contemporary fine ARTISTS int.
Posts 1-1 of 1
-
Vlado FranjevićThe company name is only visible to registered members.Symposiodesign Amman'06: West-East Graphic Dialogue by Dr. Arafat Al-Naim
Symposiodesign Amman'06: West-East Graphic Dialogue
Dr. Arafat Al-Naim
Graphic artist, designer and educator - Initiator & curator of Symposiodesign
megrafik@gmail.com
Amman, Capital of Jordan, became an arena for International Graphic Art & Design Exchange when, under the patronage of HRH Princess Wijdan Ali, the First SYMPOSIODESIGN Amman’06 – the ASU international Design Forum took place. Designers, educators, students and institutes from 19 countries met to create a better learning environment, positive attitudes and to foster creativity among art & design students as well as creating a platform for exchange, research, sharing experience and promoting collaboration among the art & design institutions.
Contemporary graphic art & design education & practice were the main theme of the first SYMPOSIODESIGN. The event, which is organized by the Department of the Fine Arts of ASU, Jordan was designed to serve as an International Graphic Art and Design Forum.
This event was transformed into a Jordanian Project and aligns Jordan with International Art & Design Community. It is an ambitious national project, to which all are requested to contribute including the Ministry of Culture, Art and Design Community, Academic and Professional Institutions, Universities and Media. The promotion of international art & design education and practice contributes to the evolution of visual culture and education and creates new opportunities for Jordanian universities, artists, designers and students.
The SYMPOSIODESIGN panels, sessions, workshop and exhibitions not only promoted graphic art & design, but also reflected contemporary education and practice, current & future needs, challenges at visual communication and provided a networking of opportunities for art & design organizations and colleagues worldwide.
The exhibited students' works demonstrated different views, technical abilities and approaches acquainted throughout years of study, visual research and experiments with different materials and themes. The "Bird Flu" poster project demonstrates the Jordanian contribution and engagement in global issues.
The symposiodesign debates and discussions brought together leading graphic art and design experts among who were Prof. Todor Vardjiev – National Academy of Art Sofia, Bulgaria; Prof. Albert (Inyoung) Choi – Hanyang University, South Korea; Assist. Prof. Elif Ayiter – Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey; Assist. Prof. Evripides Zantides – Intercollage, Nicosia, Cyprus; Assist. Prof. Muqeem Khan – VCU, Qatar; Assist. Prof. Peter Martin – VCU, Qata; Vlado Franjevic – Multimedia Artist, P. Liechtenstein; Sudhir Sharma – Elephant Design, India; Ahmad Taher Al-Saffarini – Professional Photographer, Jordan and Prof. Dr. Anna Paula Silva. Gouveia; Prof. Dr. Denise Dantas; Prof. Marlivan Moraes Alencar; Ana Paula de Campos; Alexandre Santilli – Centro Universitário Senac - São Paulo/SP - Brasil. It highlighted the Art & Design Programs need of adoption according to international standards to ensure integration of students with international system and to promote Jordan in this field.
In her presentation, Sabanci University (Istanbul/Turkey) Assist. Prof. of Design Elif Ayiter elucidated and demonstrated a teaching methodology in graphic design, which she has developed to the unique specifications of Turkey and its alphabet change from 78 years ago. This method focuses on the evolution of culture and stylistic and design problems brought about by the “alphabet revolution” and still needs to be addressed.
This dramatic change, undertaken to facilitate the literacy of the populace and also to align Turkey with the “west” culturally, not only affected the life style values and mentality of the culture but also the design processes in that it brought about a new typographic system. For that Turkish design students had to be familiar and grounded in a typography system, which was not part of their design tradition, which had been imposed upon their culture, albeit with the best of intentions and with most beneficial results in terms of the enablement of literacy.
Eventually it resulted in that the primary task of a design educator is to teach students how to plan, to draw, to sketch, how to setup correct compositions, formal relationships, and hierarchies – in short, the skills of the trade.
Sudhir Sharma, the founder director of Elephant strategy + Design (India) presented a paper entitled “Design Moksha – a road for design philosophy". “Moksha” in Hinduism is the spiritual goal of release from reincarnation. For design the release of an object from the need of redesign, to become timeless is “Design Moksha”.
