The Society of Publication Designers

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Art Director, YES! Media

Job Description: Are you a lifelong magazine junkie who happens to be a highly creative, conceptual designer and thinker with a passion for design across mediums? Do you have a sophisticated and unique design aesthetic with attention to detail? YES! Media is looking for an imaginative, collaborative, motivated, organized, and deadline-oriented Art Director to join our staff.

Ideal candidates understand how magazines work and can bring ideas and innovations from throughout the wider magazine world to YES! Media. They are willing to challenge the existing rules of print design, and will bring concepts and strategies to leverage YES!’s growing reach into multimedia platforms—including audio and video mediums.

Responsibilities include:

  • Supervise and mentor the Associate Art Director for digital design. Work collaboratively with Audience Relations Team designer. Report to the Executive Editor.

  • Determine the overall look and feel of YES! Magazine such that it supports editorial objectives, marketing and development objectives, as well as the brand and mission of the YES! organization.

  • Design magazine pages so that the overall impression of the magazine communicates brand personality: Inspiring, Insightful, Truth-telling, Compassionate, Active, Authentic. It needs to communicate the breadth of our coverage—so that if you’ve never heard of YES! and you pick up an issue, you will get a strong sense of what we care about: Economy, Democracy, Racial Justice, Civil Liberties, Health Justice and Wellness, Environmental Justice, and Native Rights.

  • Commission illustration, photos, infographics, and oversee the organization's creative budget.

  • Commission and edit structurally creative storytelling forms, such as illustrated essays, and stories heavily integrated with design, data stories, video, and audio.

  • Contribute your own illustrations and infographics, as needed.

  • Manage prepress production.

  • Collaborate with Audience Relations Team to produce effective inserts and ads supporting brand communication, fundraising, and marketing goals.

  • Support reader engagement and feedback loops.

  • Oversee translation of print content to an engaging digital magazine, newsletters, and social media platform stories.

  • The Art Director will manage licensing of photos, illustrations, and other graphic designs for print, web, and other potential mediums.

Job Requirements: In addition to excitement for the YES! brand and mission and for our antiracism work as we build an equitable, diverse, and inclusive organization, qualified applicants should have:

  • A passion for magazines and storytelling through design, both print and digital.

  • Strong multitasking + organizational skills + communication skills.

  • 5+ years of print magazine design experience.

  • 3+ years of digital design experience.

  • 2+ years in a leadership role where you’ve managed employees and deadlines.

  • Cross-platform understanding of latest trends and best practices in magazine design.

  • Fluency with Adobe Creative Suite, specifically InDesign, Illustrator, and Photoshop.

Type of Job: Art direction and design

City: Seattle

State/Country: WA

Duration: Full-time, remote

Benefits: Salary range $70,000-85,000. Paid health, dental, and vision insurance, a health-care deductible reimbursement program, sick and vacation leave, IRA.

Company: YES! Media

About Our Company: YES! Media is a nonprofit independent publisher of solutions journalism. For 25 years, we have been inspiring people to build a more just, sustainable, and compassionate world through our reporting on the positive ways communities are responding to social problems and insightful commentary that sparks constructive discourse.

Contact Name: Zenobia Jeffries Warfield

Contact Email: jobs@yesmagazine.org

How to Apply: To apply, please send your resume, cover letter, and links to your portfolio (or at least three published examples of projects you art-directed, illustrated, or designed and led). In your cover letter, tell us how your artistic direction and vision will complement YES!’s print and digital aesthetic. Submit these materials in a single PDF via email to jobs@yesmagazine.org, with “Art Director” in the subject line, by September 21, 2021. No phone calls, please.