this is a joke, right?

rip, i could not agree with you more! like you and all the other 08 applicants i've been working my ass off on port, aps, resume.... you know what i think..... i think penage11 needs to be signed up for some really nasty spam porn

I was waiting for this post in regards to that job. I was going to outsource my portfolio to India...

Don't most grad school applications require you to sign some sort of statement indicating that all the work you've presented to them is your own? If they find out that your credentials have been misrepresented, they can rescind an offer of admission or expel you from the university.

I hope penage11@gmail.com uses that same email address on his/her application so that schools can tie it back to that job listing, and shun him accordingly. It's a shame to wonder how many talented people get rejected so that admission can be offered to the dishonest snakes who manage not to get caught.

artists hire graphic monkeys all the time to package their genius designs and artwork. this is the same condition. if the schools want fancy graphic presentation portfolios rather than work, then this is the way to go about it. graphic monkeys are there to be hired to format pages and click on buttons to make things consistent.

if the artist/designer delegates the design intent to the monkey then the artist/designer should note that these pages were entirely designed by artist/designer and executed by a contracted graphic monkey under the immediate and scrutinized eye of the designer. otherwise, the university should ask for a simple set of slides without all this graphic monkey bullshit. art and architecture is not graphic monkey production.

some people design the ditch. other people dig the ditch. the messy details of production are a waste of time when there are ideas and visions to be had.

Just out of curiousity, I wonder how much he/she plans on paying their portfolio master.

vado, if they could design it themselves and just needed a graphic "monkey" to execute, then they would say so. That's not what they say- they say they need someone with top notch design skills, someone with vision. That is not a monkey that is a designer.

they are just looking for the best monkey. this is what genius designer/artists do. they look for the best supporting cast.

so, how are we doing on his spam porn account or do you guys want me to get his password when I get off work?

I have friends who can key log this asshole.

I'm with rationalist. He may be looking for a production monkey, but it sounds a lot like he's looking for somebody to do his design work for him.

Top-tier architecture schools seem to have no shortage of talented applicants who are perfectly capable of doing their own monkey work on their application materials. I would hate to think one of them gets passed over so that admission could be offered to this hack.

If he lacks the talent or initiative to do his own portfolio, hopefully that will be apparent in the work he's presenting, no matter how slick the presentation turns out to be.

apurimac and blaise. the two of you are evil geniuses.

if you are sitting at the computer and i am standing behind you telling you move this here move that there. oh yes this color not that color, what were you thingking??? then i am the designer even if i don't know how to spell the word computer. the computer is a tool. the music is in the artist/genius designer's vision. someone has to tune the piano however.

According to the 'Urban Dictionary' the word 'penage' (from his email address) means 'to have a small penis.'

My point is that applicants should be perfectly capable of tuning their own pianos. If this person can't, there are many others who can.

i think stewart hick's on to something. this seems like either a hoax or a scam.

...stewart hicks is... (sorry)

vado: as someone who is applying to schools as well this winter, I think that what you're trying to legitimize here is pure shit. Insofar as your portfolio as an object is what makes the admission panel actually look at your work, it is just as important that your portfolio is as much yours as the work it holds. Schools get 300+ applications yearly. The admission panels are very rarely larger than 3/5 people. Your submission really has to stand out as a well considered thing in order to get these people to actually give your work some consideration. It has to say "I CAN DO THIS" even before it's opened. Hiring someone else to do that is what people in the advertising industry do, not what designers do.

Typical for this time of year... We always see these desperate souls come onto Archinect only to pander and pine about how much they want to get into Ivies...without having much of clue as to what schools are even looking for...I cant say I blame any little rich kids out there with no graphic skills trying to embellish their presentation so they can get into the best school they ever heard of....thats fine if you want an Adobe nerd to help you out but....
However, If you cant showcase your work in some way accordingly, then the content probably isn't worth showing.

I certainly hope so. If it were real, it would depress the hell out of me to think that I'm competing against such people when I re-apply to grad schools.

