MIKON VAN GASTEL - NEW YORK

Mikon van Gastel is the New York-based Creative Director and co-founder of AVSO (A Very Small
Office). Van Gastel’s explorations in layering and interconnecting storytelling elements into architecture, film, and motion have most recently resulted in the design of the electronic signage for the new Museum of Modern Art in New York, seamlessly merging art, architecture and information. He has collaborated with architects CoopHimmelb(l)au on the experience design for BMW‘s Event & Delivery Center in Germany, and with United Architects, as one of six finalists for the redevelopment of the former World Trade Center site. Van Gastel’s additional credits include: the design of non-linear content for the facade of a skyscraper in Times Square and the design of IBM’s Centers for e-business Innovation. As a director/creative director Van Gastel has worked extensively in both the film and advertising business designing title sequences for feature films, theatrical trailers and directing commercial campaigns for such brands as Nike, IBM, Reebok, Olympus and Smirnoff.

FIONA RABY - LONDON

Fiona Raby is one of the partners of the design studio Dunne & Raby and leads studios in the Design Product and Architecture & Interiors departments of the Royal College of Art London. Together with industrial designer Anthony Dunne, she is the head of the Critical Design Unit in the Computer Related Design Research Studio. Dunne & Raby use products and services as a medium to stimulate discussion and debate amongst designers, industry and the public about the social, cultural and ethical implications of emerging technologies.

TEAL TRIGGS - LONDON

Teal Triggs is Professor of Graphic Design and Head of Research, School of Graphic Design, London College of Communication, University of the Arts London. As a graphic design historian, critic and educator her writings have appeared in numerous international design publications including Émigré, Eye, Visible Language, Blueprint, Grafik, ZED, and Journal of Design History. She is co-editor of the academic interdisciplinary journal "Visual Communication" and has recently edited a special issue of the publication titled "The New Typography". She is author of "The Typographic Experiment: Radical Innovations in Contemporary Type Design"; co-editor with Roger Sabin of "‘Below Critical Radar’: Fanzines and Alternative Comics From 1976 to Now"; and editor of "Communicating Design: Essays in Visual Communication". She is currently working on a book about fanzines (Thames & Hudson) based upon her PhD thesis undertaken in the Department of Typography & Graphic Communication at the University of Reading. She is also conducting research on "Screens and the Social Landscape" with Dr. Carey Jewitt and Prof. Gunther Kress which has been funded by the British Arts and Humanities Research Council. Teal is also co-founder of the Women’s Design + Research Unit (WD+RU), an organisation which seeks to raise awareness about women working in visual communication and related areas. WD+RU has recently received a Royal Female School of Art Foundation grant to fund a research project exploring the cultural identity and role of women in craft and design history in the Elephant & Castle community.

BORIS MÜLLER

Boris Miller has a Diploma in Graphic Design from the Hochschule für Künste Bremen (College of Art and Design Bremen, Germany) and a MA in Computer Related Design from the Royal College of Art London. He has worked for a number of international clients and companies like MetaDesign San Francisco, the Science Museum London or the Fraunhofer Institute for Media Communication in Bonn. After being a visiting Professor at the Interaction Design Institute Vireo, he became a Professor for Interaction Design at the newly founded Interface Design course at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam. His design work has received several awards like the Excellence Award from the Media Arts Festival in Tokyo, a Certificate of Typographic Excellence from the Type Directors Club New York or the first prize in the student’s category of the EuroPrix Multimedia.

LAURIE HAYCOCK MAKELA - STOCKHOLM

Laurie Haycock Makela is well-known for her interdisciplinary experimentalism and her works in typography. From 1997 on she was together with her husband Scot t Makela the head of the 2D department at Cranbrook Academy of Art, Detroit and their studio, Words and Pictures for Business and Culture. Since moving to Stockholm, Laurie Haycock Makela is famed as designer of installations, exhibitions, gardensand “experience design“ in an art context. She is currently guest professor at the HfG Karlsruhe and K TH in Stockholm.

FLORIAN PFEFFER - AMSTERDAM

Florian Pfeffer is a founder of the design studio Cjung und pfeffer“ with offices in Amsterdam and Bremen. He teaches design at universities in Germany (Karlsruhe) and in the USA. Together with Friederike Lambers he is the editor of the yearbook :output in which he publishes works of design students from all over the world. :output fosters young talents and contributes to the dialogue between cultures.

PETER SLOTERDIJK - KARLSRUHE

Peter Sloterdijk is currently the director of the HfG Karlsruhe. To move from his book “critique of cynical reason“ to “Rules for the human park“ Peter Sloterdijk knows how to heat and baffle the interested philosophic mind. His controversial speech about the “Human Park“ was held at the international symposium “Exodus from Being – Philosophy after Heidegger “.
“This kind of philosophy is an event!“ said Raymond Felling in his laudatory for Peter Sloterdijk.

TANIA PRILL - ZÜRICH

Together with Alberto Vieceli Tania Prill runs the “Prill & Vieceli“ design studio located in Zurich. Their main focus lies on typography and book design. Their newest book project is a 2300 page publication callled “100 Peace-Women Across the Globe“. Tania Prill currently teaches at the universities of Luzon, Bern and Zurich and since 2004 she‘s a guest professor at the HfG Karlsruhe.

SVEN VOELKER - BERLIN

Sven Voelker is one of the founder of the Profile Intermedia conference in Bremen. He defined his
graphic style at PLE X in Berlin and is well known for his work for Volkswagen Autostadt and the new corporate identity of Suzuki. Nowadays he runs a design studio in Berlin and practices the consequent crossing of interdisciplinary borders what he already documented in his book “Beyond the Borders“. Today he‘s a professor and the head of the graphic design department at the HfG Karlsruhe and is questions himself: “What‘s next in graphic design?

LAURENT LACOUR - FRANKFURT A M

Laurent Lacour an associate of the design studio ade hauser lacour, based in Frankfurt am Main. Ade hauser lacour carries out extensive award winning corporate design projects. Working between the borders of art, science and design. He also teaches visual communication as design research in the universities of Zurich and Basel. He was a member of the Fraunhofer Institute in Darmstadt in the department of visual mathematics.

ALOIS MUELLER - BASEL

Professor Alois Müller is the director of the Hochschule für Gestaltung und Kunst in Basel. After his studies of philosophy, art and architectural history, as well as anthropological psychology he became a curator for exhibitons such as "Swiss design of the 30s" and "The Disposedness to the Gesamtkunstwerk". Subsequently he became a conservator for exhibitions like "Switzerland and design: The 80s", "New Realities I and II (New Media)," "Film Stills," and "Radix – Madix, Architecture of Daniel Libeskind." Until 1994 he was the head of the the lecture sequence "Intervention" and together with Jörg Huber he published a yearbook of the same name. Currently, he is teaching at various art schools design theory, art theory, literature, aesthetics and cultural philosophy. He is a writer and an arts editor for the Zurich "Tages Anzeiger."