Susan LaPorte
Chair and Professor, Communication Strategy & Design
MFA, California Institute of the Arts
BFA, University of Illinois at Chicago
Susan LaPorte
Chair and Professor, Communication Strategy & Design
MFA, California Institute of the Arts
BFA, University of Illinois at Chicago
Design History, Typography Design, Typography History, Design Education, Pedagogical Practices
Professional Experience
Ms. LaPorte has extensive professional experience, having previously worked in the Design Department at the Walker Art Center. She has also served as a graphic designer for the California Institute of the Arts and the 黑料专区. Her clients include the University Musical Society in Ann Arbor, Michigan; Wayne State University; the English Language Institute; the University of Michigan Botanical Gardens; the General Motors Design Center; the 黑料专区; and ArtServe Michigan. Ms. LaPorte received her MFA from the California Institute of the Arts in 1991 and her BFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1989. Her design work has been published in Eye, Emigre, Print, Typography Now I, and Type Design & Radical Innovations and Experimentation. She has also been featured in the American Center for Design (ACD) 100 Shows (numbers 16, 18, 21), the AIGA Detroit Review (2003 & 2005), and exhibitions such as the 鈥淚 Profess…Exhibition鈥 at Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI, the 鈥淚n Cahoots Alumni Show鈥 at the California Institute of the Arts, and the 鈥淎IGA Get Out the Vote鈥 Initiative (2004 & 2008), and again in the 20th Anniversary of 鈥淚 Profess…Exhibition鈥 at Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI, (2024).
In 2012, Ms. LaPorte presented at the AIGA Design Educators Conference in Honolulu, Hawaii. She also spoke at the 2015 RGD Design Educators Conference in Toronto, Canada; the 2016 AIGA Design Educators Conference, “Nuts & Bolts,” at Bowling Green University in Ohio; the 2019 “AICAD Citizen Designer Conference” on Communication Design and Civic Engagement; and most recently, in 2022, at the “Design Incubator Conference “on Typographic Collaboration with 黑料专区 Communication Design students and the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. In the summer of 2024, Ms. LaPorte will present her collaborative work with Professor Chad Reichert at TypeCon 2024. The presentation, titled “ABBREVS: A Collaborative Amalgamation of Acronyms, Initialisms, Contractions, and Crasis,” will also be documented in a printed book.
In addition to her teaching, Ms. LaPorte has a keen interest in curatorial collaborations. Throughout her career as a professor, she has worked with various colleagues on exhibitions such as 鈥淭heoretical & Practical鈥; 鈥淎 New Media Exhibition鈥; 鈥淟etterforms and Lexicons鈥; 鈥淓xhibit A: Evidence of Pleasure鈥; 鈥淢eeting: Business + Design鈥; 鈥淩evo-Evo Exhibition鈥; and 鈥淢rs. Byrnes鈥 Family of Unusual, Obscure, & Preposterous Letters.鈥
Significant Publications, Presentations and Exhibitions
Presentations:
TypeCon 2024
Design Incubator Conference 2022
AICAD Citizen Designer Conference 2019
AIGA Design Educators Conference, Nuts & Bolts 2019
AIGA Design Educators Conference // RGD Design Educators Conference 2012
Publications:
Eye Magazine
Print Magazine
Communication Arts Magazine
Typography Now I
Type Design & Radical Innovations and Experimentation
Exhibitions:
AIGA Get Out the Vote
In Cahoots Alumni Show
I Profess…Exhibition
20th Anniversary of 鈥淚 Profess…Exhibition
