December 9, 2013

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Looking toward the Future: Introducing SAVisual

As Scientific American's design director, I realize the weight this office brings to bear on me. SA has published groundbreaking art and graphics since its inception in 1845.

By Michael Mrak

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This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American

As Scientific American‘s design director, I realize the weight this office brings to bear on me. SA has published groundbreaking art and graphics since its inception in 1845. From the first etchings to today’s 3-D illustrations and photography, it is an incredible legacy.

In this blog we will call out great art and design from our hallowed pages and elsewhere in order to elevate science visuals to their proper place. Where would we be if we failed to depict the things we cannot visualize in our mind’s eye? As a child, I read books such as Man’s Reach into Space, by Roy Gallant and Lee Ames, and watched Star Wars. I looked at the art and tried to figure out how to draw it. Today I am fortunate to be able to facilitate the same type of art in our pages, bringing new life to concepts that are challenging to visualize. I don’t get to do the art (well, at least not all the time), but that doesn’t mean that I am not intimately involved with the process. I imagine that my predecessors were the same in this.

Hopefully, the art we showcase here will inspire the next generation of artists to draw things that are scientific, because by visualizing these things we can build them.

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In the spirit of looking forward I looked at Scientific American‘s past covers and pulled a few of my particular favorites. I hope you like them, and keep checking back here for new (and old) art, graphics and videos from my staff and me.

Rights & Permissions

Michael Mrak was formerly creative director for Scientific American and was responsible for ScientificAmerican.com and its newsstand specials. He and his team established the visual language for the brand and produced its award-winning graphic design, illustrations, photography and information graphics. Not always a science journalist, he designed for magazines as disparate as Esquire and Architectural Record, but his love of science led him to work for Discover magazine and produce award-winning design for that publication as well. Always curious, when he’s not designing, he works on cars, illustrates and paints and practices fencing in his off time.

More by Michael Mrak

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