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2004 AIGA MEDAL
Jay Doblin (1920–1989) believed in the power of design to solve
large-scale and complex problems. He was an innovator in
industrial, product and graphic design, design methods, design
theory, and management. Through his teaching, practice, and role as
spokesperson, he continually pushed the profession to extend itself
beyond surface roles.
Doblin studied industrial design at Pratt Institute, Brooklyn,
graduating in 1942. He designed camouflage for the military before
being hired by Raymond Loewy in New York with whom he worked for
the next 12 years, much of that time as executive designer managing
the office's largest accounts that included Shell Oil, Nabisco,
Coca Cola, and BP.
In 1964, following a brief stint as a partner in Lippincott
& Marguiles, then the country's leading corporate identity
firm, Doblin co-founded Unimark International, which became the
world's largest design firm of that era with offices in seven
countries. At Unimark, he worked with the J.C. Penney Company to
develop a comprehensive corporate identity program that in 1974 won
an IDSA Special Award for the Advancement of Design. After leaving
Unimark in 1972, Doblin formed Jay Doblin & Associates, in
Chicago, a firm which has managed innovative programs for Xerox
Corporation, General Electric, American Hospital Association,
Borg-Warner, and others. The company was sold to partners in 1985
but continues to extend and apply Doblin's theories and
methods.
Throughout his life, even as he ran these large design offices,
Doblin was a dedicated and influential educator. From 1947 to 1952
he served as chairman of the evening division of the Pratt
Institute. In 1955, after the resignation of Serge Chermayeff, he
was selected to direct Chicago's celebrated Institute of
Design—established by the late Laszlo Moholy Nagy in 1937 and part
of the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) since1946. While
maintaining the experimental nature of the school, Doblin broadened
the curriculum to include more formal methods and theories of
design. His emphasis on design methods remains one of the school's
strengths.
Through his 32-year-long connection with the Institute, as
director and teacher, Doblin influenced thousands of designers,
many of whom now lead major product design and graphic design
operations worldwide.
His influence also extended to policy making. In 1959 Doblin
advised Japan's Ministry of International Trade and Industry on the
formation of a national design policy that helped to develop the
export laws, design practices and schools that were instrumental in
improving product quality.
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“Jay Doblin taught us the importance of rule-based design
systems. Each added eloquence, clarity and commonality.”
—Clement Mok
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