Elaine Lustig Cohen (March 6, 1927 – October 4, 2016) was an American graphic designer, artist and archivist.
[2] Her work has played a significant role in the evolution of American modernist graphic design, integrating European avant-garde with experimentation to create a distinct visual vocabulary.
[5] Elizabeth instilled in Cohen from an early age the idea that being a woman was not a limitation and encouraged her to pursue her passions, paying first for drawing classes and eventually for her college education.
"[8] In 1948 during an opening at the Modern Institute of Art in Los Angeles where she was a summer intern, Cohen met graphic designer Alvin Lustig.
[12] Despite this, carrying out Lustig's artistic visions and observing his process taught Cohen various graphic design techniques.
Shortly after her husband's death in 1955, she was approached by architect Philip Johnson to complete a commission given to Lustig to create the signage for the Seagram Building.
Johnson was so fond of her work on the signage that he later hired her to create catalogs and advertisements for the building's rental spaces.
[2][13] Around the same time, Arthur Cohen, founder of Meridian Books and a friend of the Lustigs, insisted Elaine create cover art for the publisher's new line of paperbacks.
[16] The Jewish Museum's 2018 exhibition of Lustig Cohen's work describes:"Drawing on her knowledge of modern typography and avant-garde design principles, such as asymmetrical composition, dramatic scale, and image montage, Lustig Cohen forged a distinctive graphic voice.
For book jackets, she described her process as one of distillation in which she would identify the central ideas of the text and render them abstractly with bold lettering, expressive forms, and playfully collaged photographic elements.
[13] Arthur Cohen sold Meridian Books to World Publishing in 1960, and Elaine wished to turn to painting full-time.
[12] By the late 1960s, the two both left commercial work in order to focus on their creative pursuits and found themselves in need of additional income.
[18] They were some of the first Americans to sell European avant-garde materials, and found success in being one of the few dealers to meet the needs of this niche market.
Cohen eventually closed the store in 1998 upon having difficulty both finding materials to sell and making a significant enough profit.
During the latter part of her artistic career Cohen continued to produce works both by hand and digitally using Adobe Illustrator.