Character sketch

My most recent work is an amalgamation of my interests in literature, artists' books, transmedia, and how these things may intersect and inform each other as the book moves into a digital format. Over the course of my MA in Design, I have investigated video, animation, and other forms of media and its application to the written word. The result has been an interactive piece and four short films based around the essays contained in J.B. Priestley's Delight.

Prior to my MA work at the University of Lincoln, UK, I worked for eight years in New York and lived across the river in Hoboken, NJ. Primarily I was employed as a senior graphic designer within the museum and exhibit design industry, but I also freelanced for a diverse and interesting group of clients. My design work with enviromentally-scaled graphics for cultural institutions actually began in Boston, MA, giving me a total of a dozen years of experience in that industry plus a long and eclectic list of projects that I have been involved with.

My professional career as a graphic designer began in a much different place. After receiving my bachelor's degree at the University of Texas at Austin, I moved to Chicago, IL with a friend and was hired by a local music magazine, where I designed feature articles, updated ads, and generally assisted the editor (ie. filing press photos). It was a pretty killer job for me being a huge music fan. Free CDs and being signed in for shows – amazing!

Music, museums, and books. That list could be how I best enjoy using my leisure time and I am lucky enough to have actually been involved in those areas professionally. Now if someday I get to design a skateboard deck …

–James C. Cameron Silva, summer 2011.