8 May 1920 25 April 1996 Saul Bass was born on 8 May 1920 in the Bronx in New York, the son of a Furrier emigrated. Conquered, in 1938, the scholarship at the Art College Students based in Manhattan, he became an Assistant to the art Department to "Warner Bros", at the headquarters of the Big Apple. In 1944, when he collaborated with Blaine Thompson, publicity, you register at Brooklyn College: his teachers there is Gyorgy Kepes, famous Hungarian graphic designer, student of Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, which causes Saul can approach the works of the Bauhaus and Constructivism. Later Saul Bass embarks on a path of apprenticeship in various design studios in New York, before being named art director of "Buchanan & co.", advertising agency of California. Is the 1946: Bass moved to Los Angeles, where six years later opens his studio, called "Saul Bass & Associates". It is to him that turns the Otto Preminger in 1954 to Commission the creation of posters for the film "Carmen Jones" means the production of Saul excites him so much that in Bass are given even the opening credits of the film. The one with Preminger is only the first of a long series of collaborations in cinema: for Billy Wilder creates the opening credits to the critically acclaimed "the seven year itch", 1955 film with Marilyn Monroe; in the same year he collaborated with Robert Aldrich for the film "the big knife," and again with Preminger on the film that will make him known worldwide, "the man with the golden arm." The following year in his study Elaine Makatura, destined to become his wife, while in 1959 deals with the introduction sequence of "Anatomy of a murder", the most famous work of Otto Preminger. This is the outline of a dead body (invoked by the film poster, designed by Saul Bass) divided into several parts, which only for a moment remains whole before the different pieces that make up begin to slip in and out of the screen independently, on the basis of the soundtrack, written by jazz musician Duke Ellington. That is how Bass is called by the greatest masters of the big screen, fascinated by its ability to summarize and abridge in minutes a whole movie: the case of Alfred Hitchcock, it called for "the woman who lived twice" (in 1958) commissioned him also introductory sequences "North by Northwest" and "Psycho." But even Stanley Kubrick remains attracted to his abilities, to the point of claiming his collaboration for the titles and the creation of some crowd scenes in "Spartacus" (released in 1960) and a poster of "the Shining". We are already in 1980: Meanwhile, Saul Bass had dedicated themselves to directing, directing the sci-fi film "phase IV: Earth's destruction", which though critically acclaimed hadn't been a good success at the box office. Saw the failure behind the camera, then, the New York designer returns to his old business, devoting himself to graphic design business and collaborating with Minolta, Bell, United Airlines and At & T to create numerous brand images. Following a phase of tired, Bass back to the movies (as Director of the short film "Quest") operand for introductory sequences of "broadcast news", in 1987, and "Big", the following year. Starting from the early 1990s embarks on a high-level professional ties with Martin Scorsese, who entrusted him with the opening credits of "Goodfellas" in 1990, the poster of "Cape Fear"-Cape fear "in 1991, and the opening credits of" the age of innocence "and" casino ". Meanwhile, Bass also produces the advertising posters relating to ceremonies of Oscar, and create your movie poster of Steven Spielberg's "Schindler's List". Saul Bass dies in Los Angeles, California on 25 April 1996, at the age of 75 years.
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