Congratulations to AIGA MN member and past president Patrick Redmond on being selected as the Art Educators of Minnesota (AEM) 2023 Emeritus Art Educator of the Year.


A creative director, graphic designer, consultant, artist, and author, Patrick M. Redmond, M.A., (b.1950) is founder and owner of Saint Paul, Minnesota-based Patrick Redmond Design (PatrickRedmondDesign.com), an independent brand identity and design firm, a consultancy tracing its beginnings to 1966 when Patrick began working in the field.

Patrick’s career, to date, has included providing design for over 130 clients through his firm; and, in addition to owning and operating his own ongoing business, has included positions as: senior layout artist and special projects designer at $1.5 billion diversified retail corporation Gamble-Skogmo, Inc.; creative art director, Norwest Corporation (now known as Wells Fargo); a senior art director, Carlson Frequency Marketing Company, Carlson Marketing Group, Carlson Companies; graphic designer for the University of Minnesota’s Department of Design, Housing and Apparel (DHA) and the Goldstein Gallery (now known as The Goldstein: Museum for Design) [note: DHA is now part of the University of Minnesota’s College of Design]; independent consulting art director/ designer for publishers Mid-List Press and Dos Tejedoras Fiber Arts Publications; and, in the early 1980s, as a design tech entrepreneur, co-founding and serving as vice president of pioneering computer graphics firm COMCEPT (a spin-off of Patrick Redmond Design).

He taught at the University of Minnesota (for many years in the evening extension program); the College of Visual Arts (CVA, formerly known as the School of Associated Arts and the College of Associated Arts), St. Paul; MCAD (Minneapolis College of Art & Design); Augsburg Weekend College; and University of Wisconsin-Stout, Wisconsin’s Polytechnic University.

In addition to his ongoing business, earlier in his career he served respectively in rural and greater Minnesota communities as artist-in-residence in the small town of Eagle Bend, Minnesota, and as a graphic designer-in-residence in the Grand Rapids, Minnesota area. Patrick was the first person to lead the graphic design sessions at the University of Minnesota Design Institute’s first “Design Camp” in 2000.

Design by Patrick Redmond has been included in Graphic Design+, Japan; Graphis Annual and Graphis Packaging, Switzerland; Biennales of Graphic Design, Brno, Czech Republic; Print Regional Annual; SIGGRAPH; Colorado International Invitational Poster Exhibition; and in competitions including New York Art Directors Show; Society of Publication Designers; Creativity, Art Direction magazine, New
York; Desi (now known as the American Graphic Design Awards), Graphic Design: USA magazine, New York, and American Corporate Identity 23; and The Show, Advertising Federation of Minnesota & Art Directors/Copywriters Club, Minnesota.

Patrick’s early career included working – in what he considers to have been like apprenticeships to master designers – for industrial designer Robert J. De brey, at De brey Design (Robert De brey is a graduate of the “New Bauhaus” Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago) and for Peter Seitz, at interdisciplinary design firm InterDesign, (Peter Seitz [1931-2023], AIGA Minnesota’s first AIGA Fellow, was a graduate of Hochschule fr Gestaltung Ulm (HfG Ulm), Ulm, Germany, and Yale). At 20, Patrick had even worked on a freelance project for Ron Siechrist, founder of Portfolio Center, Atlanta; and of Miami Ad School.

He has presented at National Council on the Arts/ National Endowment for the Arts, icograda (now known as ico-D), and UNESCO conferences. At the 2013 AIGA National Conference “Head, Heart, Hand” in Minneapolis, Minnesota, he was a panelist in the affinity session moderated by Su Mathews of Lippincott on the topic “Designers Mentoring Designers” with his protégé, Pamela Mead (at the time of the 2013 Conference, Director of User Experience, Telefonica Digital, Madrid, Spain) and AIGA Medalist Michael Bierut, with his protégé, Jennifer Kinon, a past president of AIGA New York.

Patrick Redmond coined the term “Designers As Entrepreneurs” at the 1977 International Design Conference in Aspen, Colorado.

He has been a member of AIGA Minnesota, for many years (beginning in 1977 and continuing membership during various years, renewing membership 2005 to 2007; 2009-present; president, MGDA, AIGA Minnesota, 1979-1980)[a summary of his term may be read in the MGDA February 1980 newsletter at https://aigaminnesota.org/archive/ mgda-newsletters/]. He has served as a Board Member of the organization, was a member of the first (1980) AIGA Minnesota Design Camp® committee when it was known as the Minnesota Graphic Designers Association (MGDA) Design Conference at Lutsen, Lutsen, Minnesota, and was Chair of the “Design for Society Award” committee, predecessor of the AIGA MN Fellow Award.

