DESIGN TODAY
BY JOAQUIN ECHEVERRY BRAVER
2026
1 - How am I supposed to make a thesis on graphic design if the process of making one made me reject the practice
2 - How am I supposed to make a thesis on graphic design if my values go against the practice's inherently capitalist nature?
Well, I'm a graphic designer, a probelm solver... no? So it is in this chain of thought that I solve that for myself.
However. Before that. Here, my thesis statement:
THESIS STATEMENT
Design not only has the power to sell, yet to represent and push culture, it is a tool for research, activism, visibility. Design is all about its assignment, so we as designers should choose carefully, as we are knowledgeable for how to manipulate it, it is our responsibility.
Design is forever bound to reality
1.
WHAT IS GRAPHIC DESIGN
Graphic Design is the practice to represent others visually.
"Design—the art, science or business of representing others visually—serves the dreams of the commissioner. And when there are no dreams, practical goals will do. Can design itself, however, dream? In the human mind and body, dreams play an essential role in 'post-producing' our lived experiences. Thus, can design, devoted as it is to life still be healthy and self-repairing when it cant *dream?*
Uncorporate Identity, Metahaven, p.76
Now, what if I want to represent myself through graphic design? Then in the process of representing yourself you'll find graphic design is not the best practice to choose. Think of the graphic designer as a translator, why would you as one choose to translate yourself rather than speaking your own language.
I have discussed the idea of g.d. being empty when there is no comissioner with piers and I always get the most disheartening looks. I believe desing can definetely be greater than its commissioner, yet this is a time where the practice is misunderstood, and its power is incredibely manipulated and misused.
2. WHY IS GRAPHIC DESIGN BEING MISUSED
The problem with graphic design is that it is the most profitable form of visual communication, or at least the column of what gives capital an identity. It has always been that, it is not a new asset of contemporary graphic design, the problem is that nowadays, the people that graphic design has served the most throughout history, are threatening to erase culture and media for the general population, and in some actually-not-so-extreme cases, are guiding us to the end of the world.
This is big corporate. Capitalism. Tech. Graphic Desin is capitalism greatest servant. The graphic designer is hired to make something SELL
Yeah branding is fun but watch who you're branding. My petition for this generation of graphic designers is to drift the focus from monetary profit to cultural profit.
We know you're excited that the studio you're interning for in New York is branding the next revolutionary CoPilot for you to ✨take your brand to the next level✨ but its probably gonna look like another iteration of an asshole.
What I mean is that we're headed towards a cultural deficit. And it is now the time to realize that the designer has the power to push culture and represent it in the post-digital age, instead of using it to profit and consumerism while being the puppets of old white billionaires and tech bros, that are planning to discard you anyways.
"...It is only through this lens that we can see AI art for what it is—an enticing but empty spectacle that holds up a digital mirage that mirrors our culture's surrender to profit over meaning."
Eric Carter, "Design Harder", Act V, The Doom.
Don't get me wrong, graphic design is not dead and doomed for good, yet it is imperative to understand that we are well headed that way. This is not the only graphic design that exists, on block 4 I pan out what I envision as the political spectrum of current graphic design and the different parties that are fighting for power.
The last issue I care to pronounce and lay upon the young generations to act upon is 'caring for graphic design'. I mean in from a technical standpoint. You need to be obsessed with typography, obssessed with being the absolute best at communicating something, you need to want to be a design theory god and understand visual communication thoroughly. Change won't happen with bad design. I see a lot of young designers who care more about who they're working for or will be than about actual design and how to be better at it. Why spend on an education in graphic design if you're not listening, and in 4 years of it you can't tell the difference between Arial and Helvetica.
3. MY EXPECTATIONS ON GRAPHIC DESIGN AS A TEENAGER WHO JUST DOWNLOADED PHOTOSHOP
I was 17 years old when I first downloaded photoshop, a little later than I now wish I did, but I was a stubborn pen and pencil traditional illustrator until then. I pirated the software to try out my new Wacom and give digital illustration a try, absolutely hated it.
But now I had photoshop, I had the internet, and I had beautiful references from internet communities I was a part of. I was an internet nativist, and my first ever digital art proves that. I got into digital collaging, with found images and collaborating with phtogographer friends.
This was my firts encounter with typography, layout, RGB, etc. I had no instruction on graphic design and didn't care to seek it, because I still considered myself an illustrator who was trying out something new.
That's how my portfolio looked when I applied to the communication design program at Parsons School of Design. Oversaturated, chaotic, internet inspired digital art that were brought to life through sheer intuition and messy layering. I don't think I'd be able to replicate these pieces now that I know how to use photoshop.
