Design holds a lot of power. It influences all of us, and if you think design or advertisements don’t influence you—please think again. I see design from both points of view: as someone who designs things and as a viewer, an audience member to the spectacle.
The political decisions we make also contain a lot of power. And design is one of those things which helps influence our political decisions. As a graphic designer, I don’t see myself designing a political campaign, but design in politics doesn’t explicitly mean designing for candidates. Something I’ve been seeing a lot of, especially on Instagram, are political messages in the form of graphics or digital illustrations.
Some statements are more bipartisan, filled with information everyone should know. Other designs have a very specific goal. These types of political design statements can have a lot of impact. If these posts are shared over and over, then the message gets spread further as more people look at it. This is great when creating awareness, or trying to promote change and activism.
However, it should be noted these posts are only impactful if information is given—and accurate, and if viewers are inspired to take action. There is a certain element of performative activism with these posts, more so if created by a white person in order to make money and receive attention by being “on trend”. As a viewer, I’ve seen more good come from these posts, including actual activism taking place from the creator. As a designer, one particular critique I have is the similarity between posts. There’s a lot of mimicking happening as one style trend takes off, and that’s never fun to see because it makes all the posts blend together.
Even though I haven’t worked on any explicitly political designs, I could see myself creating awareness for progressive messages to encourage more people to think. When I think about my own design philosophy or mantra, I want to design for the betterment of society. I want to put design into the world that impacts people in an encouraging way to take action, to think critically, and also to imagine. It’s why I see myself working for a museum, a publishing company, or perhaps in education one day. Those lines of work, particularly with publishing, have political elements to them—because in publishing there’s a decision process in what gets published and how it gets marketed.
In design, we think a lot about what we want to stand behind, and as a designer that means we also have to remain aware of what messages our designs convey. I hope to look at my own work through a critical lens as a designer and viewer, so I know what messages I am putting out into the world. I don’t want to be a passive voice, getting lost in the mix—I want to propel us forward into a better world than what I grew up in.