He is a member of the College of Design Alumni Society, University of Minnesota Alumni Association (he served as a Board Member of the College of Human Ecology “CHE” [formerly known as the College of Home Economics with DHA “Design, Housing and Apparel” later becoming part of the University of Minnesota’s College of Design] Alumni Society during the early to mid 1990s… he served as Co-founding Co Chair of the inaugural CHE Alumni Mentoring program, to which the University of Minnesota College of Design Mentor Program traces its roots).

He is a former member of AdFed (the Advertising Federation of Minnesota, AdFed.org, a member club of the American Advertising Federation, AAF.org), and – with a longtime interest in business (and the business of design) – the Saint Paul Area Chamber of Commerce, Saint Paul, Minnesota. He isa member of the Art Educators of Minnesota (AEM), the Minnesota affiliate of the National Art Education Association (NAEA). He is also a member of the NAEA Design Interest Group. He is a retired member of MATA, Milwaukee Area Teachers of Art. He is a member of the Katonah Museum Artists’ Association (KMAA), Katonah Art Museum, Katonah, New York.

Interested in graphic arts, he has served as one of the judges for the five-state (Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota) Printing Industry Midwest (PIM) “Star” Awards competitions.

Patrick holds bachelor’s (’73) and master’s (’90) degrees from the University of Minnesota, the former through what is now known as the University’s College of Continuing and Professional Studies (CCAPS), the latter through what is now known as the University’s College of Design. (When he began graduate studies, it was through what was then known as the Design graduate program, in what was then known as the University’s College of Home Economics, which later became known as the University’s College of Human Ecology. His undergraduate work at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities was through what was then known as the University College University Without Walls [UWW] program, later known as the University’s College of Continuing Education Program for Individualized Learning, and is now known as the University’s CCAPS Inter-College program.) (His undergraduate work through the University of Minnesota was funded, in significant part, through the U.S. Department of Labor New Careers Training Program, and the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity, while he was artist in residence in Eagle Bend, Minnesota.) Patrick is also a former MCAD (Minneapolis College of Art and Design) [formerly Minneapolis School of Art] student,
1968-1970, where he had received a scholarship to attend.

Patrick is an alumnus of Pius XI Catholic High School (’68), Milwaukee, Wisconsin (https://www.piusxi.org/art.html), where he was Art Club president, had been a member of the National Honor Society and had received the school’s Art Achievement Award. He had also served as the Vice President of the school’s Future Teachers of America (FTA) chapter. In this position, he coordinated the school’s tutoring program. This helped provide experience in his later role helping to launch, in the early 1990s, what has become the University of Minnesota College of Design Mentor Program [https://design.umn.edu/news/design-mentor-program-supports-next-generation-designers]. While a student at Pius, Patrick received awards in the Scholastic Art Awards competition including a Strathmore® Award for Graphic Design. In 2005, Patrick received Pius XI Catholic High School’s highest honor, a Distinguished Alumnus Award.

Patrick had also attended the Milwaukee Art Center’s (Milwaukee Art Museum’s) Children’s Art Program (CAP) during the 1960s. In 1968, his art was included in the Milwaukee Art Center’s first CAP graduate three-person exhibition.

A recipient of Scholastic Art Awards himself, Patrick was a keynote speaker for two of the 2016 Minnesota Scholastic Art Awards Ceremonies at the Frank Gehry-designed Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. Numerous writings and/or commentaries by Patrick have been published in Art Educators of Minnesota “Art Exchange” publication and at NAEA “Collaborate”.

Patrick is included in the national Scholastic Art and Writing Awards Centennial Timeline.

In 2021 Patrick received an inaugural Irish Echo Arts and Culture Award with an awards celebration broadcast from Ireland.


Below is a link listing all those who received awards and recognition during the Art Educators of Minnesota (AEM) 2023 ceremony.

https://www.aem-mn.org/about-us/awards

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Rich Higgins
Rich Higgins
Vice President
Rich Higgins is the Creative Director at Parallel Retail Group. His background is as diverse as a platypus.

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.