I grew curious on Graphic Design when I applied to college, and even more once I started taking graphic design courses. Here's is were I thought I understood the purpose, and got filled with excitement on the endless possibilities the practice offered. 'Graphic design is everywhere', I thought. I realized the immense power graphic design had, everywhere you looked, inside or outside, digital or physical, something was graphic designed.
However, I was too naive, and I wasn't thinking about the politics of style, I was not thinking about the purpose of the designer and how it can affect society, I wasn't thinking about capitalism and how every sign on the street that had me thinking 'its everywhere' was trying to sell something. I just thought that if I got good enough at this, I could influence the masses. I was lured by the irrational desire of being able to design everything around me.
Spare me some fantasy, I was not trying to rule the world by being a graphic designer. But I misunderstood the fact that design guides and manipulates, and thought it was just cool and exciting rather than dangerous and profitable. I was not thinking about money.
My expectations and potential were high but my theory, philosophy and understanding were not, as well as my skills.
4. STYLE IS POLITICAL: THE INSTITUTIONS RESPONSIBILITY
I think It is very important to understand form, style and beauty as primary conductors of politics and ideology in art and design. This is one of the key factors I did not have in mind when I first started designing, or consuming design. I was not instructed in aesthetic theory, and realized too late how important it would've been for me to be during my formative years as a designer.
Most design institutions (at least for undergraduates) do not expect the students to apply art philosophy or aesthetic theory into their work or research, which I believe leads to careless and insensitive design at a time of crisis. We need to push the young generations to design with purpose headed into an ocean of meaningless, unoriginal, slop imagery. AI image generation is made out of human work, so it'll never produce something original. Students are designing a certain way because it's cool. Period. Visual strength and the power to address an audience are important, but it is now the institution's responsibility to encourage students to back their designs with research and meaning. And to understand that every decision they make, and every style they decide to dip their toes in is a statement of its own.
As per Immanuel Kant's judgement of beauty states that subjective aesthetic observation is the predecessor of all judgement when looking at an object, and that aesthetic judgement generates the first reaction in the observer which is that of pleasure. If AI reaches a point where it can generate this reaction from an observer seamlessly on every attempt to generate something, the human being as a species guided by pleasure and desire, will be, per say, cooked. Now stitching together my last point on raising good designers with this one, that is the reason new design can't be careless, it has to be visually outstanding, culturally literate and original. That is the vanguard. Yet its visual components shall be intentionally traced from the two other factors mentioned. Again, especially if AI succeeds to generate this pleasure, which is already doing with certain audiences that can't distinguish it.
Another important piece of aesthetic theory to be applied when designing against something is Theodor Adorno's. His analysis of the culture industry and how companies are trying to mass produce culture is nothing more than an exact, less tragic, analysis of what's happening right now. Cultural role models that are brands and pop culture nowadays are merging with the corporations that are headliners of the commodification of culture festival. The main problem is the suppression of critical thought by the commodification of art and culture. Adorno argues that art is the only thing that can resist its own commodification, and how it should be rather complex and disruptive to contradict the homogeneity capitalism is seeking.
Style is not only a personal preference, but a reflection of social, historical and political forces.
If graphics and images are reproducible, and will be reproduced more accurately day by day, design needs something that can't be reproduced to fight against this, and that's the meaning, concept, culture and research embedded into every decision.
5. GRAPHIC DESIGN NATION
It would be a task worth years of my time to divide and detail the entire spectrum of politics within styles in graphic design, so i've reduced this division to 8 different parties (tribes, styles, ideologies) from what I have mainly been in touch with the last fours years of my life as a graphic design student, and what I believe most of my piers have as well. I believed the division in parties and the thought of graphic design as a nation facilitates my ideation when it comes to the power dynamics between them, and to represent ideas of per say revolution, (cultural) colonialism, capital and individuals.
1. Corporate Modernism:
This is the antagonist I have been talking about all along. But in this section I am concerned about the designers that speak this language, not the corporate overlords. These designers support market expansion, design for profit, commodify culture and design. They work within the tech world and collaborate with Startups. OpenAI, Adobe, Figma, meta, Anthropic, X, subscription based models etc. Their language is digital, they concern themselves with UX growth metrics and algorithms. Efficacy, optimization and market value OVER concept, form, culture, theory, aesthetics. DESIGN IS A PROBLEM SOLVER FOR BUSINESS.
A lot of individuals in this party cosplay as designers when they are tasteless tech bros that have massive pull on social media and push the AI agenda. They use buzz words like taste, vibe coding, and tool.
