STEVEN M. JOHNSON
Since the early 1970s, he has toiled away quietly in his free time creating a “line” of alternative products and systems that he hopes will benefit or at least amuse his fellow consumer-citizens. He has also ventured into an edgier area, making predictions about the future. His ideas, and his methods for arriving at ideas, are somewhat unique. He has perhaps benefitted from having had little formal instruction in art, nor training in engineering or industrial design. Curious images have filled his mind during weekends and odd free moments, while he was earning a living in careers as urban planner, newspaper artist and future trends analyst at California companies. Only after he turned 36 did he discover he had an inventor and designer inside himself, wanting to come out.
On long trips or during boring commutes, he has made use of time that is normally wasted watching scenery by sketching product ideas and cartoons on his home-made “automobile drafting board” (once featured on a TV station in Sacramento, CA). The board sits at an angle against the dashboard and is fitted out in black naugahyde to match the car’s interior. He is unaware of any California law forbidding drawing while driving.
His drawings have been featured in newspapers and magazines both nationally and abroad. A short list of magazines includes Road & Track, Harper’s, Utne Reader, Whole Earth Review, Sierra, Esquire, The Futurist, Design Mind, Good, Fastcompany, as well as Box and Brutus (Japanese magazines). Two books of his work have been published: What the World Needs Now, Ten Speed Press, 1984 and 2001, and Public Therapy Buses, Information Specialty Bums, Solar Cook-A-Mats and Other Visions of the 21st Century, St. Martin’s Press, 1991. A new book will be available on Amazon.com in May, 2012: Have Fun Inventing, Createspace.com, 2012.
He was born in 1938 and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. His undergraduate studies were at Yale University and U.C. Berkeley. He lives in Southern California with his wife and son.
