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The Richard Hess Spirit of Creativity Award

Jason Carreiro

After a weekend engaged in polite design debate, the judges panel was primed to step into the cage for a brutal, knockdown, drag-out battle regarding the recipient of the Richard Hess Spirit of Creativity Award. Unfortunately Chris Piascik ruined it for us by being so damned good. The guy seems to be everywhere at once — print, packaging, publishing, editorial, advertising. He’s a one-man cultural design zeitgeist! God forbid he gets into animation and web design — we’ll all be unemployed.

Christina Holmes

On the second day of judging this award choice just made sense. Among the entries a handful of these wonderfully hand illustrated designs kept grabbing my attention. Not knowing that Chris was responsible for a numerous amount of them until the second day, it just felt right once it clicked. The work entered, yet in different categories all represented a nice array of different projects utilizing his illustrations and typography. Chris's vast talents, continued use of unique noticeable style, and quality of work says it all. Congrats!

Joe Scarano

During our discussion about Best In Show one of the judges suggested awarding this prize to Chris Piascik and it makes perfect sense. Chris' style is amazing in that it is unique and can easily adapt to any number of products or industries. His ability to compliment existing brands or completely set the tone of a project with his style is what we felt really embodied the idea of the Spirit of Creativity award.

Rebecca Kelly

Without knowing who the recipient was – I knew that this person needed to be acknowledged. This year – the judges discussed a change – wanting to award a person vs. a singular piece. We all thought the same thought – and thankfully one of the judges bravely brought it up. We all unanimously awarded Chris Piascik the “Spirit of Creativity” award. He represents the creative being we all want to be. He is experimental, pushes boundaries all the while, having fun while doing it. It is evident in the work. It speaks for itself.

Fritz Klaetke

Chris Piascik's hand-drawn type was frickin' everywhere is this show! Book covers, t-shirts, posters, tote bags, packaging, etc., etc.! So we, the esteemed judges, HAD to bend the rules and give the Spirit of Creativity Award to Chris for his body of work in the show (rather than just one project--since HE embodied the spirit of, well, you know...) SO CHRIS, GET SOME SLEEP NOW!

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