JASON MUNN THE SMALL STAKES
EXHIBITION GUIDE
About
Jason Munn is originally from Wisconsin but now calls Oakland, California home. Arising from a love of independent music, design, and making for the sake of making, his posters soon became a fixture in the local independent music scene. He started The Small Stakes in the fall of 2003, and it has since unfolded into a successful independent design studio, producing nationally and internationally commissioned work in a range of print materials, including book covers, album packaging, T-shirt designs, screenprinted posters, and illustrations. Jason’s work has appeared in Print, Communication Arts, Step Inside Design, Computer Arts Projects, ReadyMade, and Creative Review. His work has also been featured in numerous exhibits and is part of the permanent collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
About
Jason Munn is originally from Wisconsin but now calls Oakland, California home. Arising from a love of independent music, design, and making for the sake of making, his posters soon became a fixture in the local independent music scene. He started The Small Stakes in the fall of 2003, and it has since unfolded into a successful independent design studio, producing nationally and internationally commissioned work in a range of print materials, including book covers, album packaging, T-shirt designs, screen-printed posters, and illustrations. Jason’s work has appeared in Print, Communication Arts, Step Inside Design, Computer Arts Projects, ReadyMade, and Creative Review. His work has also been featured in numerous exhibits and is part of the permanent collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
About Jason Munn is originally from Wisconsin but now calls Oakland, California home. Arising from a love of independent music, design, and making for the sake of making, his posters soon became a fixture in the local independent music scene. He started The Small Stakes in the fall of 2003, and it has since unfolded into a successful independent design studio, producing nationally and internationally commissioned work in a range of print materials, including book covers, album packaging, T-shirt designs, screen-printed posters, and illustrations. Jason’s work has appeared in Print, Communication Arts, Step Inside Design, Computer Arts Projects, ReadyMade, and Creative Review. His work has also been featured in numerous exhibits and is part of the permanent collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
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About Jason Munn is originally from Wisconsin but now calls Oakland, California home. Arising from a love of independent music, design, and making for the sake of making, his posters soon became a fixture in the local independent music scene. He started The Small Stakes in the fall of 2003, and it has since unfolded into a successful independent design studio, producing nationally and internationally commissioned work in a range of print materials, including book covers, album packaging, T-shirt designs, screen-printed posters, and illustrations. Jason’s work has appeared in Print, Communication Arts, Step Inside Design, Computer Arts Projects, ReadyMade, and Creative Review. His work has also been featured in numerous exhibits and is part of the permanent collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
1
About Jason Munn is originally from Wisconsin but now calls Oakland, California home. Arising from a love of independent music, design, and making for the sake of making, his posters soon became a fixture in the local independent music scene. He started The Small Stakes in the fall of 2003, and it has since unfolded into a successful independent design studio, producing nationally and internationally commissioned work in a range of print materials, including book covers, album packaging, T-shirt designs, screen-printed posters, and illustrations. Jason’s work has appeared in Print, Communication Arts, Step Inside Design, Computer Arts Projects, ReadyMade, and Creative Review. His work has also been featured in numerous exhibits and is part of the permanent collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
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Interview Favorite poster you’ve created? The 1st books poster Where does the Small Stakes name come from? A song by Spoon of the same name. The song is about taking chances and I saw starting my own business as taking my own chances. What were some of your early influences? Album covers, especially from some of the mid-west bands like Boys Life, Promise Ring,and Giant’s Chair. Also Jeff Kleinsmith’s work on Sub Pop. Jeff’s cover for Sideshow’s lip read confusion really stuck in my mind and inspired me to be a designer. Besides album covers, I was really into skateboard graphics, the designs on the bottom of the decks etc.
fine arts degree if I wanted to get into advertising/design. It wasn’t till later that I realized what I really need were classes in design. When did you start doing posters full time? I had just moved into my own studio apartment (I was previously living with 4 other guys). I needed a way to come up with rent each month so, thats when I started to take my poster design work more seriously.
When did you start getting the bigger jobs? I started to get know many of the bands that played at the ramp. If they were coming to town I would contact them directly and ask if I could design the poster for the show. I met Death Cab for Cutie’s management and They hired to me to do a poster Did you goto an art/design school? and some merch designs for them Well, I went to a university where I and it received a fair amount of studied fine arts. I thought I needed a attention and that led to more work.
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Around this time there were some guys in Berkeley that put together a book called The art of modern rock. I submitted some pieces for that. The book did really well so, that led to more work as well. Many of your earlier works were created using found imagery. Where were you finding your source material? I was searching public libraries, Dover books, found image books etc. Why were you using found imagery? At first I wasn’t confident in my abilities to draw etc. Plus it was a huge part of the learning process for me. I was learning how images work together but, as I became more confident, I started to incorporate more illustration into my work. Whats it been like to make that transition between working exclusively with found imagery to a mix of that
and hand drawn elements? My posters take longer to create. Plus, it takes a while to come up with a strong central image. I’m also adding different types of found imagery. For example, in the Bright Eyes poster I used real flowers and scanned in black pieces of paper for the bow. For the Stellastarr poster I used a wedding veil for the hair.
