Ted Audio Collective.

This is the 10th anniversary of Design Matters, and to mark the anniversary were

we playing some favorite shows from the archive.

This one, an interview with Brian Ray, was recorded in November of 2011.

This is Design Matters with Debbie Milman from Design Observer.com.

On this program, Debbie Millman talks with Brian Ray, about the value of being rejected, about

art directing for the New York Times, and about his development as an illustrator.

I oftentimes try to avoid illustrating exactly what I'm reading. I try to almost create

like a secondary story to what that piece is and you can tell people stories about you too.

Here's Debbie Miller.

You may know Brian Ray already. You might even have had coffee with him last weekend.

Brian does murals, posters, magazines, music videos, even surfboards.

But he's most widely known for his drawings of heartbreak and adoration,

which appear each week in the Modern Love Column of the Sunday New York Times.

Before landing that gig, Brian Art directed the paper's op-ed section.

So you might say that Ray is familiar with picturing abstract ideas and arguments.

That experience came in handy recently when Ray spent six months working on Malcolm Gladwell

collected.

It's a box set of Gladwell's three best-selling books and it's

illustrated with almost 200 of Ray's amazing drawings. Welcome to Design Matters, Brian.

Oh, thank you for having me.

It's wonderful to have you here.

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