Their design language is boring, efficient, soulless, repetitive, modern and experience driven. It is one big brand. Unfortunately, a lot of great design studios that are very well respected and would form part of the second party have allied with the Corporate to design their brand. Here fit Studio Dumbar (Open AI), Mouthwash Studio (Brand AI), Porto Rocha (Gemini).
2. Avant-Garde Consumerism
Here fit the studios that design cultural consumerism. They are cultural advocates, they work mainly in the entertainment industry, and they very well understand the designers role as a sales associate. They turn culture into trends, make it cool, produce, art direct it, design it. Yeah, they know design shape culture, yet they still want to sell it, they are cool corporate. They take the time to experiment within structured brand systems with code, motion graphics and physical processes. They shift design trends, have big followings, and work with your favourite artists and brands.
This is where most young designers seek for opportunities after graduating or during their studies. You'll hear a lot of "have you seen ____ new campaign for nike?" Speaking of, I find it comical that all of the studios that fit in this category have done work with or for Nike. The Nike Craze. And a lot of it looks extremely similar. I think it is some type of co-sign from one of the biggest culture shifter brands in the world, Nike, and seeing its name on a studios website, no matter how groundbreaking the project, is exciting. Nike tries to be cool through graphic design, through book fairs, interactive experiences and new apps nobody will use with sick release videos that shatter many students' hearts when they realize they wont make a living if they dont learn after effects, so they join a Motion Graphics class taught by some cracked RISD graduate and delete the software after turning in their final because every time they open it it consumes 50GB of their application memory, only to download it again when they see special offer is hiring and motion graphics is a must.
Sorry
SSS*, Eric Hu Studio, Porto Rocha, Sometimes Always, Special Offer, Zak Group, etc. Some studios like Studio Dumbar and Mouthwash, which I have put in the 1st party, could also belong here, yet due to their recent tendency to brand AI I decided not to. And bigger studios like Pentagram are kind of on a league of their own, not because they are good, but because In pentagram's case they have achieved a greater level of corporate branding and not really advocate for culture anymore, if they once did.
So they merge with corporate modernism, they move immense amounts of capital, yet, there's taste, per say.
3. Cultural Industrial Freelancing
Not really a collective, or big party, yet worth mentioning, since these people are exciting designers, theorists and artists. A lot of the designers that fit this party, which is the most politically ambiguous, put various hats on, and you'll see them walking in and out from party 1, to 2, to 4, 5 and 6. Since they mainly work freelancing, and are well respected in the industry, these designers do it for the love of the game, and there's exciting graphic design in all of these groups.
These people work mainly with the entertainment industry, music, fashion, other creatives, film, art, parties. You'll see a lot of countercultural, ground breaking, beautiful work coming from them. They are way ahead of trends, and often have operated in the shadows in big trends before they exploded, without getting much acknowledgement, ifykyk. They are culturally and theoretically informed, they mainly condemn capitalism and party N1, yet still operate within the market. You will see them working both with underground artists, and branding the biggest film production of the year.
Yet as instructed as they are in graphic design, their work is not often brought forward in GD education because it doesn't necessarily show conventional use of foundational principles that are taught, and will be often extremely ornamented, which we know the east coast graphic design academy does not condone.
These designers care about graphic design, and some of them give me hope.
4. Academic Formalism
This style derives from swiss lineage that the east coast of the United States embraced decades ago. The academic formalist is either a RISD Graphic Design MA graduate or Yale Graphic Design MA graduate, from the 2000's on. These designers will experiment only within a deep understanding of the rules and standards that this school of design has. They will find the simplest and most clever way to bend the rules without breaking them, and don't you dare ornament or use color before you learn type hierarchy in one of their classes, because you will be sent to the gd jail.
They are anti-ornamentalists, UNLESS EXTREMELY NEEDED. As mentioned, mainly all are professors in the east coast at schools like Parsons, RISD, Yale, SVA, Pratt, etc, and were also formed in one of these institutions. They are shaping the next generations of American educated designers, most of them in their 30's. They suffer from two complexes: cultural elitism and formal narcissism.
Cultural Elitism: they advocate for culture yet only within the institutional setting and a niche group of designers, students, and art oriented audiences that will consume their culturally rich work. They are the elite of design, they design the syllabus… they design cool, tidy, painfully perfect typeset books that you buy from draw dawn books… you'll intern for one of them and when you add an underline to that section divider ON PRINT, you will meet SATAN.