(cross-posted with isotap and Formfunction33)

my point is that genius artist/designers (which this person is obviously one) who are able to employ the piano tuner should employ them. lets say this genius designer/artist is a person of independent means. they may not need to struggle along as a monkey like the rest of the unwashed archimasses. why bother learning these pedestrian programs. if a genius writer writes a geenius book on scrap paper and then hires a typist does that make the genius book less genius? i don't think so. rock on genius.

That assumes, of course, that he's really a genius... I'm skeptical about that.

People pay thousands of $ for this kind of service. It's not unheard of in the MBA world. Sad I know. Makes you think twice about the caliber of people in our schools.

for example right now in the office where i peel bananas the master genius designer is giving instructions to the marketing monkey telling him to move this here change this there etc. does the master designer genius know how to do this? no. he doesnt need to. he is the genius and not the monkey.

and now the it monkey is working on the genius designers iphone.

i agree with vado. people are tools that are available to the designer every bit as much as a laptop loaded with adobe & autocad. the sooner one "masters" the human tool with effective delegation then the sooner one is able to leverage their own talent in manner that effectively allows them to tackle bigger projects.

if this guy pulls it off then i would argue he should be accepted to school...and probably with advanced standing. in fact, it's exactly those kind of skills that schools should be teaching if they were really, truly interested in producing effective professional architects.

i'm sure vado & i will be discussing this over cocktails this afternoon while our cad monkeys keep the office humming. people are tools too, don't be afraid to use them.

That's delegation of work and there's nothing wrong with that. What the lazy applicant is "asking" for is on a different level. I don't think it's comparable.

I should have hired a tool to take my GRE for me. Maybe I'd be at Harvard now instead of working as a tool for somebody else.

Vado, this asshole wants someone to design his portfolio, he's not looking for someone to put his brilliant ideas into a computer. That's not cool.

Isn't the whole point of a portfolio to represent your work? Some people put little effort into the binding and presentation and just use vellum and spiral binding but put a lot of effort into the layout of the pages, content and descriptions. But, to outsource your portfolio to graduate school seems like a mistake. Is outsourcing school work acceptable then? I would really be interested to see if a school would kick a student out of the school for pulling portfolio outsourcing.

if a design/artist/ genius student wants to hire some monkeys to build the models and do the three d models for his design that is fine. as long as the genius states clearly that he is responsible for the genius of the design and the presentation was done by hired monkeys. how do you think famous genius artists work. do you think cimabue or van rijn or andy warhol executed their great genius art work? no they had workshops of monkeys to do it.

which is fine, but the monkey's should get some credit for putting it together. So under his name on the cover should be the name of the monkey.

and isn't there a difference between already establishing yourself as a "master/genius" and having proven your abilities to a point that you're able to obtain "monkeys", rather then just starting off from the beginning by paying your way through? This isn't Warhol creating a masterpiece, it's a lazy masters-bound college kid with deep pockets who's unwilling to do their own work. If this is real and said person gets into school, god speed, but I'll want to see their first review.

the first step of genius is declaring oneself so.

Agreed phuyaka.....Someone that has developed a name for themselves and also has an artistic style that is all about mass production can have workers and it only reinforces his methods, "genius" and art. Someone that hasn't even began a career hardly deserves to have support.

Also, following the rationale of vado/retro, this person would have to state on their portfolio that the work was actually done by someone else. Let me say that again, on this person's portfolio, they would clearly state that someone else designed their portolio? It defeats the purpose of making a portfolio. Also, this person would want them to write their letter of intent. This hardly seems to be ethical. It seems to me that the only reason that a person would do this is because it was never explicitly stated not to do it. You CAN do it but, I don't think you SHOULD do this.

