Master in Graphic Design

In the master’s degree you’ll work in pairs, and each team will define its own brief. You’ll develop a comprehensive graphic project to find versatility in the face of different needs, environments, processes and languages.

1.1 Research and Context
Develop critical awareness as citizens and designers. Reflect on the current economic and social model to understand where design comes from and where it can go, focusing on the role it should play. In addition to providing this theoretical background, you will learn how to create a research plan to help you tackle your Master’s Final Project.

1.2 Strategy and Verbal Identity
A good designer is, above all, a good thinker. Strategy is an essential tool for defining and narrowing down the objectives and particularities of any design project, adding value to our work. Based on strategy, verbal identity allows us to shape the project with words through naming, concept, narrative, tone of voice, and the creation of all types of texts, a necessary complement to graphic identity.

1.3 Comprehensive Project
Based on the course theme and the brief defined by each working group, we will develop a holistic design project. You will create the identity and a visual language, deploying the project across various areas: editorial, digital, packaging, motion graphics, and environmental graphics. You will learn how to present the project concisely, attractively, and powerfully to share it in the best possible way.

1.4 Showcases and Case Studies
Meetings with designers who, through their experiences, allow us to identify current phenomena and gain new perspectives, reflections, and references that will expand our knowledge of graphic design practice.

1.5 Design Crit
Informal critical discussion sessions about the strengths and areas for improvement of the Master’s Final Projects with guest professionals and the programme director.

Delve into the world of typography and discover how graphic design lets you to create solid, scalable, consistent solutions that are also original. You’ll learn to enhance and strengthen visual languages through experimentation.

2.1 Typography
Typography helps us present ideas and information in an orderly and understandable way. We will explore different approaches to typography treatment in various applications, both in physical and digital media, without overlooking the more technical aspects. We will develop ways of communication with the most essential element: the letter.

2.2 Graphic Systems
Thinking about graphic design with a systemic perspective allows us to create solid, scalable, consistent, and simultaneously original solutions. We will discuss the limits and scope of graphic systems and identify their basic elements. We will explore the advantages and possibilities of a systemic approach to design problems and develop a graphic system that puts the learned concepts into practice.

2.3 Art Direction
The overwhelming amount of information we are exposed to requires an effort to differentiate and develop unique visual codes to capture the attention of a defined audience, through any type of medium. Art direction is the tool we use to build visual codes, whether aesthetic and/or conceptual, on any communicative platform that requires an image to achieve the objective of a message.

2.4 Experimentation
Graphic design, being a practice of mass production and dependent on a system that demands high efficiency and effectiveness, often loses spaces for exploration and exercise without a clear objective. Even though many of these explorations do not have a defined focus, they are extremely useful when it comes to differentiation and also to defining the identity of a designer.

2.5 Graphic Workshop
Sessions to learn some graphic techniques and discover the production possibilities at the school’s facilities.

Master the issues that are part of the day-to-day work of graphic design: forging human relationships, working in teams, looking for business opportunities, making quality presentations to clients, and billing profitable projects.

3.1 Principles of New Teamwork
Today’s industry demands that we work with clients, users, and other profiles to complete our tasks brilliantly. We must design our co-creation processes and establish frameworks that help us work more smoothly and efficiently.

3.2 Strategic Design Management
Did I receive a good brief? How do I organize my time and tasks? How much should I charge for a project? How do I prepare a budget that includes all the work I will do? This course will provide us with tools to manage a studio and/or work team while helping us understand the processes inherent to design.

3.3 Professional Projection
What type of professional am I? What do I need to become who I want to be? Do I sometimes feel like I’m constantly trying to align my projects with my values, emotions, and beliefs? We will delve into who we want to be, how to develop our skills, and what are the best ways for the world to discover our superpowers.

Enjoy five days of meetings with distinguished specialists and professionals. These workshops will help you complement and deepen different skills and disciplines in graphic design.

4.1 Design Potential
After spending the first trimester thinking about the Master’s Final Project by defining the brief, developing the strategy, and creating the verbal identity, this workshop will explore the design potential of each project.

4.2 Systemic Type Design
We are living in a (new) golden age of systemic type design. New technologies and easy-to-use programmes give us the opportunity to experiment with new ideas. The world of display fonts has witnessed many new developments: typefaces have become more flexible, variable, and kinetic than ever.

4.3 Experience
Research, experimentation, and observation are essential to nurture talent. In this regard, we propose sharing and learning for a week with a figure from the international design scene who has developed a distinctive and recognizable visual language.

4.4 Collaboration
The profession of graphic design is enriched by collaboration with other fields. We will conduct a workshop with another master’s programme at Elisava, guided by guest instructors, to explore and stimulate the interdisciplinary capabilities of the students.

4.5 Grad Show
The final workshop consists of showcasing the course experiences to the public through various formats. We will face a real and complete exhibition and editorial project, an intense process that takes place in a very short time and culminates in the Grad Show.

Our events will help you broaden your knowledge by listening to the experiences of emerging or established professionals, who will introduce you to different points of view and serve as a source of inspiration.

5.1 International Lectures
We invite prestigious international designers to give lectures to learn firsthand about experiences, projects, and case studies in different fields of graphic design.

5.2 Master’s Talks
We organize talks with prominent creators from various fields to share experiences, observe design phenomena, and gain new perspectives, reflections, and references that enrich our interdisciplinary view of design.