ORGANIZERS

This conference is spearheaded by Dr. Kok Cheow Yeoh, area coordinator of Graphic Design at IU Southeast with three other collaborators. Dr. Purba Joshi and Prof. Mandar Rane from IDC School of Design, IIT Bombay, India, and Prof. Sheeraz Wania, Adjunct Professor, George Brown College, Toronto, University of Toronto, Mississauga, Canada.

The School of Arts and Letters offers 10-degree programs in fields that include communication studies, modern languages, English, philosophy, fine arts, music, theatre, and interdisciplinary studies. To learn more, visit us at ius.edu/arts-and-letters.

IDC School of Design, IIT Bombay was established in 1969 offering academic programs in the areas of Industrial Design, Communication Design, Interaction Design, Animation, and Mobility & Vehicle Design. To learn more, visit us at  www.idc.iitb.ac.in

With over two decades of teaching under his belt, Associate Professor Kok Cheow Yeoh is head of graphic design at Indiana University Southeast in New Albany, Indiana. Dr. Yeoh taught in California, Arkansas, Texas, and Georgia before joining Nanyang Technological University in 2004 as a founding faculty member of Visual Communication at the School of Art, Design, and Media. He has actively participated in several international exhibitions in Brazil, China, Turkey, Italy, and Russia and has presented in Brazil, Colombia, Cyprus, India, Portugal, Taiwan, and the UK. His research about visual studies is published in journals and proceedings such as the International Journal of Design in Society, The International Journal of the Arts in Society, and the Journal of Public Relations and Advertising. He sees travel as a form of active and deep learning, especially the latter in which it is about understanding, not just memorizing.

Dr. Purba Joshi is the faculty of Industrial Design at IDC School of Design, IIT Bombay, India, with over 16 years of industrial design and packaging design experience. Her research is related to CAD’s role in the design process and its effect on creativity. From the design of complex medical equipment for breast cancer patients to anticipating the unmet need of water carrying devices for rural women in undulating terrains, her focus and concern are to realize design as a catalyst to bring visible change in the lives of the people of India. Her effort and guidance were recognized through her student being felicitated with the ‘Gandhian Young Technology Innovation Award’ from the President of India for the design of a low-cost vein tracker. She is currently working on various projects in the area of design for special needs, health, and well-being. She has been teaching Product Design, studies in form, design detailing, understanding materials and processes, product interface design, and packaging design since 2009.

Sheeraz Wania is an international, independent designer and design educator with over 20 years of experience. Her key focus for most of her professional life has been on brand design and editorial design projects incorporating design thinking into her professional practice. Her work ranges from artists retrospectives to publications for corporations and cultural institutions, like the Mingeikan Museum, Japan to the Export Promotion Bureau, Pakistan, among others. With a Masters degree in Educational Leadership & Management with an emphasis on Art and Design Education from the University of London UK, Sheeraz’s research interests lie in the arena of design pedagogy relating to design thinking and the Universal Design for Learning [UDL] principles, and in practice with reference to the impact of culture and context with its implications to social change.

Mandar Rane was born in Mumbai, INDIA, and received his Bachelors in Applied Art (B.F.A.) from J.J. Institute of Applied Arts, Bombay in 1997 with a specialization in illustration. For the past two decades, he is teaching communication design. Currently, he is the professor of Communication Design at IDC School of Design, IIT Bombay. He has been actively involved in teaching courses in basic design, semantics and communication theory, publication design, packaging design, and information design. Visit his personal website to know more about him.