Vancouver, British Columbia

I feel very honored to have been invited to give the keynote talk at the 2012 GDC/BC Salazar Student Awards, the annual juried competition and awards-presentation event held to celebrate BC’c most talented and promising design students and their inspirational work. The event takes place at UBC Robson Square on the evening of Friday, 11 May 2012.

The awards competition is open to all students who are enrolled in BC academically recognized certificate, diploma, or degree graphic design and advertising programs, with work in the categories of Print Design, Interactive, Brand Identity, and Video and Motion. Entry deadline for submissions is 12:00 pm on 30 April 2012. More information can be found at the event website here.

My talk entitled ‘Aim Higher’ builds on presentations I gave in Norway, Taiwan, and Spain last fall—the abstract reads as follows:

Our globalized society is morphing rapidly from an information era into an age of ideas—at the same time, we flounder in the uncertainty of tumultuous political, social, economic, and ecological instability—even as our fragile planet accelerates towards the edge of survival.

Designers have greatly influenced the shaping of the over-consuming, hyper-stimulated, non-sustainable world we are in—suddenly we find ourselves thrust into a leading role as necessary change-drivers. This presentation will address a shift in design’s role and the power it holds, share diverse perspectives from around the globe, and offer a challenge to “think about our thinking.”