Kevin Halstead | Senior Art Director | Retail, Brand Systems & Creative Campaigns

Portrait of Kevin Halstead, Chicago senior art director, in a charcoal jacket and black turtleneck, holding a stylus at a desk

Senior Art Director & Designer

Art Direction
Retail & Shopper
Brand Systems
Print & Packaging
Retouching & Color
Generative AI · Image & Motion

Still curious

Creating brand systems, retail experiences, and creative campaigns that connect strategy with unforgettable execution.

Chicago-based Senior Art Director specializing in shopper marketing, packaging, visual identity, AI-powered content creation, and production from concept to launch.

View selected work

Selected clients

Cricket Wireless
Tropicana
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Aon
GM Fleet & Commercial
McDougal Littell / HMH
American Bar Association
MacNeal Hospital
GTE
Ovation Musical Theatre

Agency: TPN / Omnicom · In-house: Holt McDougal / HMH · Studio: Havas

What I do

Twenty-five years of making things that ship, from the first sketch to the press check.

A cyan-lit digital kiosk on a downtown sidewalk

Retail & shopper

Store environments, point of purchase, lightboxes and seasonal offer systems.

An exploded charcoal and cyan presentation box

Packaging

Structure, graphics and unboxing, from dieline to shelf.

A basketball player in motion under neon light

Print & campaigns

Posters, out-of-home and social built on one idea and one lockup.

Brand identity

Marks, systems and guidelines that hold up at every size.

A cyan press proof with registration targets and color bars

Art direction & production

Prepress, color and press checks, the craft that gets it printed right.

Generative AI

Image and motion made with AI, directed and finished like any other source.

Illustrative imagery made for this site with generative tools.

Portfolio

Client work from agency, in-house and freelance roles. Older pieces are rebuilt at full resolution from the original concepts and copy. Every project is labeled, and each one opens with the story behind it.

Client work — remastered
Client work
Speculative concept — not commissioned
Fictional brand concept

Filter the work

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Concepts

Self-initiated and speculative work. None of it was commissioned by the brands shown. It's where I test ideas in image-making, typography and tone, with generative tools directed and finished like any other source.

More work

Earlier client work and further concepts, kept for range. Click any piece to open it with its full project notes.

Project	Formats	Label
MacNeal Hospital residency recruitment cover	Recruitment cover	Client work — remastered
ABA Source publication cover	Publication cover	Client work — remastered
GTE Student Visa website	Website	Client work — remastered
Find Your Own Frequency — Converse	Vertical poster / social	Speculative concept — not commissioned
Philips Hue print concept	Print ad / OOH	Speculative concept — not commissioned
Put In the Work — Gatorade	Vertical poster / social	Speculative concept — not commissioned
A Different Point of View — Warby Parker	Vertical poster / social	Speculative concept — not commissioned
Find Your Next Favorite — Spotify	Vertical poster / social	Speculative concept — not commissioned
Sidequest Citrus Co. poster	Beverage ad / poster	Fictional brand concept
EM Studio type poster	Service poster	Fictional brand concept
Ovation Musical Theatre poster	Poster	Client work

Experience

Twenty-five years across agency, in-house and freelance roles: retail and shopper marketing at TPN / Omnicom, educational publishing at Holt McDougal, and an in-house photo studio at Havas. The through line is owning the work from concept to press-ready files.

2001–PresentArt Director & DesignerIndependentIdentity, print, packaging, digital, environmental, and generative image/video for agencies and direct clients.
2010–2014Senior Art DirectorTPN / OmnicomRetail creative for Cricket Wireless across the complete path to purchase.
2004–2008Senior DesignerHolt McDougal / HMHDesign standards and art direction across a large educational marketing catalog.
2000Art Director, DigitalDouglas–DanielleWebsites and microsites from concept through preproduction.
1997–2000Studio Artist to Art DirectorHavasBuilt an in-house high-resolution photo studio and moved into art direction.
1990–1993Production & DesignMcKnight Kurland / Vision ProductionLayout, electronic publishing, packaging mechanicals, and typography.

About this site

Designed and art-directed by Kevin Halstead, and built by hand in HTML, CSS and JavaScript with Claude AI. No templates or site builders.

Studio portrait heroThe opening is drawn live in WebGL: Kevin in cool studio light against slow blue swirls, with small cyan, magenta and yellow registration squares drifting through the room. Move the cursor to stir the swirls; click to send ripples across the surface.
TypographyArchivo Black, Archivo and IBM Plex Mono. A small script ties the last two words of every line together, so no word ever sits alone.
Built to be usedFull keyboard navigation, reduced-motion support, alt text on every image, and layouts tested from phone to desktop. Hosted on Cloudflare.

Let's make the next one

Hiring for a senior creative role, planning a campaign, or short on hands before a deadline? Tell me what you're working on, even if it's only a rough idea. I'll come back with questions, a point of view, and a plan for getting it to print.

Full-time rolesSenior art director and design lead positions, Chicago or remote.
Projects & retainersCampaigns, retail programs, brand systems and production.
Agency overflowAn experienced pair of hands that needs no hand-holding.