UTS VISUAL COMMUNICATION
Design research projects created as part of the Visual Communications Honours program at University of Technology Sydney.
Information
In the Visual Communication Honours degree, students challenge the conventional positioning of visual communication design and re-imagine it, not simply as a strategy for conveying messages, but as a distinct way of investigating contemporary issues. Students employ a range of research methods to both interrogate and creatively respond to a research theme. Students have the opportunity to challenge the material boundaries associated with professional visual communication practice by working with emerging digital technologies and new material processes alongside more established methods of production. With a focus on qualitative and practice-led research approaches, the honours degree prepares students for future professional design practice and/or postgraduate study.
Teaching staff: Zoe Sadokierski, Andrew Burrell, Monica Monin, Gabe Clark, Jacqueline Lorber Kasunic, Jesse Adams Stein, Aaron Seymour.
Thank
Sappho’s Ghost
by Ali Chalmers Braithwaite‘Sappho's Ghost’ is a 5 minute real-time interactive VR experience. It is a speculative interface that places queer digital poetry literally within the reach of the audience, and provides a threshold into alternate, utopian existences. There are two key spaces for the audience to experience: the box and the rainbow slime riot. The first presents a traditional reading experience, the second more tactile. By putting queer text within reach in a visceral way, ‘Sappho's Ghost’ rethinks discourses surrounding queer cultural production and strategies of meaning making in digital environments.
Frankenbike
by Anita Gallagher‘Frankenbike’, a point-and-click adventure newsgame, is a satirical critique of Sydney’s share bike phenomenon. It employs narrative-based roleplay to situate the player amongst varied perspectives within the local share bike culture. Through a series of interlinked scenarios, players are able to explore and act out the relationships between the system’s actors, revealing underlying concerns over infrastructure, governance, ownership, and community — ideas which have not been addressed in mainstream media coverage. ‘Frankenbike’ demonstrates the potential for interactive journalism to foster critical, empathetic, engagement with the news.
Love Seaweed
by Amelia Hanigan‘Love Seaweed’ emerged from my frustration with the lack of urgency ascribed to climate change. I questioned: how could design dispel the overwhelming doom that feeds ignorance? How might I foster hope and participation with climate solutions?
The answer: seaweed. Scientists are exploring these organisms for renewable sources of fuel, plastic and food that offset carbon in closed-loop systems. Love Seaweed is an online platform which demystifies the science. A grow-your-own-algae kit celebrates seaweed, allowing individuals to grow their own climate-change-solution: chlorella algae. There are reasons to feel good about the planet - it’s just a matter of communicating them well.