The first step in genius is creating genius work!

the portfolio is not the content and therefore can be farmed out to someone who will organize the real content. what is unethical about this? this is the everyday of a design firm. genius designers on the back of their monkey staff.

the portfolio is not the content and therefore can be farmed out to someone who will organize the real content. what is unethical about this? this is the everyday of a design firm. genius designers on the back of their monkey staff.

or monkey designers on the back of their genius staff

But the portfolio is supposed to represent a person's work and also display their edited presentation (whether graphic or written) of work. It is unethical because it is a representation of a person's work and the idea that a person would need to state that the organization and presentation of the work was done by someone else, displays the fact that it is misleading. A portfolio represents a person's work. If they make a generic, spiral bound portfolio, then its not much of an issue. But, if someone puts a real design effort into the portfolio, it is unethical. I guess it depends on the circumstances, but most people do not just submit spiral bound portfolios for admissions into graduate school.

vado i think this is the part that gets me:

I want someone who is confident in their work and their vision of portfolio organization. Please send me examples of your own work in jpeg form. Due date of this project is in 11/9. I need someone that will feel as responsible for the project as I do. Writing skills are critical, this will be needed in editing and creating text for the projects in the portfolio. Some session will be collaborative work while other will require you to continue to work by yourself.

...which to me seems to implicate going just beyond surface organization and actually hiring someone to take creative control of this persons work, to the point of explaining it. When i was in thesis I had a friend help me cut basswood and chipboard for my final model, but i didn't ask them to organize my layouts and present/defend my project... I think it's a slight line this person is crossing.

how else does one find the adequate support staff? support staff monkeys need to feel the pride of taking ownership. otherwise they will fitter away time surfing the internets.

Maybe one day we can feel entitled once we have told ourselves that we are a genius. I think we can all understand the difference between working for a company (where there are many people and some devoted to marketing) and an individual applying to college.

if, for an extreme example, you could get balthazar korab to photograph your work and bruce mau to design the book presentation, then why wouldn't you want to use that for your protfolio? more realistically, if you could strike a partnership with others of similar visions & complementary talents, young up-and-comers like yourself then why wouldn't you?

granted i don't know this penage11 person at all...but i'm willing to suppress any cynicism in favor of the possibility that it might actually be a talented and ambitious individual. the critique his actions seems to be fuelled by jealousy but under the guise of ethics and fairness. but let's face it, most of us like to spit cliches about "thinking outside the box" but few of us are actuallly capable of doing it.

exactly why waste time doing all this monkey graphic work when you could be making genius designs and handing them off to the monkeys to format into an awesome portfolio which although produced by someone else, is your design vision. puddles email me at penang.gmail.com! and we will parlay!

Jealous of questionable ethics?............that's a new one. Also, it sounds like doing what is proposed here proves that this person could be a CEO or a Principal of any company and not necessarily a good designer.

I suppose I have a little to say about this...but no time.

I'll just say that I find the use of the term "graphics monkey" in this thread a little troubling. Partially because of just how piss poor most architects are at issues of graphic design and partially given how multidisciplinary architecture is becoming, looking down your nose at neighboring design fields and calling it "monkey work" is perhaps unwise. Graphic design is not monkey work.

I think this is the first time vado's ever kind of irritated me. But I think he's just pushing buttons because it's Friday.

I hate rich kids!

then maybe he will fit in at some architectural schools?

vado and others: I don't agree with your point that people are tools and should be utilised as such. In a professional arena, sure that's expected...the profession would be impossible without specialisation and teamwork. But in the academic world you get rewarded for your own work. What this person is doing is taking short cuts and paying to bypass boxes that need to be ticked.

vado, i get your point that the boss doesn't need to know how to draw everything up to run an office, but they should know the principles of how to do it. The perfect boss is one who has gone through all this shit before: they understand what is a reasonable expectation for a drawing because they've gone through the process themselves in the past. The same applies for project managers who understand the construction process rather than blindly hiring someone else to take carre of it. This lack of overlaping knowledge is very dangerous.

Those renderings and paintings that you see in Zaha exhibitions...she doesn't do them. They are designed and made by someone else (or many others in the case of the renderings). This doesn't make them any less a product of her office/style because she went through the process of authenticating her abilities in the AA - producing the original drawings that continued into the early part of her career. We know she can do it. These derive from her orignal aesthetic intention.

But paying someone else to work up your portfolio is only done for one of 2 reasons: laziness or incompetence. Neither of which you should be able to pay to bypass and both of which will come back to haunt you in the future.