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Michael Bierut

American graphic designer (born 1957)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 19, 2026
Entity authorityQ3856114 ↗
Source-derived summary

Michael Bierut (born 1957) is a graphic designer, design critic and educator, who has been a partner at design firm Pentagram since 1990. He designed the logo for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign.

Early life and education

Michael Bierut was born in 1957 in Cleveland, Ohio. His mother Anne Marie was a housewife, and his father worked in printing press sales. His family lived in Garfield Heights and he attended Saturday morning classes at the Cleveland Museum of Art where he developed his drawing skills. The family moved to the suburb Parma in 1967, and he attended Normandy High School, graduating in 1975.

In the ninth grade, Bierut created his first poster for a school play and came to a realization that he wanted to create things with purpose. He also enjoyed album cover art and discovered the book Graphic Design Manual by Armin Hofmann and Milton Glaser: Graphic Design. He studied graphic design at the University of Cincinnati's College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning (DAAP) as a result of these influences. While in school, he interned for three months for Chris Pullman, an AIGA medalist and a Yale professor, at a Boston public television station, WGBH. In late summer of 1978, after completing the internship, Bierut travelled from Boston to New York City and shared his portfolio with Massimo Vignelli of Vignelli Associates, and was offered a job on the spot.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Michael Bierut” as american graphic designer (born 1957). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1957, 1990, 2016, 1967—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1957. The account is most persuasive where Michael, Bierut and American can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american graphic designer (born 1957). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3856114. VIAF identifies the subject as 71510347. The Library of Congress control number is no94029554. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1957, 1990, 2016 and 1967.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Michael Bierut”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Michael Bierut primary sources, Michael Bierut archive and Michael research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Michael Bierut”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Michael Bierut” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.