Alex Steinweiss

Alexander Steinweiss (March 24, 1917 – July 17, 2011) was an American graphic design artist known for inventing album cover art.

Early life Born on March 24, 1917, in Brooklyn, Alex Steinweiss was the son of a women's shoe designer from Warsaw and a seamstress from Riga, Latvia. His parents had first moved to the Lower East Side of Manhattan and later on, settled in the Brighton Beach area of Brooklyn. and his classmates marveled that he "could take a brush, dip it in some paint and make letters," he recalled. "So I said to myself, 'If some day I could become a good sign painter, that would be terrific!"'

Career After graduation Steinweiss impressed Lucian Bernhard, the renowned German poster designer, with his portfolio, Bernhard got him a job in his friend Joseph Binder's studio. In 1938, Alex Steinweiss was the first art director for Columbia Records, where he introduced a wider application of album covers and cover art. "They were so drab, so unattractive," said Steinweiss, "I convinced the executives to let me design a few."

During World War II, Alex Steinweiss served as Columbia Records' advertising manager before leaving to take up a role at the Navy's Training and Development Center in New York City. There, he was responsible for creating teaching materials and cautionary posters. Steinweiss continued to do freelance work for Columbia after the war. During a lunch meeting with Columbia, the president of the company, Ted Wallerstein, presented Steinweiss with a new innovation that was being prepared to be unveiled by the company: the long-playing record. Unfortunately, the Kraft paper that was folded to protect the 78 rpm records proved to be too heavy. The Kraft paper left marks on the vinyls microgroove of the 33 1/3 rpm LPs when they were stacked. Steinweiss later went on to develop what is now known as a record jacket.

Alex Steinweiss was involved in creating album cover designs from 1938 until his semi-retirement in 1973, where he shifted his focus towards painting. Throughout his career, he designed around 2500 covers, his career can be divided into five different periods:

The first period, from 1938 to around 1945, Steinweiss designed all the covers for Columbia, where he developed the complete visual "language" for album design.

In the second period, from 1945 to approximately 1950, Steinweiss was no longer the exclusive designer for Columbia, and he started to work with other companies. This period is occasionally referred to as the "First Golden Age" of the album cover. The Steinweiss Scrawl, which is now recognized as Alex Steinweiss's signature font, made its initial appearance around 1947. Steinweiss can also take credit for the Grecian column design Columbia used in 1948 on the first LP envelopes. The design was borrowed from the earlier 78 rpm album cover, MM577, the Mendelssohn violin concerto played by Nathan Milstein. This performance was chosen by Columbia to be the first 12-inch LP, ML4001.

In approximately 1950, Steinweiss designed the covers and record labels for Remington and established a relationship spanning over 20 years with both Decca and London Records. During this period, he primarily used drawing as his preferred design technique for clients such as Columbia, RCA, Remington, Decca and London. This marked his third design period, in which he employed drawing, lettering, and layout to create brilliant designs, though perhaps not as memorable as his late 1940s work. It was during this period that he collaborated with Margaret Bourke-White on a memorable series of covers for Columbia.

In 2001, Steinweiss was featured in Carlo McCormick's gallery show "The LP Show," originating in New York's Exit Art and then in 2002 traveling to the Experience Music Project in Seattle and The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh.

He was interviewed for a chapter in Sound Unbound: Sampling Digital Music and Culture (The MIT Press, 2008) edited by Paul D. Miller a.k.a. DJ Spooky.

Death Alex Steinweiss died on July 18, 2011, in Sarasota, Florida, as confirmed by his son Leslie. He is survived by his daughter Hazel Steinweiss, six grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren, in addition to his son.

Awards In 1998, Steinweiss was inducted into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame.

In 2003, CMP Information and the International Recording Media Association created the Alex Awards for Excellence in album cover art, which were named in honor of Alex Steinweiss.

Sources and further reading

Alex Steinweiss, Jennifer McKnight-Trontz. For the Record: The Life and Work of Alex Steinweiss , Princeton Architectural Press; 2000. Eric Kohler, In the Groove: Vintage Record Graphics, 1940-1960 Chronicle Books, San Francisco, 1999. Heller, Steven; Pomeroy, Karen, Design Literacy: Understanding Graphic Design Watson-Guptill Pubns, NY, 1997. One chapter on Steinweiss. Chusid, Irwin. The Mischievous Art of Jim Flora (Fantagraphics Books, 2004); features an interview with Steinweiss Heller, Steven, and Reagan, Kevin: Alex Steinweiss, The Inventor of the Modern Album Cover , , Taschen, 2009.