Artist: GMB Akash

For years, GMB Akash has been traveling the world, capturing social issues faced by the people whom society seems to forget.  He focuses on capturing and exposing the problem of the lesser known people of the world, mostly in his home country of Bangladesh.  Through his photographs, Akash has shown countless stories of the socially isolated groups, making him known around the world as one of the leaders in documentary photography. 

Over his years of work, Akash has received over 60 awards international awards from all around the world.  His work has been in over 50 major international publications including: National Geographic, Vogue, Time, Sunday Times, Newsweek, Geo, Stern, Der Spiegal, The Fader, Brand Ein, The Guardian, Marie Claire, Colors, The Economist, The New Internationalist, Kontinente, Amnesty Journal, Courier International, PDR, Die Zeit, Days Japan, Hello, and Sunday Telegraph of London.  

Artist: Brandon Rike

 Since Brandon Rike could hold a crayon, he was in love with art.  He "wanted to be an artist when he grows up" ever since he knew what growing up meant.  In elementary school he took special art classes for advanced kids, and when in high school he was taking college art classes.  When he was 13 years old, him and his friends started a band.  That where he began his band design career.  He was constantly making flyers for his band by hand, or creating them in Microsoft paint.  His first real band logo was done on a piece of graph paper in Geometry class.  It was until later that he found out that this was called "graphic design."

After high school, Brandon went on the road with his band.  He spent his "college years" living in a van, traveling around the country, playing rock and roll for anyone that would have him.  They even managed to get signed to a label in Seattle, and put out three albums.  Over these years, he made friends with a number of bands, which allowed him to start designing shirts for more than just his own band.  Somewhere around 2002, he began getting paid to design shirts.  In 2006, his band stopped playing together, and Brandon started his full time career as a graphic designer.  He has been designing band t-shirts ever since.

Besides band shirts, he does an occasional logo or poster.  But his true love is in the shirt designs.  he enjoys most "tweaking letters around, getting them just right, and being able to come back to it, some time later and still be tickled with my work."

Artist: David Airey

David Airey was born in 1979 in Bangor, County Down, near the Northern Ireland capital of Belfast.  Being a genius, David went to college at the age of 15 to study art and design.  After 4 years, Airey went to Scotland to study graphic communications management at Edinburgh Napier University.  He then earned a post-graduate diploma in management at Belfast's Parity Training, before returning to Edinburgh.  In 2003, David finally finished his "formal design education."

After school, Airey taught English as a second language for a short time.  He then went on to advertising sales for Scotland's national newspaper, The Scotsman.  His next job was as the head of print design, print management, and web management at Myeloma UK.  Airey loved the jobs he had over the few years of his career, but in 2006, he decided that going the self-employed route was best for him.  As he began to build a web-presence and attract new clients, he worked as a contractor with his former employer for a couple of years.

As a brand identity designer and author, Airey specializes in creating visual identities for companies including Yellow Pages, Giacom, The Asian Development Bank, and Berthier Associates.  He also writes 2 graphic design blogs, logodesignlove.com and davidairey.com.  He also manages Identity Designed, a site featuring the work of design studios around the world.  Airey is author of a book called Logo Design Love: A Guide to Creating Iconic Brand Identities.  He is currently stationed in his home studio in Northern Ireland, where he continues to work as one of the most sought after designers in the world.

Interactivity

Interactivity, by definition, is "allowing or relating to continuous two-way transfer of information between a user and the central point of a communication system, such as a computer or television." Interactivity on a website means that the viewer of the site has the choice to click on things, scroll over them, etc, and that in turn triggers a response. It can make an object move, bring you to a new site, bring up information, or a plethora of other things. 

Artist: Herman Leonard

Herman Leonard was born and raised in Allentown, PA.  His interest in photography began in 1923, at age 9.  Herman witnessed an image being processed in his bothers darkroom and became enthralled with the magic of photography.  Throughout school, Hermans shyness was always holding him back, but not when he had a camera in his hand.  As the official school photographer for his high school, he was able to capture many great images of his classmates and the events that they went to.  Herman went to college at Ohio University because it was the only school at the time to offer a degree in Photography. In 1943, he took a break from college to serve with the United States Army in Burma.  He returned to college and graduated in 1947 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree.


Hermans passion for Jazz brought him to New York City in 1949.  He quickly established a studio at 220 Sullivan Street and captured the jazz clubs of Broadway, 52nd Street and Harlem.  He photographed and forged friendships with some of the worlds greats, such as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington, and many more.  In the late 50's Herman moved to London where he continued to shoot jazz, while also being the European photographer for Playboy Magazine.  In 1980, Herman moved from Paris to the Island of Ibiza, where he lived until 1988.  He then moved to New Orleans in 1991 and fell in love with the cities lively jazz scene and exhibited his work around the world in numerous solo shows.  In 1995, Herman released his second book, Jazz Memories, published by Editions Filipacchi and in that same year was awarded an Honorary Masters of Science in Photography from The Brooks Institute of Photography. Other awards include the "Milt Hinton Award for Excellence in Jazz Photography," from Jazz Photographer's Association in 1999, the "Excellence in Photography Award" from the Jazz Journalists Association in 2000 and a "Lifetime Achievement Award" from Downbeat Magazine in 2004.


Herman's jazz photographs are a unique record of the jazz scene of the 1940s, 50s and 60s. The Smithsonian claims 130 original Herman Leonard photographic prints in its permanent collection, where they are considered as essential to American music history as Benny Goodman's clarinet or Louis Armstrong's horn. Herman's work is also represented in numerous public collections including, Jazz at Lincoln Center, NY, Ogden Museum of Southern Art, LA, and the George Eastman House, NY, as well as the private collections of Sir Elton John, Bruce Bernard and His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand.