I’M A PERSON, HE’S A CARVING, BUT WE EACH HAVE OUR INFOGRAPHIC ROLE TO PLAY.

UNSOLICITED PRAISE In 1999, I received this letter. The person who sent it is now a Master Lecturer in the Writing Program at Boston University. Sometimes in my career, especially in the early newspaper years, I felt like a second-class citizen. “He’s just a graphics person,” was an attitude that I came across several times. I know other older (or just plain old) people in the field who have experienced this mindset, which (thankfully) has mostly disappeared in the last few decades. So although this is a very lofty, and certainly undeserved, designation, it works for me in terms of being the complete reverse of that “who cares about infographics” attitude. Thank you, Marisa.

THE GOD OF GRAPHICS A wooden figure from Mexico has stood over all the graphics departments that I’ve worked in. Back in the early days at Condé Nast Traveler, we decided that this would be our talisman, looking after our infographic well-being. Now sporting a worrying crack in the torso, but as inscrutable as ever, the God of Graphics still watches over my studio. He/she doesn’t love my data-to-ink ratio, but I’m working on that.