Great
Ideas of Western Man” campaign for CCA and it was Miho who
introduced to the series the work of Pop artists such as Andy
Warhol, and Larry Rivers. These contemporary images paired with
timeless quotes created intriguing tensions that helped to keep the
campaign relevant.
Miho left Ayer in 1965 and after an extended trip to Greece,
resettled in Los Angeles. Here he embarked on what would be a
22-year relationship with Champion Papers through the agency
Needham, Harper & Steers, Inc. Miho designed a wide range of
material for Champion, including product promotions, and industrial
films (two of which won gold awards at Cannes Film Festivals.) He
is best known, however, for his concept, design, and photography
for the annual book of papers for designers, “Imagination.”
Through James Miho Incorporated, the design office he
established in New York in 1970, Miho consulted with the Chrysler
Corporation, Atlantic Richfield, Xerox Corporation, Denise Rene
Gallery of New York, and the Danish Embassy.
In 1988 he was appointed chair of the Graphic Design department
at Art Center College of Design. He held the post until 1996 when
he moved to Seoul to serve as the chair of multimedia design at
Innovative Design Labs (IDS) of Samsung.
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