IBM software visual identity

Erik Adigard

Our aim was to help IBM rethink itself as a new holistic organization that engages issues beyond corporate bottomline. We needed to represent IBM and its brands as fully concerned with issues ranging from business to culture and from science to ecology. This was expressed through the creation of a new visual vernacular and syntax illustrated in a pictorial mosaic (or “quilt”) that can be used freely by IBM designers worldwide. (w/Patricia McShane, M-A-D)

Images of IBM software visual identity

  1. Image 1 — IBM mosaics 2 (IBM software visual identity)
  2. Image 2 — IBMsoftware adigard (IBM software visual identity)

    Erik Adigard, France (2009)

    Erik Adigard is a co-founder of M-A-D, based in Montpellier and Berkeley. His practice explores relationships between technology and humanistic concerns in all mediums for both corporate and cultural institutions...

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    • IBM software visual identity, 2002

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    Our aim was to help IBM rethink itself as a new holistic organization that engages issues beyond corporate bottomline. We needed to represent IBM and its brands as fully concerned with issues ranging from business to culture and from science to ecology. This was expressed through the creation of a new visual vernacular and syntax illustrated in a pictorial mosaic (or “quilt”) that can be used freely by IBM designers worldwide. (w/Patricia McShane, M-A-D)

    Erik Adigard, France (2009)

    Erik Adigard is a co-founder of M-A-D, based in Montpellier and Berkeley. His practice explores relationships between technology and humanistic concerns in all mediums for both corporate and cultural institutions.

    Significant projects include Wired Ventures visual essays and conceptual apps, an IBM global brand campaign, an exhibition for ExperimentaDesign. the Venice Biennale US Pavilion, a multidisciplinary installation for the Bauhaus Centennial, a degrowth oriented app concept for Driving the Human, and SIMAGE, an on-going investigation on the culture and implications of contemporary image.

    Adigard teaches Machinic Modernity, a design and philosophy California College of the Arts class which became a 2023 exhibition at the SFO Museum.

    Adigard’s work is in collections such as the SFMOMA, the Smithsonian Library, and has been featured in major international exhibitions, film festivals and publications, such as The Sundance Film Festival, the London Design Museum, the Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, and international biennales.

    Recognition includes the Chrysler Award for Innovation in Design, the Rome Prize in Design, the Venice Biennale Special Mention.

    Education

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    • Undergraduate,  
    • Postgraduate

    2011 – today

    • California College of the Arts (USA)

    Adjunct professor of communication design, time-based media and image experimentation. Other academic projects include workshops in the US and Europe since 2000

    Agencies

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    • Wired Ventures

      1992 – 1998

    Awards

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    • 1999

    Chrysler Award for Innovation in Design
    • 2012

    Rome Prize in Design

    Other Professional Activities

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    • Academic reviews, advising and juries in US and Europe (graphic design and architecture programs)

      1996 – present

    • Advisory boards of Adobe Design Achievement Awards

      2006 – 2011