Shepard Fairey: Obama Poster / Courtesy Design Museum, London

Ranging from Shepard Fairey’s iconic Obama poster, to the economically sustainable Magno Wooden Radio and the multi-functional landmark of the New Oslo Opera House, the international winners in each category of the Brit Insurance Design Awards 2009 are spread across Indonesia, Colombia, USA, Norway and Italy. The winning entries represent a snapshot of contemporary design and demonstrate the role that design plays at a global level. Deyan Sudjic, Director of the Design Museum said: “The judges had an exceptionally challenging role in selecting seven category winners from such a comprehensive shortlist. This year’s winners are a true reflection of the exceptional calibre of design that has been conceived internationally in the past 12 months.”

The panel of judges, chaired by Alan Yentob, had a difficult undertaking in selecting just one winner in each category from such a diverse collection of entries. Yentob was joined by MoMA’s senior design and architecture curator Paola Antonelli, designer, environmentalist and educator Karen Blincoe, architect Peter Cook, fashion author, stylist and critic Sarah Mower and last year’s winner, designer Yves Béhar. The panel commented, “We were captivated by the stories behind the winning projects and how they demonstrate the strength of design as a tool for cultural, political and social change.”

The New Oslo Opera House, Norway won for the category Architecture. The Norwegian National Opera and Ballet in Oslo is located on the Bjørvika Peninsula overlooking the Oslofjord. The design by Snøhetta won the international competition in 2000 with the plans to provide Norway with a landmark building, offering a stage to showcase Norwegian culture. Also at the centre of urban redevelopment, it now provides a new dynamic public space, attractive for visitors as well as an area for locals to enjoy. The building features dramatic angles that literally dive into the fjord, allowing the visitor to take in the entire structure from ground level as well as appreciating the views as they ascend to the top of the building. The structure also combines a series of architectural features created in collaboration with a number of artists.

The judges commented, “This is more than a beautifully designed building and an opera house; it’s a living part of the city, a place for music, but also an outdoor space, somewhere all kinds of people like to go. Its mix of indoor and outdoor spaces attracts not just opera enthusiasts. It's a building that gives people the chance to roam through, across and on top of it, all the way from sea to roof level.”

The Black Issue of Vogue Italy was the jury’s number 1 in the category Fashion. They said: “Deemed a cultural watershed, A Black Issue firmly placed the debate about the lack of black models in the fashion industry to the very forefront of the fashion world's consciousness as well as causing wide spread debate outside fashion circles. Steven Meisel and Franca Sozzani created an issue that truly captivated an audience much wider than the regular fashion reader's mind, where young black women finally felt that they could relate and aspire to the content through the people portrayed. The issue has undoubtedly raised questions amongst consumers and critics as to how casting agencies and other fashion promoters include non-white models in their portfolios and magazines, as it's now proven that 'black' does sell.”

In July 2008, Italian Vogue dedicated an entire issue to black models focussing on successful, black women. The editor, Franca Sozzani entitled the magazine: A Black Issue, featuring some of the leading black models within the fashion industry and editorial celebrating influential women in the arts and entertainment industries. It coincided with the US presidential campaign and was at a time when American protest groups demonstrated about the lack of black models in the fashion industry. This inspired Italian Vogue to elevate the debate and make it more public. The feedback was overwhelming, mainly positive, where newsstands from Milan to New York were inundated, with an increase in sales by 40%. Despite some critics’ view that A Black Issue was nothing else but a cynical sales campaign by Vogue Italia, sold and distributed in a country still challenged by racism, most felt it was a tribute to black people achieving equal goals to their non-black counterparts.

The team at Konstantin Grcic’s studio collaborated with the Italian furniture producer Plank and chemical company BASF to create the MYTO Chair, the Furniture category-winner. Reinterpreting the typology of the cantilever chair, it was designed primarily as a manufactured chair that utilises BASF’s engineered plastics. The design development took place within the space of one year, during which Grcic experimented with the creative potential of the material Ultradur® High Speed (PBT – polybutylene terephthalate) and as a result found that the materials properties shaped the final form. Its extraordinary consistency, strength, viscosity and thermoforming abilities meant that the fluid plastic could be injected into a mono-block. The supporting frame would harden and conform to the perforated seat and back, dissolving seamlessly into the net-like perforations of the structure, presenting an elegant transition from thick to thin cross-sections.

The judges commented, “It is tough creating a design classic, but the MYTO might just have achieved this through its rigorous experimentation and research, resulting in the technically very difficult outcome of a cantilevered plastic chair. It is a successful balance, a sense of functional purpose and elegance, the result of a partnership between designer, manufacturer and BASF's engineers.”

Interactive: Zoo films director James Frost, Radiohead House of Cards / Courtesy Design Museum, London

Following the tremendous success of their inaugural year in 2008, Brit Insurance Design Awards and supporting Brit Insurance Designs of the Year exhibition return for their second year, making them an annual fixture on the design industry calendar. Brit Insurance Design Awards is the Design Museum's annual exploration of the of the most innovative, interesting and forward looking designs produced over the last twelve months from around the world and celebrated in seven categories: Architecture, Transport, Graphics, Interactive, Product, Furniture and Fashion. The shortlist is on show at the Brit Insurance Designs of the Year Exhibition from 12 February until 14 June at the Design Museum in London. read more

DESIGN MUSEUM / Photographer: Luke Hayes / courtesy DESIGN MUSEUM

The Design Museum is one of the world's leading museums devoted to contemporary design in every form from furniture to graphics, and architecture to industrial design. It is working to place design at the centre of contemporary culture. It demonstrates both the richness of the creativity to be found in all forms of design, and its importance. Design is a hugely fertile field of inventive new work, as well as a key component underpinning the modern economy. It provides a means for understanding the contemporary world, and, potentially, for making it a better place. The Design Museum's mission is to celebrate, entertain, and inform. read more

Shepard Fairey 'Duality of Humanity 1', spray paint and stencil on collaged paper / courtesy Merry Karnowsky Gallery Berlin

Tom Felber for ceative face Magazine

Just a few months after Merry Karnowsky Gallery successfully opened its new gallery in Berlin the gallery now features the Los Angeles-based, contemporary street artist Shepard Fairey at Berliner Liste Art Fair. Frank Shepard Fairey (born in Charleston, South Carolina) who usually omits his first name is a contemporary artist, graphic designer and illustrator who emerged from the skateboarding scene and became known initially for his "Andre the Giant Has a Posse" sticker campaign. In addition to his successful graphic design career Shepard Fairey also DJ's at many clubs under the name DJ Diabetic and Emcee Insulin, as he has diabetes.

Fairey graduated from RISD in 1992 with a Bachelor of Arts in illustration. After graduation, he founded a small printing business in Providence, RI called "Alternate Graphics", specializing in T-shirt and sticker silk-screens, which afforded Fairey the ability to continue pursuing his own artwork. read more