Showcase Spotlight: MA Design for Art Direction

Faced with uncertain times, our MA students have continued to adapt and innovate with true creativity.

In celebration of our Postgraduate Showcase, we’ll be sharing work from a range of graduating designers, thinkers and makers as they explore new, thoughtful and experimental approaches to creative communications.

MA Design for Art Direction

This year, our MA Design for Art Direction graduates have developed the concept of a virtual hotel to showcase their work, which aims to explore, challenge, dismantle and transform.

Located across a series of digital spaces curated as different ‘rooms’, over 40 students have developed projects exploring themes from culture and history (in the library collections) to connecting with the spiritual (at the rooftop gardens). The MAD Hotel welcomes audiences to consider wider contextual threads of the present moment and of the future while learning more about the visual narration, conceptual research and creative collaboration underpinning the practice.

An Antidote / Ecospirituality - Alisha Prasad

Alisha Prasad is a multidisciplinary designer and art director from Bengal, India. Her practice gravitates towards the experimental and poetic while exploring themes of sustainability and social issues, and she is also influenced by her BA degree in Fashion Communication.

An Antidote / Ecospirituality is comprised of 4 lyrical films, each of which contribute to discussions on how the Western World has inherited paradigms of separation from nature. Each film combines staged scenes through the lens of dance movement and ritual to explore the search for meaning and personal connection to nature in modern society.

Connecting Influence - Claire Latham

Claire Latham is a London-based designer who has international experience working as a fashion designer. Her work explores themes around dress within contemporary society, and she is passionate about designing, experimenting with different mediums, developing new skills and exploring ways of creatively communicating ideas.

Connecting Influence focuses on the influence of Instagram on clothing decisions in contemporary Western society. This project contemplates how influencers and virtual communities contribute to today's clothing decisions through 4 photography series which explore themes of connection, community and influence: connection through garment design; community through the outcome of the series; and influence through storytelling.

Period. - Laura Kueng

Laura Kueng is an art director and storyteller with a background in product design. Her work challenges the status quo, using an inherent curiosity and quest for knowledge in ways that benefit others.

While periods play a significant role as an indicator of health and wellbeing, they are often surrounded by misinformation and a sense of wider social taboo. Laura's project explores the period through various perspectives to encourage conversation, empowering audiences to understand and overcome period stigma while creating an environment where people can talk opening, confidently and comfortably about their bodies.

Modern Muses - Raya Van Der Kroon

Raya Van Der Kroon is an art director and concept developer from Amsterdam who has a particular focus on narrative fashion photography and performance art. Her work as a visual storyteller varies from photography and film to choreography and creative writing, and can be described as ethereal, speculative, metaphorical and full of colour. Her projects are strongly research driven, exploring her fascination for modern femininity, fashion and identity.

Modern Muses is a conceptual fashion editorial which reinterprets ancient mythological women into contemporary icons of female empowerment. It approaches Jungian archetypes through the female gaze by introducing 4 'core values' of female identity for 2021: the Queen, Diva, Lover and Carer.

bodyscapes - Emanuela Passadore

Emanuela Passadore is an architect and art director from Genova, Italy. Working with multidisciplinary approaches which merge a range of creative and research fields, her Final Major Project explores the potential of media including photography, film and movement.

Bodyscapes investigates the relationship between the body and architecture through improvised dance and fashion. This work considers the concept of fabric as a dialogue between concrete and skin, and acts as an ode to movement and the power of fashion as a tool for self-expression.

One-size-fits-men - Stine Arnulf

Stine Arnulf is a graphic designer who has a background in journalism, editorial design and branding, and is particularly interested in creating meaningful concepts which address social and mental health issues. Throughout her time on MA Design for Art Direction, Stine has explored the potential of 3D design and video editing to expand her skill set.

One-size-fits-men interrogates the social structures and biases that may shape technological design, and reflects on the resulting impact on women and marginalised groups. This project uses critical thinking and speculative design to build a dystopian tale of a future in which women are excluded from the design processes of developing technologies, and considers the role of technology itself in upholding structures of oppression.

Quesada's Broken Box - Juan Serrato-Gomez

Juan Serrato-Gomez has professional experience in a range of design fields including advertising, branding and UX/UI.

Quesada's Broken Box depicts the diverse history of his home country, Colombia, creating 'a vision of a foreign land' through the use of baroque photography. Tackling themes of memory and perception, Juan's project aims to encourage audiences to explore the beauty of Colombia's rich origins through the depiction of key moments and figures from the national consciousness.

Oyster Boys - Lucie Zoe Lazarus

Lucie Zoe Lazarus is an art director who focuses on developing conceptually-driven projects which critique or highlight trends in contemporary society. She is particularly interested in the themes of identity and transformation, and focuses on the areas of art direction for photography and editorial design in brand environments.

Oyster Boys is a photobook which dismantles the dynamics of hegemonic, white British masculinity by inverting the dominance of the male gaze, showcasing contemporary images of male sensitivity and fragility from a feminist perspective. It focuses on intimate and vulnerable aspects of the men featured, highlighting a range of personal experiences, informal conversations and insights into masculine identity.

Three, Walkings of Violence - Jun Qi Xie

Jun Qi Xie works under the name of Future, and uses art to 'destroy the concept of normal thinking'.

Three, Walkings of Violence considers why people use violence to express their emotions, to face their loved ones and to face themselves. Drawing on the vocabulary of creatives including Japanese director Kitano Takeshi, this project aims to ask why and how artists consider the concept of violence to create new conversations and aesthetic forms.

Related links:

• Explore more work from MA Design for Art Direction on our Postgraduate Showcase.
• Learn more about studying MA Design for Art Direction at LCC.
• Find out more about our Design School.