Eddie Opara is a renowned designer whose award-winning work is held in the Museum of Modern Art’s permanent collection. A partner at New York’s prestigious Pentagram design agency, he has developed brand identity across multiple mediums for clients such as Samsung, lululemon athletica and Morgan Stanley. He is also a senior critic at Yale University School of Art. UK-born Opara was as a guest of the Alliance Graphique Internationale AGI Open design conference in Auckland.
When you go to parties and tell people you’re a graphic designer, how do they respond?
For a long time, I’d say I was a plumber, because when I did say I was a graphic designer, they usually had something in their head like, “Oh, you do logos.”
What do you say you do now?
I tell them what I do, then I try to explain what it is by saying, “Take taxes. Some people do their taxes on their own. Some go to H&R Block and other people go to Goldman Sachs. Well, I’m like the Goldman Sachs of graphic design, because I do the big stuff.” Then they might say, “Tell me more.”
What do you say then?
Graphic designers try to elevate the uses of things, to find better ways to communicate while also giving joy and delight. Yet we still haven’t unlocked the utter, absolute importance of graphic design. Most people are still in first gear, which means clients often come to us, and they don’t know what they want. They might have a prescription or a perception of what they think they want, but that’s usually not what they need at all.
Is the world of design dominated by men, and white men at that?
That’s been problematic for me. I tried to reflect that sense with a poster I made called Stealth. I love posters, but Stealth is not an ordinary poster. It’s big, and it’s folded like a Stealth Bomber, so when you pin it to the wall, it protrudes. It’s about me, as a black man being invisible. There are also quotes from Ralph Ellison’s 1952 novel Invisible Man about African Americans not being seen for who they are. I chose quotes that resonated with me, sometimes feeling invisible or scorned. I also used a moiré pattern so, from a distance, you can see it, but when you get closer, you see it’s an illusion, which means it relays information on multiple levels. When you cover an entire wall with them, you wonder what on earth you’re looking at, and it’s like “welcome to my world”.
Do you actively seek to blow people’s minds?
I try to embed things into my work. To make it impactful, functional and aesthetically pleasing. I also aim for my work to have important narrative layers, and longevity while also being flexible. That’s what I love about design, being able to do all those things and, yes, to blow people’s minds.
How early did you know design was your forte?
When I was little, I was very rumbunctious so, when we went to church, Mum would bring paper and pen and I’d draw in the pulpit during the service.
What was a Wandsworth childhood like in the 70s and 80s?
Being born on Wandsworth Common Northside [in London] was very pleasant, although Young’s Brewery used to be in the centre of town and by a quarter to eight each morning the whole area smelled of yeast. I couldn’t stand that, but mostly it was a lovely middle-class childhood. You know how people sometimes say normal is crap? I actually think normal is quite nice.
Your parents arrived in England from Nigeria in the 1960s. How did their immigration experience inform your own life?
They were in their 20s when they moved over, and they met at Northcote Road Market in Battersea. Mum was a trainee nurse and Dad came on a scholarship that never occurred, so he took other jobs, including some in advertising as a graphic designer who did a bit of copywriting. Dad returned to Nigeria in the mid-70s, as did a lot of his generation, because there was thought to be more opportunity there for intelligent black men by then. In spite of there having been one coup, there was also a sense of optimism, partly because Nigeria was rich with oil and raw materials. I’d visit every year, and we had very short, very expensive telephone calls, which were really just, “Hello, how you doing?” My parents stayed together, but I didn’t realise till later how tough that must have been for Mum.
You’ve excelled professionally and academically. Was that always the way for you?
Immigrant parents tend to push their kids, but I wasn’t great at school. I didn’t really listen, and I was quite naughty. When I was about 17, I’d been mostly flunking, and I had an epiphany that I needed to become interested in something. So, I retook all my exams and passed a second time.
Your dad did some graphic design. Did he guide you in that direction?
To a degree. Dad did ask me once, what’s the difference between a master carpenter and a doctor? I had no idea, and he said, there is no difference, because they both have amazing skills and the ability to earn good money. He then said I could do whatever I wanted to do, so long as I was really good at it.
Where did you study?
I went to LCP [London College of Printing], where I was constantly drawing and writing. I loved doing research, and I filled books with notes, sketches and concepts, when one day one of my teachers asked when I was going to actually design something, and that’s when it got problematic. I still had quite a childish outlook – I just wanted to design posters for bedroom walls, and I wasn’t ready for the professional world, so after four years at LCP, I applied to the Royal College of Art and to Yale.
What did you know about Yale?
A friend a year above me had gone to Yale – before that I didn’t know they even had a graphic design department, or an art school. I do remember being little and reading a Sunday Times magazine story. Dad was there and I was turning pages looking at this ivy-covered college and I asked what it was. Dad, being a typical Nigerian father, said, “If you want to be a lawyer, that is where you go.” Which is how the Yale seed was planted.
How daunting was it to leave home and move to another country?
I still played with toys and watched cartoons. I lived in my head and was so naive. I knew I needed to go, to learn different philosophies and methodologies, but for the first year, I was exceedingly homesick.
You’ve talked about using design to give back. What do you mean by that?
Some 90% of people in this world are pretty darned poor. Governments are being destabilised, we have a massive influx of migrant issues. My wife is a migrant expert – she’s German and works in Brooklyn and I’m a British-born Nigerian working in New York. So, I do ask myself, how can I give back to Africa, or Nigeria, or even my village? How do I do that? How can I even live my life without trying to help people? So, that’s what I’m looking to do next. To find ways to use design to give back. I’m at that point where I need to do my research, to conceptualise a system for the greater good. To brew something that works not just for the self, but for humanity.
