10 July 2008

BEIRUT: Graphic design is a booming industry across the world and the Middle East is no exception. But what exactly is graphic design? As Natalie Fallaha, a graphic-design professor at the Lebanese American University (LAU) explains, "Tagged as 'commercial art' since its inception, graphic design is neither art nor advertising. It stands on the fine line between information sending and receiving and acts upon the human need to visualize one's thoughts. A graphic designer's role lies in the visual exploration of the intellect."

Quality graphic design is also about delivering a message accurately, effectively and in a way appropriate to the target audience. With the economies of the Middle East growing rapidly, the work of a good graphic designer can help make or break a new product, concept or service.

Khaled Halwani, a graphic-design student at LAU, said he felt there were many misconceptions about graphic designers in the region. "There is more interest in graphic design now but the older generations also misunderstand what graphic design is. They fail to appreciate the power of a poster and the message of a graphic designer. We are responsible for the relation between text and images and how we promote our ideas to the community we live in. I think it's underestimated as a field in the Arab world."

Today, more Arab students than ever before are choosing to study graphic design and the discipline is experiencing a boom.

"With the current endeavour to build cities and islands and whatnot in the Arabian desert, the need to identify and brand different stakeholders has never been more pressing and as a result, graphic designers are in high demand in the region," said Fallaha.

Lebanon is at the fore of such Arab productivity, with the country's graphic designers dominating design workplaces across the region. The first university to offer a course in graphic design was the American University of Beirut in 1992. Today the subject is taught at nearly all the major Lebanese universities and is slowly reaching its tentacles into other Arab countries, notably the United Arab Emirates.

"By its geographical location at the edge of the Mediterranean and open to the Arab world, Lebanon has long played the role of a membrane between its neighbors on the left and on the right," said Fallaha. "As such, graphic-design students in Lebanon are also key players in this sense, having been brought up and fed with media from all kinds of provenance. Their visual output is very much a reflection of this blend, proposing a heterogeneous outlook on the city, a collective memory and morale."

Professor Randa Abdel-Baki, coordinator of the graphic-design program at LAU, said that "many Arab students of graphic design come to Lebanon to be inspired. Beirut is a cosmopolitan place and that is an important ingredient for graphic design," as the recent exhibition of LAU graphic design graduate work testified to.

Inspired by anything from video games, Lebanon's violent history to popular culture and online networking sites, the graduate graphic design exhibition at LAU in Beirut last week proved to be a colorful and diverse collection of cross-cultural design.

The weeklong exhibition, this year entitled BrainStormInk, showcases the work of LAU graphic-design students every year and provides many of them with valuable exposure to potential employers.

In fact, said Fallaha, many students are offered jobs as a result. This year many graduates will take up positions, mainly in the Arab Gulf, although also in Lebanon, in graphic or Web site design studios, television, or advertising agencies.

On display at the graduate exhibition were 3-D video games, packaging concepts for restaurants and consumer products, original Arabic typography and futuristic caricatures. Corporate logos, exhibition posters, comics and a board game for children were also on view.

Although much of the work had humorous, jocular themes, a number of designs tackled controversial topics. One female student designed an aggressive anti-abortion poster while another addressed child abuse. Such issues as pre-marital sex, the veil and drug abuse were the premise of other works. Sami Hmaidan created a video game which took rebuilding Lebanon's infrastructure after the war with Israel in 2006 as its theme.

This year's exhibition winners were digital media specialists Ahmad al-Shami and Hayat Sheikh, who created video games and interactive animation. Dana Abdel-Ghani, who specialized in print design, also picked up an award for her fashionable guide book to Gemmayzeh, a favored nightspot for Beirut's residents. For the curious, a full catalogue of the students' work will be available later in July and will include work from all the various design courses taken by LAU students, including Arabic and Latin typography, illustration, silkscreen, corporate design, packaging and editorial design. The catalogue will also have a DVD of the multimedia work produced.

Talking about what graphic design meant to him, Shami said "it's a way to express yourself without anyone being able to interfere. It's the way in which you can communicate on different levels to different audiences."

Meanwhile, Hayat Sheikh was enthusiastic about the partnership between graphic design students.

"It's not a competitive major but more collaborative and we have all worked together as students. Graphic design is a good career and the field will continue to grow," she said.

With many Lebanese graphic designers taking their skills elsewhere in the region, it can be assumed that Middle Eastern design will continue to take its cue from Lebanon, at least until other Arab countries have homegrown designers and university graphic-design courses on a scale that can rival Lebanon's.

For more information on the  catalogue, contact: graphicdesign.beirut@lau.edu.lb

Copyright The Daily Star 2008.