On September 12, 2008, John Maeda was inaugurated as RISD's 16th president.
John Maeda is a world-renowned artist, graphic
designer, computer scientist and educator whose career reflects his philosophy
of humanizing technology. For more than a decade, he has worked to integrate
technology, education and the arts into a 21st-century synthesis of creativity
and innovation.
Maeda's early work redefined the use of electronic media as
a tool for expression by combining skilled computer programming with sensitivity
to traditional artistic concerns. This work helped to develop the interactive
motion graphics that are prevalent on the web today. A pioneering voice for
simplicity in the digital age, he also initiated the Design by Numbers project,
a global initiative to teach computer programming to visual artists through
a freely available, custom software system he designed.
As a digital artist, Maeda has exhibited in well-received
one-man shows in London, New York and Paris. His work is in the permanent collections
of the Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the
Cartier Foundation in Paris. In the design realm, he is a trustee of the Smithsonian's
Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum and has developed advanced projects for
major corporations such as Cartier, Google, Philips, Reebok and Samsung, among
others.
In 2008 Maeda was named one of the 75 most influential people
of the 21st century by Esquire magazine. In 2001 he earned the National
Design Award in the US; in 2002, the Mainichi Design Prize in Japan; and in
2005, the Raymond Loewy Foundation Prize in Germany.
A former professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
Maeda taught media arts and sciences there for 12 years and served as associate
director of research at the MIT Media Lab. He has published four books, including
his 480-page retrospective MAEDA@MEDIA and his most recent, The
Laws of Simplicity, which has been translated into 14 languages. Maeda
has lectured widely, including at Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, Harvard, Princeton,
the Royal College of Art, Stanford and UCLA; at the Centre Pompidou, TED conferences
and Walker Art Center; and for corporations such as Herman Miller, Sony, Steelcase,
Toshiba and Yahoo!.
A native of Seattle, Maeda earned bachelor's and master's
degrees in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering from MIT, followed by
a PhD in Design Science from the University of Tsukuba Institute of Art and
Design in Japan and an MBA from Arizona State University.