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Interview Favorite poster you’ve created? The 1st books poster Where does the Small Stakes name come from? A song by Spoon of the same name. The song is about taking chances and I saw starting my own business as taking my own chances. What were some of your early influences? Album covers, especially from some of the mid-west bands like Boys Life, Promise Ring,and Giant’s Chair. Also Jeff Kleinsmith’s work on Sub Pop. Jeff’s cover for Sideshow’s lip read confusion really stuck in my mind and inspired me to be a designer. Besides album covers, I was really into skateboard graphics, the designs on the bottom of the decks etc. Did you goto an art/design school? Well, I went to a university where I studied fine arts. I thought I needed a fine arts degree if I wanted to get into advertising/ design. It wasn’t till later that I realized what I really need were classes in design.
3 When did you start doing posters full time? I had just moved into my own studio apartment (I was previously living with 4 other guys). I needed a way to come up with rent each month so, thats when I started to take my poster design work more seriously. When did you start getting the bigger jobs? I started to get know many of the bands that played at the ramp. If they were coming to town I would contact them directly and ask if I could design the poster for the show. I met Death Cab for Cutie’s management and They hired to me to do a poster and some merch designs for them and it received a fair amount of attention and that led to more work. Around this time there were some guys in Berkeley that put together a book called The art of modern rock. I submitted some pieces for that. The book did really well so, that led to more work as well. Many of your earlier works were created using found imagery. Where were you finding your source material? I was searching public libraries, Dover books, found image books etc.
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Interview Favorite poster you’ve created? The 1st books poster
that I realized what I really need were classes in design.
Where does the Small Stakes name come from? A song by Spoon of the same name. The song is about taking chances and I saw starting my own business as taking my own chances.
When did you start doing posters full time? I had just moved into my own studio apartment (I was previously living with 4 other guys). I needed a way to come up with rent each month so, thats when I started to take my poster design work more seriously.
What were some of your early influences? Album covers, especially from some of the mid-west bands like Boys Life, Promise Ring,and Giant’s Chair. Also Jeff Kleinsmith’s work on Sub Pop. Jeff’s cover for Sideshow’s lip read confusion really stuck in my mind and inspired me to be a designer. Besides album covers, I was really into skateboard graphics, the designs on the bottom of the decks etc.
When did you start getting the bigger jobs? I started to get know many of the bands that played at the ramp. If they were coming to town I would contact them directly and ask if I could design the poster for the show. I met Death Cab for Cutie’s management and They hired to me to do a poster and some merch designs for them and it received a fair amount of Did you goto an art/design school? attention and that led to more work. Well, I went to a university where I Around this time there were some studied fine arts. I thought I needed a guys in Berkeley that put together a fine arts degree if I wanted to get into book called The art of modern rock. I advertising/design. It wasn’t till later submitted some pieces for that. The
3 book did really well so, that led to more work as well. Many of your earlier works were created using found imagery. Where were you finding your source material? I was searching public libraries, Dover books, found image books etc. Why were you using found imagery? At first I wasn’t confident in my abilities to draw etc. Plus it was a huge part of the learning process for me. I was learning how images work together but, as I became more confident, I started to incorporate more illustration into my work. Whats it been like to make that transition between working exclusively with found imagery to a mix of that and hand drawn elements? My posters take longer to create. Plus, it takes a while to come up with a strong central image. I’m also adding different types of found imagery. For example, in the Bright
Eyes poster I used real flowers and scanned in black pieces of paper for the bow. For the Stellastarr poster I used a wedding veil for the hair.
2
Interview Favorite poster you’ve created? The 1st books poster
that I realized what I really need were classes in design.
Where does the Small Stakes name come from? A song by Spoon of the same name. The song is about taking chances and I saw starting my own business as taking my own chances.
When did you start doing posters full time? I had just moved into my own studio apartment (I was previously living with 4 other guys). I needed a way to come up with rent each month so, thats when I started to take my poster design work more seriously.
What were some of your early influences? Album covers, especially from some of the mid-west bands like Boys Life, Promise Ring,and Giant’s Chair. Also Jeff Kleinsmith’s work on Sub Pop. Jeff’s cover for Sideshow’s lip read confusion really stuck in my mind and inspired me to be a designer. Besides album covers, I was really into skateboard graphics, the designs on the bottom of the decks etc.
When did you start getting the bigger jobs? I started to get know many of the bands that played at the ramp. If they were coming to town I would contact them directly and ask if I could design the poster for the show. I met Death Cab for Cutie’s management and They hired to me to do a poster and some merch designs for them and it received a fair amount of Did you goto an art/design school? attention and that led to more work. Well, I went to a university where I Around this time there were some studied fine arts. I thought I needed a guys in Berkeley that put together a fine arts degree if I wanted to get into book called The art of modern rock. I advertising/design. It wasn’t till later submitted some pieces for that. The
3 book did really well so, that led to more work as well. Many of your earlier works were created using found imagery. Where were you finding your source material? I was searching public libraries, Dover books, found image books etc. Why were you using found imagery? At first I wasn’t confident in my abilities to draw etc. Plus it was a huge part of the learning process for me. I was learning how images work together but, as I became more confident, I started to incorporate more illustration into my work. Whats it been like to make that transition between working exclusively with found imagery to a mix of that and hand drawn elements? My posters take longer to create. Plus, it takes a while to come up with a strong central image. I’m also adding different types of found imagery. For example, in the Bright
Eyes poster I used real flowers and scanned in black pieces of paper for the bow. For the Stellastarr poster I used a wedding veil for the hair.
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DR. STRANGELOVE Two color silkscreen 18” x 24”
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DR. STRANGELOVE Two color silkscreen 18” x 24”
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DR. STRANGELOVE Two color silkscreen 18” x 24”
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5 DR. STRANGELOVE Two color silkscreen 18” x 24”