Formal Narcissism: the graphic design they love is special. It's pure, fundamentalism, what they learnt in these institutions they will ride or die with those rules, that's their bible. These people are design FREAKS, they know, oh they know, they know and love graphic design and its principles too much, that It becomes their biggest enemy. This is tied with cultural elitism, a lot of these people won't get jobs at culturally groundbreaking studios or agencies because they can't let go of this design. And as clever and bright as it is, often times is not fun and only they can geek about it, so it does not fit the industry. So then I've seen three different routes:
1 Open your own studio, under your name or with a pier, become a professor, and make work for these schools, art institutions, photographers, etc
2 Turn to the corporate world, make use of your knowledge in type and layout to design neat campaigns for huge brands like Apple and make a lot of money. Even if it's not the design you love, you can become a professor too and try to get the kids obsessed with it.
3 You realized if you don't design that way you can't design. Drop all hopes of a job within the industry because you don't fit in and are too cool and become an Uber Driver while writing your book "The Graphic Design Spectrum" that will sell out on draw dawn books and maybe printed matter. Oh and also become a professor.
5. Digital pluralism
This party is not necessarily formed by all graphic designers, yet more so, self-proclaimed, visual artists. It's massive, and another name I'd give it is internet Nativists. These are young adults that grew up on the internet and make internet art. No rules, following old trends, recycling them, internet nostalgia, exaggerated, extremely decorative and layered. These people have personality and so does their work, yet they operate within niches, small communities, scenes, ephemerous trends, the internet. They are anarchists of design theory yet are not instructed in it. Some times some of these people will ascend on to being Cultural Industrial freelancers, yet they will never fall out of love with the internet.
This party is politically empty, not only because of being the most populated one, but because even if they want to skin Sam Altman or Elon Musk, they only exist thanks to them. They are currently enabled by big tech and algorithms.
6. Intellectual Vanguard
The Intellectual Vanguard is the most politically strong party, and a strong contender to take power if capitalism fails, of course, if merged with other parties. Studios here are not only design studios yet research studios, art organizations, activists. Designers here are not only graphic designers, but also design theorists, philosophers. All projects will be heavily researched and purposeful, you will see a lot of work on geopolitics, ownership, war, anti-capitalism, information, etc. They have a curated set of clients and will take on projects not for capital.
These people operate mainly in Europe with organizations, art institutions, embassies, museums, universities. Some of their writing is considered by mature designers to be biblical. You need to listen to what these people have to say, even if you're not entirely compelled with their visual treatments or even ideas.
They are not in the mainstream of design because they care and don't seek exposure and interaction. They are out of the loop, while still profiting from their work.
Metahaven, Forensic Architecture, Dunne & Rabby, Studio Harris Blondman, etc.
7. Coop Activism
Cooperative Activist Design is technically the only party that is strictly graphic design which operates %100 outside of capitalism. These are the people that Ruben Pater indicates are the key to escape the hold of capitalism as graphic designers in his renowned book "CAPS LOCK". All their work is cooperative, they work in activism, social justice, they represent marginalized communities, educational institutions, small businesses, non profits. They are outside of the market, they don't design to sell, they design to give identity. Their mission is great.
The problem? They are all terrible designers. The design of these projects is childish, unorganized, and completely lacks graphic design theory. It fails to get messages across, no type hierarchy, bad color selections, childish ALMOST corporate illustrations, complex and off putting logos, on and on. So in all honesty, we can't have them headlining the revolution.
8. Free For All
The last party is small, and old. Mainly not composed by graphic designers, rather technologists, writers, publishers, internet nativists, archivists. FFF advocates for piracy, freedom of ownership, open source code, open source publishing, open source tools and typography. For them authorship is collective and iterative. Always fighting against big corporations and monopolies, they undermine proprietary control.
Strongest political message, working a lot in anonymity, dysfunctional and mechanic inspired design. Their work usually lives digitally, and is default, not designed, or designed for old interfaces. A great ally for a revolutionary party, these people are smart.
6. RESPONDING TO ANGER: DYSFUNCTIONAL DESIGN
I was instructed in graphic design by Academic Formalists, I fell in love with it through their references, teaching, exercises. My first typography professor, Geoffrey Han, locked me in so tight with type hierarchy, black and white and anti-ornamentalism that I wasn't able to use color in my work for a long time. But I was advocating for the same type of design that he taught me, and I'm grateful that I was raised by someone so true to their design philosophy that it feels they are imposing it on every single word of feedback.
Because I learnt the rules. How could I forget them after that? I was surprised with how my work shifted from being an internet nativist, part of digital pluralism, to the complete opposite. If Geoffrey had seen my work a year prior to his class, he probably would've asked why I picked graphic design and that I was not suited for it. But these two extremes are the base of the design I love now. My decisions as a designer are the result of this formation + my personal interests and experiences and what culture and the world is asking for.
