Authority control databases
| International | |
|---|---|
| Artists | |
Jennifer Morla | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1955 (age 68–69) New York City, U.S. |
| Awards | Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum National Design Award[1] (2017) AIGA Medal[2](2010) Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI) (1998) |
| Website | www |
Jennifer Morla (born 1955, New York City) is an American graphic designer and professor based in San Francisco.[3] She received the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian National Design Award in Communication Design in 2017.
Morla attended the University of Hartford in Connecticut studying conceptual art[4] before receiving her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Design in 1978 from Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston, Massachusetts.[5] She is also mother of 2 girls. Morla married Nilas de Matran, an architect.[3]
She was influenced to undertake her career as an artist through visits to the MOMA growing up in Manhattan, seeing Charles and Ray Eames' IBM exhibit and films at the 1964 Worlds Fair, and her aunt's career as editor in the art department at Condé Nast.[6]
After graduation in 1979, Morla was hired at PBS station KQED in San Francisco. Her job consisted of her designing on-air, print graphics and designing animated openings.[7]
In 1981, she was hired as the head of the art department of Levi Strauss & Co. Her job role consisted of designing the store environment, logos, packaging, and labels for the advertising purposes of the brand.[8]
In 1984, she founded Morla Design. Clients include The New York Times, Levi Strauss & Co., Apple Computer, Herman Miller, Stanford University, and Luna Textiles.[9][10] She has worked extensively with conceptual art venues designing identities, books and posters for The Mexican Museum, SculptureCenter, Capp Street Project, and New Langton Arts.[3] In 1995, she created a poster celebrating the 20th anniversary of the San Francisco Mexican Museum entitled El Museo Mexicano. The piece featured vibrant colors, print and pattern as a way to pay tribute to the Mexican culture.[11]
In 2000, Morla collaborated with Nordstrom creating a new face for the store's credit card to appeal to its consumers. The four holographic cards with vibrant colors and bold patterns reflected a reinvented version of the brand.[12] In 2019, Morla worked with the brand K&M Confections creating the packaging for their milk chocolate to create three different styles of packaging for the types of flavored chocolate featuring the same typeface and foil lettering texture.[13] Morla joined Design Within Reach in 2006 and developed campaigns emphasizing sustainability.[14]
Morla is regularly invited to judge design competitions, for instance the Webby Awards. She is a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI).[15]
Her design work is featured in museums such as the SFMoMA[16] and referenced in books such as Meggs' History of Graphic Design,[17] and was the object of a monography in 2019.[8] It is archived at the San Francisco-based Letterform Archive.[17]
Since 1992 she has taught as an adjunct professor at California College of the Arts.[18][8]
