James Johnson—Past AIGA Minnesota President, 1977 and MGDA Founder February 19, 2014
Tim Larsen, James E. Johnson & Eric Madsen met in the conference room at the Walker Art Center in 1972. At that time I was the Chief Graphic Designer at the Walker.
Tim Larsen had called me and thought we should get together as Graphic Designers and talk about how to establish some standards to define the profession of “Graphic Design” and as we know now it became > much > Much > More ! ! !
We wanted the organization to be local in scope and not national, so it became the Minnesota Graphic Design Association.
In retrospect it was a little short sighted, but after-all it was just three young Minnesota Scandinavians (”The Three Amigos” as Eric called us) Tim came from North Dakota, me from Minneapolis and Eric from Texas.
We were all just a few years into this fairly new profession for Minnesota called Graphic Design. Previously most people defined us as “Commercial Artists.”
At that time there wasn’t even a listing for Graphic Designers in the Yellow Pages. MGDA was a first for the State and a first for The Walker!
Contact Leadership
He started his own design studio, Oryx & Moth, doing branding, art direction and design for clients big and small. Meanwhile he was the chair of the Solopreneurs Committee for AIGA MN (2022-2023) and served on the Design Student & Alumni Board at the University of Minnesota (2010-2013). Prior to that he worked at TSG, a design agency in Robbinsdale, for clients including: Target, HealthPartners and Crate & Barrel. He's also had a short stint designing for financial institutions (PNC Bank, Citibank and BBVA Compass). He started out designing and art directing photo shoots for multiple national salon chains throughout the US and Canada. And has had mediocre hairstyles since.
His interests vary widely with the season but he always willing to chat about DIY projects, soccer, LEGO, minimalism, FIRE, AI, technology, saunas, traveling, camping, parenting, etc.