For this project I wanted to respond to the anger that the commodification of design was stirring up inside me. Yet I wasn't angry enough when I began. My first response, inspired by graphic notation (experimental sheet music), was to create what I called abstract systems. In other words, dysfunctional design. Systems, languages, compositions, that are abstract yet every decision is arbitrary and, inherently, designed. I was searching for beauty, I was the only one that had to understand it. This was my statement:
"Both from peers and from the industry, as designers, we are taught the imperative functionality design should have, that separates it from art. Design is labeled as an objective practice which serves the purpose of communication, from sender to receiver. However, design can be taken on as a subjective, arbitrary practice, designing within abstraction, de-functionalizing design."
However, I wasn't necessarily thinking about what it implied, graphic design being a commodity, I wasn't as angry as I needed to be with capitalism to produce a project that was actually facing it. I was bored from formalism and traditional graphic design.
7. IS IT POSSIBLE TO REVOLT
To answer this question it is important to understand what we are revolting against. Given the outline of this essay, on my end it is pretty clear what that would be. Yet I don't think the revolution has to be so specifically centered around one specific group of people, since the issue lies on most of earth's population, capitalism. Revolution is always possible, and following history, it will eventually happen. So the reason I'm asking if it is possible to revolt is because we are talking about graphic design. A revolution against capitalism in graphic design. Or more than a revolution, for now, how do we resist? How do we resist the evergoing commodification of design, the loss of physical media, the degradation of images, the replacement of designers and artists.
David Rudnick in his MIT Media Lab lecture from three years ago talks about an extremely possible near future where companies start to only produce synthetic art, with the goal to create a solipsist world of consumerism. Where, since the consumer does not care about who or how the product is made, it'll consume fake content, the company won't have to pay artists or designers, so they can just keep making shit and people will keep paying bigger and bigger subscription fees to consume it. Solipsism in this case implies that the consumer is content with this product being all that exists since it generates the same pleasure in them as human made music would, so why find new artists, for example in music, when a robot can make new songs for you tailored specifically for you?
I believe that if we do get to a point where this happens and the biggest part of the population falls into such matrix, for image making, designers will cease to exist in the corporate world and in the market, creating what would probably be addressed by big corp as an underworld where now artists and designers coexists. It will become a niche, harder to find, because it would disappear from day to day life and modern consumerism. This more than a revolution is a submission.
Another possibility that I imagine is that the ocean of slop becomes so oversaturated that it will become a forgotten network because it would get to a point where AI is just taking references from itself, and it would gradually compress into nothingness. Then a gate for the resurgence of human made imagery would open, bringing up its value. The problem is that the people stuck in the ocean of slop will be eternally brainwashed to not escape that cycle of consumerism.
So how can we as graphic designers actually resist, we don't have the money, we don't have the power, and we are indeed all struggling, submitting to the capitalist regime, to make a living. How can we who have the will to go against it, yet continue to contribute to it do something about this.
It takes certain actions that all of us as designers can take on to resist the unescapable truth. A full on revolution with how fluctuating everything is at the moment is not possible, yet it is possible to start a movement of resistance, to force ourselves to comprehend design as the tool for change it is and slowly build up a network of people that can stand tall against this.
8. MANIFESTING
Don't always rely on mainstream softwares or production models to design, the less subscription based memberships you are enrolled on, the better.
If you can pirate photoshop, pirate it.
To design should be free. Not a privilege, since to design is to represent, and everyone deserves both to be represented and to have the power to represent others.
Before designing, understand the context of which your work will exist in. Understand where you stand socially and culturally before designing, and where your work will be.
Graphic Design is semiotics, it influences society
Make quality work
Design slow
Design with purpose
Sympathize with your audience and with society
Understand that your work carries an ideology, then either embrace it or change it
Don't design for likes
Learn the rules
Question them
Write your own, but cite the old
Collaborate
Read about design
Write about design
Question why you design
Answer that question
Rethink if you should keep designing
Or if you're designing consciously
Graphic design is good when you see it everywhere
Don't gatekeep good graphic design, show it to your friends
If someone reposts your essay about how to fight against commodified design, repost it again.
COLOPHON
Designed and written by Joaquin Echeverry Braver
Typeface: Times Bold
Words: 4856
Website: Designed and developed by Joaquin Echeverry Braver
Scroll: Designed and printed by Joaquin Echeverry braver at 2 W 13th Street, New York
