Simple Gifts

I only know 2 designers who have won Academy Awards: the incredible Arnold Schwartzman for his remarkable documentary, Genocide (1981), and Saul Bass. Why Man Creates was written by Saul Bass and Mayo Simon, and directed by Bass in 1968. The movie won the Academy Award for Documentary Short Subject. An abbreviated version of it ran on the first-ever broadcast of CBS' 60 Minutes, on September 24, 1968. Like most of Saul's work, there is a lightness and playful nature with a complex and serious issue. I remember seeing this when I was at art school and secretly loving it. It was the era of post-modernism, and we learned to keep our modernist views hidden. This is one of those pieces that needs no critical discourse, or deconstruction. It is simply there to be loved.