Event Description

John is a partner and cofounder of C2 in San Francisco. He is founder and director of Project M, a summer program in Maine that works to inspire young designers, writers, photographers and filmmakers by proving that their work can have a positive and significant impact on the world.

Since 1991, John has produced an ongoing series of projects under the pseudonym Virtual Telemetrix, Inc. that addresses issues related to the practice of graphic design and corporate America. John has won over 250 design awards, served on the AIGA National Board of Directors, taught at California College of the Arts in San Francisco and written articles on design for notable design publications.

For more information about John, visit www.bielenberg.com

Event Summary

John Bielenberg of C2 in San Francisco was the guest for this year's Learning from Legacy. The event was held in the Metropolitan Club in the Sear's Tower. His friend, Greg Samata, acted as the moderator.

John is most widely recognized for Virtual Telemetrix, a fabricated corporation used in a series of satirical collateral pieces in the early 90s. The project, which commented on the relationship between design and business, won many design awards before being recognized as fictitious. It was later displayed in SFMoMA.

Since that time, John has gone on to win many other awards and to publish articles in notable periodicals, but he believes his biggest accomplishment to be Project M. This Taliesin-like summer program is devoted to teaching designers, writers, photographers and filmmakers in their early 20s to "think wrong." John believes that this age is most receptive to resisting heuristic biases, or expected conclusions, and is most capable of producing something truly original. Project M tries to harness this and use it to benefit society in new ways.

Most of the night was spent on a slideshow of the evolution of Project M, as it has grown in size and popularity. The project was done work in Maine, East Baltimore, Costa Rica, Ghana, and New Orleans. The most recent campaign was to raise funds for water meters in Hale County, Alabama -- an area in which a large part of the population is without fresh water.

To learn more about Project M, visit www.c2llc.com/projectm.html. For more information on the latest campaign or to donate, visit www.buyameter.com.

Sponsors: Artisan, Getty Images