Design has strategic importance for a country’s industry competitiveness. Many governments formulate design and technology missions in close cooperation with the business sector. Most of these emphasize on design as a tool for economic development, also as a role for creating business and employment opportunities. Design helps industry, commerce and services to compete on value and provides a distinctive position globally.
If the process for this design comes from the roots of a cultural philosophy – design outcome can also work for social upliftment and harmony. Even though the design process all over the world is more or less similar in nature, it’s the cultural philosophies and their understandings that increasingly will bring in the new thought and old values. The strength of the future design will be in importance of and nuance of diversities in cultural sensitivities.
How we design? How should we design? What should be the objective and its processes? Sharma asked. He presented ten most significant and persistent thoughts as a road map of cultural design philosophy, each of which leads to the next one, taken from currents in Hindu philosophy of life.
The Hanyang University (South Korea) Assoc. Professor Dr. Albert (Inyoung) Choi presented a paper entitled "Conceptor & Formalization: A Methodology for Graphic Design". In his paper he explored the central role of the concept in the process of design, and its importance as a design element that delivers a meaning and message to a form. Even though this unique relationship between form and concept, the graphic design education had been mainly concentrated on the knowledge of form and its aesthetic value. But the study of ‘concept’ that can deliver a message of design in an analytical way has been weak compared to the study of form.
The purpose of this study seeks a systematic design concept development method that is necessary in design education and the education method that raises logical thinking in conceptual development, and helps utilize a logic and language for designers who lack of logical and language oriented thinking in design.
Therefore, Dr Choi created this design methodology for formulating the value of a concept. The designers consciously create a tangible property with an appropriate concept and visual attributes so that ultimately its message can communicate clearly to the viewers and affect them either by attributing their decision-making or remembering the intention of a message. The concept is expressed with the visual information and the verbal information through the visual forms. If the concept is not related to the target’s needs and desires, then it is considered a weak concept. Therefore, this design methodology defines the values that the viewers could respond to. This design methodology is based on the statement, "The Dependant Variables are interchangeable variables that support the Inter-Dependant Variables and the Inter-dependant Variables are co-dependable variables that closely relate to the topic and the concept." The Dependant Variable (DV) is a variable that describes the feeling and/or action. The Inter-Dependant Variable (IDV) is a variable that describes the qualified issues of a message. To create an appropriate concept, first, one should lock on the target and subject matter of the design. Second, generate the IDV and DV, then correlate and learn a variety of IDV and DV relationships. Third, based on the second step, determine possible concept directions. Fourth, define the purpose of design, design effects, and concept. Fifth, finalize a concept and design direction.
The presentation of National Academy of Arts (Sofia/Bulgaria) Prof. Todor Vardjiev included a chronological preview of the development of Graphic Design in Bulgaria from the beginning of the 20th century. Trends, styles and schools of Bulgarian graphic design – Posters, Typography, Illustrations, Book Arts etc, were exposed through the works of eminent artists, starting with Boris Angueloushev and Stefan Kunchev who left their outstanding signature in Bulgarian visual art, and more specifically in books, illustrations, trade marks, philatelic graphic design and fonts. Prof. Vardjiev explored also the role of NAA in the development of Bulgarian graphic design, educational programs and contribution in the context of International practice. Alongside the projected professional artists and Prof. Vardjiev works, students’ works were exposed to demonstrate the different programs and tendencies in Bulgarian practice. A workshop –Demonstration on Bulgarian calligraphy was organized too.
"Digital photography: process and creative approach" another workshop organized by Jordanian professional photographer Ahmed Taher Al-Saffarini. In his workshop, Mr. Al-Saffarini demonstrated how to use photographic imagery in a communication design context and how to understand the creative relationship between image and text. The central practice element is the development of visual conceptual ideas and the technical processes needed to put these ideas into practice. He elucidated the development of creative image generation using the digital camera through a variety of photographic means, followed with practical experiments, to develop an awareness of electronic origination and the impact of digital imaging on graphic design.
