When I've talked recently to current or prospective MIT students, I give them two academic suggestions: take a class from John Maeda, take a class from Henry Jenkins. Obviously YMMV, but for me, it did not get any better than their classes, and I ended up with a second Bachelor's to prove it.
Well, now I only have one professorial suggestion, because John announced last week that he's leaving the Media Lab to be the next President of RISD (he links to a great video he made too).
First off, huge congratulations to him and RISD, it's going to be great. I was immediately very happy to hear the news, and I've been contemplating what it means ever since. Marshalling my thoughts has taken some time, but I'm gonna try to spit some out before too many more days have passed.
Art at MIT can be a tricky and complicated thing. No doubt there are a lot of really creative and brilliant artists, but the danger is that many people come seeking technicians to implement projects in exchange for little or none of the credit. I felt CAVS in particular adopted this artist-not-artisan stance.
To me at least, John was the solution and the antidote. He got his master's and bachelor's degrees in Computer Science at MIT, then went on to become one of the most respected artist/designers in the world while embracing those technical roots. I believe that if you're a creative person, the best thing you can do is acquire a strong technical background; anybody can become more technical, it's much harder to become more creative, and having both facets frees you from so many funding and organizational struggles, not to mention keeps you on the cutting edge.
In the two classes I took with him, John was unfailingly humble and encouraging. He has a very keen understanding of human nature, productivity, and how to approach art from a concrete and accessible place. It always felt like he was lecturing with us, not at us, and probably learning more than we were.
What else... I love that John got an MBA when he became more of an administrator at the Media Lab- it illustrates his humility and self-knowledge as much as his ongoing quest for learning. I bet the population of famous PhDs who later got an MBA is rich with hard-working geniuses who don't let their egos get in the way of self-improvement and curiosity.
Another indication is the work his students have gone on to do. I'm particularly impressed-with/jealous-of Casey Reas, whose email I ended up with, as the original casey @ media.mit.edu. Luckily he now goes by c.e.b. reas, or he'd be in the competition for most famous non-fiction male with the first name Casey. (aside: I'm pretty consistently on the front page of a google search for Casey these days, sweet.) He was a fun TA, and after graduating went on to help found an Italian Design Institute and now chairs the UCLA media/design department. How sweet is that career trajectory? Good thing he's not gunning for famous Casey.
Okay, I've gone far enough on track, and as always ended up writing about myself. But John is an incredible human and teacher, and RISD is luckily to have him.
Also, I guess now I have a suggestion to make to current and future
RISD students.
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