Okay, enough is enough. I came to St. Louis in the fall of 1969 and garnered three degrees from SLU. I’ve been connected to the University as an undergrad, grad student, adjunct instructor, Simon Rec Center member or basketball season ticket holder ever since. I have seen a lot of Billikens come and go, from the scrappy, kind of mean spirited looking one of the early seventies to the darling, welcoming, fully formed, crinkle-mouthed one of recent times. But I have never seen such a bland and soulless rendering as this new exanimate logo foisted upon our community this past month. Chris May’s inanity, “… this newest identity system is perfect for today’s era of collegiate sports,” (“identity system”?) exposes the lifeless quality of this new design. The old Biliken was a CHARACTER; the new one is a SOULLESS GRAPHIC. May also said that the new Billiken “embodies the spirit of our iconic, one-of-a-kind mascot.” What’s maddening about this is that it precisely does not! There’s no spirit involved in the new flat, two-dimensional, arbitrarily shaded caricature. What it embodies is some unconnected graphic artist’s corporatized vision of what a hip, new logo should be. Bring back the old Billiken—at least he was fun!
-Michael Bartz