SOME ODDS TO NO END(S)
Ed Fella
July 13, 2018, through August 11, 2018
Opening reception: Friday, July 13, 2018
FISK is open Monday-Saturday from 12-4 PM
EXHIBITION INFORMATION
Further exploring Ed Fella’s marriage between design and art, FISK presents Some Odds to No End(s) as an exploration of those two worlds. As an established designer, Fella
is most notable for his hand lettering. At 80, Fella still works every day in his studio. As a self-proclaimed “exit level designer,” he simply makes work for himself. This show is a culmination of the skills he has learned as a commercial artist, combined with the personal work he makes on a daily basis. Personal work that is less displayed and therefore less familiar to viewers aware of his legacy.
ARTIST INFORMATION
Edward Fella (born 1938) is an American graphic designer, artist, and educator from Detroit, Michigan. After working as a commercial designer for 30 years in Detroit, Fella returned to college and received his MFA in Design from Cranbrook in 1987 at age 40. Continually exploring the relationship between art and design, Fella has defined a style that combines commercial design and American vernacular typography. For 25 years, he taught graphic
design at the California Institute of the Arts before retiring in 2013. In the same year, he was awarded faculty emeritus and the institute invited him to keep his studio on campus, where he still works today.
His work is held in the collection of the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, the Walker Art Center, and the Museum of Modern Art. He is the recipient of the 1997 Chrysler Award and 2007 AIGA Medal. His most recent show at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Free Work in Due Time (2017), focused on Fella’s After the Fact flyers, a series used “to explore vernacular and historic typography, artistic and literary traditions, and other interests” through a number of announcements describing events and lectures that had already taken place.