Graphic design has long been a powerful tool for feminist advocacy, shaping public discourse and challenging societal norms around gender and equality. This research explores how graphic design has amplified feminist narratives, influenced public perceptions, and contributed to social transformation. By examining feminist design movements, campaigns, and the work of influential designers, this study investigates how visual communication functions as a catalyst for activism. Using a qualitative approach, the research analyses advertisements, print media, and illustrations to assess how design elements have been employed to promote inclusivity and female empowerment.

This paper analyses the co-curatorial role in iNgqikithi yokuPhica/Weaving Meanings: Telephone Wire Art from South Africa, an exhibition launched at the Museum of International Folk Art (MOIFA) in Santa Fe in November 2024. It examines how collaborative, dialogical, and multidisciplinary approaches foster engagement in exhibition design, focusing on South African telephone wire art from KwaMashu and Siyanda. The exhibition exemplifies New Museology by embracing collaborative curation and shifting authority to community participation. Its narrative is deeply rooted in Siyanda’s artistic legacy, tracing the evolution of telephone wire art from traditional forms to contemporary creations such as izimbenge (wire baskets).

The visibility of the watermelon as a representation of the Palestinian cause has exponentially increased in recent years, particularly on social media. Given the popularity of the watermelon, its use in poster design warrants an in-depth investigation. This paper presents the results of an analysis of Palestine posters that have incorporated the watermelon from 2023 to 2025. The study provides insight into the way the watermelon is used in contemporary Palestine posters and adds to the literature on Palestine posters specifically and liberation graphics more broadly. A sample of 408 posters was drawn from the web-based Palestine Poster Project Archives (PPPA) and subjected to content and semiotic analyses.

It is inevitable that with the rapid advancement of digital technologies, design education is being influenced greatly, particularly through the expansion of online learning and the integration of artificial intelligence (AI). Within a relatively short timeframe (which included the COVID-19 pandemic) there has been an accelerated transition to digital learning environments, exposing both opportunities and challenges in online graphic design education. While we are constantly shown that online tools offer potential for enhancing collaboration, participation, and feedback, it is important to remember that their effectiveness is dependent on accessibility, digital literacy, and educator preparedness.

In this paper, I investigate the evolving visualisations of the female form in selected South African art, particularly among emerging female artists. Drawing from feminist critiques that expose the historical sexualisation and patriarchal depictions of women in the canons of art history from around the world, I examine contemporary visual strategies used in representing the female body, seeking to determine if there has been any shift from traditional misogynistic depictions of women.

Using the Sasol New Signatures Art Competition digital archives from 2013 to 2023, I conduct a qualitative content analysis of selected artworks that made it to the final round to identify emergent themes in the works of young South African female artists.

This paper deals with the gap in undergraduate graphic design student prepress knowledge, and how addressing the shortfalls can lead to reduced waste through graduating designers that practice more informed reproduction. This paper follows the research for my master’s thesis (Lottering 2017) which emerged as a result of being required to teach prepress theory and finding that the amount of theory needed to be covered in the classroom was far too much and far too complex for students to fully understand given the available time allotted to teaching and learning on the topic. On an exchange trip to Sweden in 2014, my students were given the opportunity to print milk carton packs on an actual, industry standard flexographic press.

As the design industry is impacted by rapidly evolving technologies, tertiary graphic design curriculums must be continuously updated to ensure that students, specifically exit-level students, are prepared for the rigours of industry. Zines and DIY alternative publications have limited commercial value, and so may be regarded as less important than learning units that respond to the commercial (and increasingly digital) nature of industry. This paper argues that not only do zines remain relevant, but that the inclusion of a zine project in an undergraduate design curriculum is a valuable addition to the programme.

Traditional memorialisations, stone, oral and written histories, have been a key part of cultural heritage, remembrance and identity. However, with the rise of technology, we are presented with new opportunities and means to challenge our thinking in preserving and interpreting memory. This paper examines how digital design can be used to create ethical documentation and cultural preservation through the use of augmented reality (AR) and forensic aesthetics with a focus on Afrocentric cultural preservation.

In the current milieu approaches to the design and creation of visual art and design artefacts by Afrikans, no longer follows the application of Euro-American ideologies and methods, stylised with Afrikan-inspired effects so that they are palatable to a Western audience. Colonial era atavism attempted to erase Afrikanness from Afrikans' cosmologies, citing the superiority of Western Enlightenment reasoning and their more 'sophisticated' society as preferable. Afrikan aetiologies now supersede in contemporary creative practice in Afrika, grounded in values, heritage, genealogy, mythology, prolepsis and systems that are intrinsically Afrikan, and favour that which is authentically representative of the continent.

Animation is a medium that is increasingly being used in the documentary genre for its symbolic and metaphoric functions; the reenactment of events for which live action footage is missing or non-existent, the recreation of phenomena not accessible to normal human vision (such as those that were pre-photographic or are cosmically distant or microscopic), as well as the portrayal of subjective psychological states. This paper proposes that in addition to these established functions of animation in a non-fiction context, we should also consider its potential as a form of public history, giving voice to individual perspectives in a novel and  symbolically-rich medium.

Over the past twelve years, the University of Johannesburg Department of Graphic Design students have developed many feasible solutions based on human-centred and participation design principles. Implementing these design solutions to foster positive change is often problematic owing to funding and handovers; consequently, many projects remain at the conceptual stage, with few making a positive difference to the external stakeholders. Nevertheless, despite these challenges, students often produce high-end and in-depth results when working with stakeholders.

In the recent five years, the predominant approach followed in the context of postgraduate research in the field of design at Stellenbosch University (SU) has been practice-led. This reflects the Visual Arts Department’s integrated, process-oriented philosophy of design. We regard design as an inherently relational practice that connects people, things, places, and ideas, among others. Through the integrated and applied use of multiple media formats. We do not focus solely on the outcome of our practice but are rather interested in using our practice to work towards a more just and sustainable future for all.

The paper discusses a globally networked learning project with graphic design students from Mexico, the United States of America, and South Africa. Globally networked learning (GNL) aims for cost-effective internationalization strategies where digital platforms replace physical student exchanges. The project was designed according to Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) principles, which included ice-breaker activities at the beginning of the project and reflection activities at the end.

Following a query in 2018 by the University of Johannesburg’s (UJ) alumni office to establish in which industries or companies UJ alumni were predominantly employed, information was gathered by members of the department of Graphic Design and data accumulated on a large number of alumni from the Department of Graphic Design.

Graphic design as an academic and research practice is relatively young when compared to the established disciplines such as education, psychology, medicine, and history. It was only community-type colleges and technical institutions that offered design as a vocational trade. Universities in South Africa started to offer design in the latter half of the twentieth century. It is only in the last two decades that we have seen design research output in South Africa. The relatively low number of international design journals when compared to education, for example, attest to the young scientific discipline of research in design.