Debbie Millman, Kenna Kay, Stanley Hainsworth and Paola Antonelli introduce the “Gain: AIGA Design and Business Conference,” discuss the conference theme, Design (Re)Invents, and the speakers and topics coming up over the exciting two-day event.
Debbie Millman has been in the design business for 23 years fulfilling her dream of working in branding and furthering the meaning, purpose and stature of brands in our culture. Millman is a managing partner and president of the design division at Sterling Brands, the largest independent brand consultancy in the country. For over a decade, she has led long-term partnerships with global clients including Gillette, Kraft, Nestle, Pepsi, Campbell’s, Johnson & Johnson, Glaxo-Smithkline, Pfizer and Unilever. Millman is an author on the design blog Speak Up, a regular contributor to Print magazine and teaches Creative Leadership at the School of Visual Arts. In 2005, she began hosting “Design Matters with Debbie Millman, ” the first live weekly radio talk show about graphic design on the internet. In 2006, Millman completed her term as secretary, treasurer and sponsorship chair of AIGA's New York chapter. She is currently serving as the president of the board of AIGA.
After first pursuing an acting career, Stanley Hainsworth decided to apply that experience to another creative trade. He spent several years at Nike as a creative director before moving to Denmark to join the Lego Company as its global creative director. Hainsworth returned to the United States to work for Starbucks, where he led and oversaw all creative aspects of the company, including associated brands Hear Music, Tazo Tea and Ethos Water. His creative influence and responsibility in leading teams of designers, illustrators, web designers, writers and art directors extended to the look of new products, packaging systems, seasonal promotions, brand campaigns, advertising and collateral materials. Now, Hainsworth is the chair and chief creative officer of Tether, a creative company providing memorable solutions—branding, advertising, retail, digital, products, entertainment, packaging—for consumers. Hainsworth is a national board member of AIGA, a speaker on creativity at events worldwide, and the recipient of awards from I.D., Communication Arts, Graphis, HOW, PRINT
Kenna Kay is the vice president/creative director at TV Land, a division of MTV Networks. She directs a team of in-house designers and animators, as well as out-of-house studios and freelancers, to produce print, three-dimensional items, multimedia and motion graphics. Previously, she was art director at Nickelodeon. Kay has received numerous broadcast design awards, including recognition from Promax, Print, Communication Arts, HOW, Art Directors Club and D&AD. She has spoken on design issues for AIGA, the HOW Conference, the University of Kansas and the Art Director’s Club, and in such far-reaching places as Caracas, Venezuela. She has also judged for American Illustration 16 and the Minnesota Design Show “Design Excellence 2006.” From 2003 to 2005, Kay served on the board of directors as vice president of the AIGA New York chapter, and organized the “MOVE: Design for Film and Television” conference. She currently teaches “Beyond Editorial” in the illustration department at Parsons the New School For Design.
Paola Antonelli is senior curator of the Department of Architecture and Design at The Museum of Modern Art, where she has worked since 1994. Through her exhibitions—among them Design and the Elastic Mind in 2008—teachings and writing, Antonelli strives to promote a deeper understanding of design’s transformative and constructive influence on the world. She is very proud of a recent acquisition into MoMA’s Collection: the @ sign. She is working on several exhibition ideas and on the book Design Bites, about basic foods taken as examples of outstanding design.
