Rick Griffith

Ricardo "Rick" Griffith (born 1969) is a British graphic designer and letterpress printmaker of West Indian descent. One of Griffith's best-known contributions to letterpress printmaking is annotation, and his most famed work is the poster “Introductory Ethic for Designers.” Griffith was Print magazine's first artist-in-residence. a design studio, typography laboratory, and design bookstore, which was the first Black-owned bookstore in Colorado. Griffith founded the Black Astronaut Research Project (BLARP.org). As a designer, art director, master letterpress printmaker, writer, curator, educator, lecturer, and activist, Griffith works to create and disseminate graphics geared towards dismantling white supremacy and racism in the interest of reparative justice.

He lives in Denver, Colorado, USA, where he was the City Commissioner for Public Art and Culture.

Biography Griffith was born the UK, raised in Southeast London, and educated at Colfe’s College, Sidcup, United Kingdom.

Residencies, exhibitions, and awards Griffith's work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver, the Denver Art Museum, the Butler Library of Rare Books and Manuscripts at Columbia University, the Tweed Museum of Art at the University of Minnesota, Duluth, the Western New York Book Art Collaborative] (WNYBAC); and Columbia College's Center for the Book in Chicago, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, and at AIGA New York.

Griffith has been a member of the American Institute of Graphic Arts since 1994 and served as president of the Colorado Chapter from 1995 to 1998, continuing to serve on their advisory board through 2006. He served on the Denver City and County Cultural Commission from 2012 to 2016, and on the Board of Directors for the Alliance for Contemporary Art at the Denver Art Museum. He was inducted into the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences in 2001 and presently serves as the Services Nominating Chair.

In December 2020, Griffith was named Print magazine's first artist-in-residence, during which he wrote a column, Processing. and was awarded the Belmar Award for Achievement in Art and Design in 2004.

Griffith has lectured widely and worked as a visiting professor at the University of Louisville Hite Art Institute, University of Southern California Roski School of Design, Montana State University, South Dakota State University, University of Texas, Austin, University of Minnesota, Duluth, and the Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum. He has served as an adjunct professor at the University of Denver, University of Colorado, Denver, and has been a visiting artist at the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design and the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague, and the 2022–2023 Roy Acuff Chair of Excellence at Austin Peay State University.