Steven Heller

Steven Heller (born July 7, 1950) is an American art director, journalist, critic, author, and editor who specializes in topics related to graphic design.

Steven Heller was born July 7, 1950, in New York City to Bernice and Milton Heller.

He attended the Walden School, a progressive prep school on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, as well as military school.

In 1968, he enrolled at New York University with a major in English, later transferring to the School of Visual Arts illustration and cartoon program but not graduating from either.

After leaving SVA, he was hired to teach a newspaper design class.

In 1968, he became the art director of the New York Free Press without formal education or credentials because of his leftist leanings, later attending some New York University lectures utilizing his press pass.

He met illustrator Brad Holland who convinced him page layouts and type choices mattered, of which Heller was previously unconcerned.

After the Free Press, he moved on to various publications, including porn tabloid Screw.

In 1974, Heller became the youngest art director for The New York Times Op-Ed page, replacing Jean-Claude Suares.

His interest in illustration employed on the Op-Ed page led him to publish collections on the subject.

He became the art director of The New York Times Book Review in 1977''.

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In the 1980s, he became interested in design through friendships with Seymour Chwast and Louise Fili, who he later married, as well as becoming the editor of the AIGA Journal of Graphic Design.

Under his care, the Journal became a place of critical design writing, inviting authors from a variety of professions and nurturing the careers of fledgling critics, who documented design writing.

In 1984, Heller helped create the master’s program for illustration at the School of Visual Arts.

In 1996, he was inducted into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame.

In 1999, Heller received an AIGA Medal for what designer Paula Scher described as "lifetime achievement that comes from a workday existing roughly between 4:30 and 8:45 A.M. before a full workday at the New York Times Book Review."

The Society of Illustrators honored Heller with the Richard Gangel Art Director Award in 2005.

In 2007, he began a transition from his 30-year career at the New York Times.

The changes created a lot of stress, and his Parkinson’s was either triggered or exacerbated.

In 2008, Heller co-founded the MFA in design criticism program (D-Crit) with Alice Twemlow.

In 2011, was awarded the Design Mind Award by the National Design Museum.

Heller has said he writes so that he "can further discover and share what I’ve learned with others" and as a way to study topics he is curious about, notably the emergence of right- and left-wing tyrannies and pre-World War II totalitarianism.

The subjects he writes about are seen through the lens of graphic design and are motivated by not being able to sleep and how design manipulates and communicates.

Heller is author and co-author of many works on the history of illustration, typography, and many subjects related to graphic design.

He has published more than eighty titles and written articles for magazines including Affiche, Baseline, Creation, Design, Design Issues, Design Observer, Eye, Graphis, How, I.D., Oxymoron, Mother Jones, The New York Times Book Review, Print, Speak, and U&lc magazine. For thirty-three years Heller was a senior art director of U&lc magazine, a publication devoted to typography.

Heller has written, co-authored, and/or edited more than 130 books about design and popular culture.

He worked with Seymour Chwast to create Push Pin Editions and more than 20 books for Chronicle Books with his wife, Louise Fili.

In 2017, the AIGA named an award, the Steven Heller Prize for Cultural Commentary, in his honor, citing his three decades of contributions to cultural discourse on design.

The program was intended to help non-designers find a place in the design field. As of 2019, he serves on the faculty of the School of Visual Arts as co-chair of the MFA Design Department, special assistant to the president, and co-founder of the MFA Design Criticism, MPS Branding, MFA Interaction Design, MFA Products of Design programs.

Heller's pupils have included Deborah Adler.