One of the contributions of Comunicação e Artes Centro, Senac Universitary Center, São Paolo, Brazil – Marlivan Moraes Alencar; Ana Paula de Campos; Alexandre Santilli; were presented by ASU Assist. Prof. Dr. Hosni Abu Krayem "Experimental Design: a teaching and projectual challenge" presented a differentiated proposal of interdisciplinary practice which considers as an instrument of work, both the students' experiences and contents extracted from the art field (literature, cinema, the plastic arts etc.). The methodology was developed in the first semester of 2005 at the Experimental Project of Industrial Design Graduation class / Senac Universitary Center. It proposed projectual experiences of different areas of work from the effective approach of design as applied social science, a particular characteristic of contemporary design.
The other contribution of Anna Paula Silva Gouveia; Denise Dantas; Marlivan Moraes Alencar; Presented by Mr Faris Haddad, "Experimental Design: a new educational approach" highlighted the teaching work developed in the first semester of 2005 in the subject of Experimental Project of Design Graduation – Graphic Design degree at the Centro Universitario Senac. It outlined the teaching proposal recently implanted which follows the new guidelines for higher education in design. The article also related the original dynamics created from the union of three diverse academic experiences: architecture, design and social communication. It also presented exercises and thematic axes developed on a scale of increasing complexity – from the individual to the collective, from the private to the public – whose only premises are the conceptual elaboration of the project and the comprehension of the inherent methodological procedures by the student.
The Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar Assist. Professor of Communication Design Muqeem Khan presented his research and student’s work – “Design Thinking and Process for the Three Dimensional Transfer of Knowledge”.
Muqeem Khan’s presentation discussed and illustrated the pedagogical issues and challenges related to animation and three dimensional designs. He presented third and fourth year VCUQ student’s animation with reference to his research. This paper evolved around the fact that teaching on the subject of three-dimensional design, or any overlapping disciplines that involve three-dimensional thinking can be a complex process. Since the field is constantly changing and evolving, there is no recognized curriculum or pedagogical structure that can be followed. There are different methods developed by experts of many disciplines and they have either brought techniques from their disciplines or adopted structure from other disciplines to solve problems in this highly advanced area of teaching. Transferring knowledge related to three-dimensional design or thinking is like solving a puzzle. When an instructor is teaching this discipline, the most important and the challenging steps are to identify the strength and weaknesses of students and the environment where they are seeking this particular set of knowledge.
The Principality of Liechtenstein multimedia artist Vlado Franjevic presented a paper entitled “Graphic Design in the P. Liechtenstein, a small country of big possibilities”. This paper explored different cultural issues affecting the situation of graphic design in such a small country. Such issues included cultural basis, culture as a responsibility of the state, organization of state cultural promotion and state as supporter of cultural institutions – museums, Liechtenstein’s school of art, government advisory council for culture – and presented contemporary examples of graphic design practice (books, post stamps, graphic art) in Liechtenstein.
Franjevic’s workshop “Digital print in the own mixed media artworks – an experiment” demonstrates how design students can integrate the use of digital camera and technology and textile to produce design presentations.
The Intercollege, Nicosia, Cyprus Assist. Prof. of Graphic Communication Evripides Zantides presentation – “Cyprus and Graphic Communication: From the Vernacular to the Design Agency” explored the ways that Graphic Communication is applied in the Cypriot market. From the vernaculars to the design agencies: different examples of visual material were presented and analyzed in terms of the project’s requirement, concept, originality, and communication effectiveness. The paper additionally presented the status of, and influences on, the visual culture of Cyprus, local freelance and costing, competition and unemployment within Graphic Design field. Hierarchy of Type: A title of Assist. Prof. Zantides workshop on various methods that can be considered on an attempt to visually control and achieve hierarchical sequencing of Type.
Assist. Prof. Peter Martin from Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar presented a paper about Graphic Design Development in Qatar. The ASU Instructor of Graphic design Mr. Essam Abu Awad moderated a breakout talk about Graphic Design Education and Practice in Jordan.
The symposiodesign resulted in future exchange exhibitions, collaborations and portfolio projects of international scope for many of the delegates. The second edition of Symposiodesign is scheduled for April 2007.
- 29 Aug 2006, 3:22 pm
