Zut Alors! is a graphic design studio based in New York City, founded in the fall of 2008. Comprised of partners Brendan Griffiths and Frank DeRose, the studio is committed to speaking eloquently for its clients.

Selected Clients:
Alexander Gorlin Architects, Children's Museum of the Arts, Christie's, Condé Nast, Creative Time, Morrison & Foerster, Performa, The Suzanne Geiss Company, Socrates Scuplture Park

Historical Interns:
Heike Geier, Sean Manchee, Dharini Pererra, Liz Yam, Kelsey Dake, Courtney Boyle, Kári Emil Helgason, Nick Hum, Christina “X-tina” Janus, Hope Finley, Theo Steinhardt, Marc Steimer, Owen Dodd, Kurt Woerpel, Noé Halimi, Brent Hildebrand, Shiraz Gallab

Teaching:
Pratt Institute (Visual Comunnications, Typography, Web Design, Senior Project)
Parsons The New School for Design (Interaction Design)

Awards:
Sadly…

Exhibitions:
Well, we're not artists.

If you build it they will come.

Let them eat kale.

Combining various symbols and signs to make new symbols and signs that communicate the “theme,” or allow increased acuity into, the collection of words (“article”) that the image is placed in the vicinity of.
      Generally speaking familiar symbols (the oft maligned “cliché”) are the illustrators' greatest ally as they communicate quickly and lend themselves to easy and general understanding by what is often a vast and non-particular audience.

“...but I don't see a 'photograph', I see a collection of red, green, and black dots composed at various angles, and in various densities, which appear to represent an object which (given the recent explosion in, and radical availability of digital editing capabilities) may or may not exist in real life...”

In Summary B.K.A. It is easier to make a list than to synthesize disparate thoughts into a coherent thesis A.K.A. The current state of design criticism:
       1. The Painstation (google it!!); 2. Julius makes a nice Bolognese; 3. Getting on the incorrect 5:06am (“Lets get on this one!”) train to get to a one hour away 8:30am flight (“!!!!”) but seeing a small river (“Large creek?”) breathe steam on account of taking the “wrong” train; 4. Talking to 20 and 30-something year old Germans about stultifying guilt; 5. International Tinder® v. International diplomacy; 6. “Why's your sweatshirt all dirty?”; 7. Going to German museums; 8. “Nah, I’m not gonna go to the museum”; 9. The crazy man glares menacingly in the window of the space Tuesday for two (forty?) minutes, Sunday he slides a postcard under the door while we do 10am hangover pushups; 10. Rapping in a made-up language for a made-up poster; 11. The sun goes down everyday at 10pm; 12. Encouraging Julius to become the next HFJ; 13. Steinmann!; 14. Three unique generations of karlssonwilker monkeys; 15. Six people come and see 23 posters; 16. Having “nothing” to do other than make the aforementioned posters; 17. Only using the color black; 18. The wit of the staircase; 19. A two hour torrent of blabber; 20. The most wood paneled-est bar in all of Frankfurt; 21. Going to Germany and getting money from a homeless person; 22. A spur of the moment and vigorous rash; 23. A radical, untempered and irrational fear of the “unknown”; 24. The inward-ness that comes along with being unable to speak the native tongue; 25. "It’s not a date."; 26. “And I checked out your site; love it, reminds me of 40 days of dating, only in your case it’s 20 DAYS OF SHAPING!!!!! hahaha!!!!!!!!”; 27. Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-it; 28. An American “rapstar” in Köln; 29. Wait, what?; 30. The Mall; 31. The T-Mobile Store at the mall; 32. The Rewe at the mall; 33. “Can I have a kilo of ham?”; 34. “"Es tut mir leid, ich spreche kein deutsche.”

I am the slackening pace of a race coming closed. I am also the quickening pace of the blood thru my veins during the same race. You are one seven billionth of the whole. You are also the center of your entire, own universe, all important and all encompassing. You rode a crowded early morning 6 train with roughly 2500 other universes. We are the culmination of 14 billion years of evolution. We are the composers of the Arc de Triomphe and the Golden Gate Bridge; we are the manufacturers and consumers of cell phone cases with bunny ears.

“THE ONLY PIECE THAT LASTS FOREVER IS DEATH. KILL YOURSELF.”

The tripod lay prone in a corner of the room. Popcorn and beer strewn about the floor; well, the beer had soaked into the floor, but, youknowhatImean. Blue light flickered on three out of four walls; her shoes turned purple—originally blood red, now bathed in cast light.

The fact that we are, in fact, not artists. There is the occassional veneer of “art”, but the things we make are always in service (and if not always, then 99.99% of the time) to business, and if not business, then to someone else's idea(s) or need(s).
      It is quixotic, ultimately self-defeating, to become involved in this field and think that your own needs, your “artistic” vision, should always be satisfied; you are in all actuality, a conduit for other human beings' ideas. You speak for other people; and that in itself is a beautiful and formidable responsibility. It is also one that does not have to live in the shadow of any romantic notions about creativity.

ALWAYS
BE
CLOSING.

The gentle and warm smell of ozone is in the air; waves of heat wiggle up off of the pavement like see-through litle worms. The East River meets the shoreline lazily, and Manhattan loiters further towards that selfsame east, super-cool, like your friend in high school who knew just what to say and how to wear it.

They walked hand in hand through many different rooms in the museum. The hushed air of the space was dense, it became the third character in their romance novel; the third character along with all those figures in all those paintings. Old lords, Jesus Chirst and the broad swaths of brown that Barnett Newman was so fond of; all them were characters in the story also. Those same characters watched raptly as the young lovers walked hip to hip between the modern and old master wing; he put his hand around her waist and said softly, “You are my masterpiece!” A figure in a Breugel painting on the wall over her shoulder winced and started to tremble like a popcorn kernel in hot oil.

Tee Shirt. Tongue Kiss. Poster. iPhone. Cat. Girlfriend. Girl. Friend(s). ANXIETY. Lunch. Sneaker. #00FF00. LHBC. Website. Earth. Newsprint. 6th Ave. “Arm-leg-leg-arm-head, this is godbody.” Zut Alors Grotesk; the “S” in particular. Times New Roman, Italic. Eugene. Number 6. Apppppppp. “We are not French; we kiss like we were.” Miles. Yale. Pratt. Nick Hum. Shaun Manchee. The History of West Village Philosophy. Nasty Nas. Raymond Carver. “Dammmn son, where'd you find this?” Four Colour Black. ANXIETY. “VevO!!!”

Video Hits One. Vigilant Handgun Ownership. Veronica Has Ovaries; Victor Hasn't One. Virgil Handles Onions. Vast Haptic Occurence. Vagrants Humming Odes. Vigorous Hamster Orgy. Violent Human Occupation. Various Horrors Occurred. Virginia Ham Oven. Vague Heinous Offences. Vanilla Holy Order. Vee Aych Oh. Vaseline Hands Onanism.

Hansel and Gretel traipse through the woods and happen upon an art installation that shows a wolf, standing on his hind legs in human clothes (a woolen shawl, small wireframe glasses and a bonnet to be specific), mouth agape, with a small girl, in a peculiar red cloak, cowering in front of said wolf.