Lust – A Traveling Art Journal of Graphic Designers by James Victore

Article by Martin Gibson – @embody3d @martingibson – 17.03.2011

Just a warning to readers under the age of 18, or people offended by nudity there is one page with a couple of hundred very small, but quite explicit pornographic images on it, so just keep that in mind.

Lust – A Traveling Art Journal of Graphic Designers by James Victore and published by Rockport appears to promise something that it’s not. On the blurb of the book it states

“What would you do or make if you had an unlimited budget, a visionary client, and complete control? We all dream of high paying high-profile jobs and crave more creativity in our work. Lust is a peek into what is possible when designers are allowed to pursue this dream.”

This is certainly correct when it comes to being creative, but in fact when it comes to high-profile and high paying, and unlimited budgets, these projects show nothing of the sort, in fact the complete contrary. Most of these projects have very modest budgets.

The book is poorly introduced, it kind of just throws you right in the deep end. The work itself is well portrayed but it lacks any description or inspiration for each piece. I can’t recommend this book to conservative real world graphic designers, it is just too abstract. However for an artist or art appreciator this book might be a hidden gem. Every work has a message, a mark or purpose to leave on society and how we operate and think and this only where this book excels. A positive of this book is that it is really scrappy, you really get a good insight into the makings of each work and their development which is so often forgotten.

[rating:2]