Nick Bell design now has an established reputation for exhibition graphic design. The Churchill Museum is a new addition to a portfolio of recent work that includes: Communicate: Independent British Graphic Design since the 60s, Barbican Art Gallery: Art of the Garden, Tate Britain: Sparking Reaction (for the Science Museum, London) at BNFL’s visitor centre, Sellafield, Cumbria, UK: Posh, a worldwide touring exhibition about the transformation of traditional British brands, British Council: Making Portraits, National Portrait Gallery at Bodelwyddan Castle, Wales: Gainsborough, Tate Britain: Martin Parr retrospective, Barbican Art Gallery: This was Tomorrow, Barbican Curve. Nick Bell (born 1965) studied graphic design at the London College of Printing. His London-based studio was founded in 1988, and included a spell from 1998 to 2004 known as Una (London) designers when it was associated with Amsterdam based Dutch design group Una. Nick Bell has been creative director of Eye, the highly influential international review of graphic design since 1997. His experience on Eye has enabled him to develop a more curatorial method of editorial design – one he has adapted very successfully for the design of exhibitions. It was this specialism that won him the commission to design the book and touring exhibition Communicate; Independent British Graphic Design since the 60s in which his work is featured. The first ever major retrospective devoted to graphic design in Britain that showed at the Barbican Art Gallery until January 2005 and is about to tour China. Nick Bell design has also designed CD covers and a corporate identity for Virgin Classics, books for Phaidon, Taschen and Tate Publishing, stamps for the Royal Mail, and exhibitions for the Barbican Centre, the British Council, and Tate Britain. His animated typographic displays for the Science Museum’s BNFL visitor’s centre won two D&AD silver awards in

2003. In 2004, Heist, (the Higher Education Information Services Trust) awarded the London College of Printing with a Gold award for their prospectus designed by Nick Bell design. Nick Bell’s work was featured in the touring exhibition Lost and Found: Critical Voices in New British Design (British Council, 1999) for which he designed an award-winning tablecloth. Nick Bell has lectured widely in Europe and the US. He was a visiting lecturer at the London College of Printing from 1990 to 2000. In 1992, the American magazine Emigre devoted an entire issue to his work and teaching. Nick Bell was a selector for the global graphic design survey Area (Phaidon ‘10x10’ series, 2003). Through graphic design, Nick Bell’s primary, overriding concern is with the exchange of knowledge and information. For seventeen years his approach has been underpinned by an understanding of design as not just a tool for business but of design as a cultural service. See Eye no.53, vol.14, Autumn 2004 (Brand Madness Special Issue) where Nick Bell accuses the discipline of branding of diminishing the experiences offered to us by our national cultural institutions.

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