Finkel Named Graphic Design Program Chair

The School of Industrial and Graphic Design (SIGD) at Auburn University is pleased to announce that Associate Professor Robert Finkel has been named the new chair of the graphic design program. Finkel has been teaching at Auburn since 2012.

A native of Birmingham, Alabama, Finkel attended Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee, where he received a bachelor of arts in anthropology and sociology. He is also a graduate of the Portfolio Center and in 2011 received a Master of Fine Arts in graphic design from the University of Florida. He has interned at Pentagram and was a designer at Slaughter Group in Birmingham.

At Auburn, Finkel teaches courses in graphic design history, corporate identity design, signage and wayfinding and typography. His creative work has regularly appeared in annual design competitions and publications including PRINT Magazine, Communication Arts, Creative Quarterly and Graphic Design USA. Most recently, he and SIGD industrial design chair Shea Tillman published a book entitled “The IBM Poster Program; Visual Memoranda,” which tells the story of the design team behind IBM’s striking internal corporate communications.