2026 Conference Speakers

Bruno Porto Comunicação Visual

Talk

Typography in Superhero Logos

Over the past decades, the superhero genre has emerged as a dominant force in mainstream pop culture, firmly establishing itself across global entertainment networks. For example, the very first public visual piece of information unveiled about any upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe project is traditionally its logo. Far from being arbitrary designs, these logos serve as the primary symbolic sign of a brand, conventionally derived from historical comic books that served as the foundational source material.

Fish

Talk

The Typographic 2000s

The rollercoaster role of typography in the last 20 years in North American pop culture has been A RIDE.We'll take guests on a retrospective journey of design through the 2000s, examining the good, the bad, and the ugly, while bringing out a crystal ball for what’s next.

Jordan C. Bowden

Talk

Typography: The Silent Activist

Activism doesn't always have to be loud. While actions may speak louder than words the act of visually spelling out certain words, and posting them for all to see, can effect more change than the loudest megaphone.

Typotheque

Talk

Indigenous North American Typographies

Despite a high number of living languages and such graphic richness, Indigenous communities continue to face widespread challenges towards typographic expression and accessing and using their languages on essential digital platforms.

OneMethod

Talk

Be graffiti.

I spent twenty years of my life addicted to painting graffiti on trains. Then I got arrested.At that point I truly thought my life was over, but the truth is that this was in many ways the beginning for me because I was finally forced to apply my graffiti mindset to all the the other things in my world.

Blended Creative House

Talk

Making in the Middle

For bicultural and diasporic designers, there can be pressure to either assimilate into dominant Western design languages or lean on familiar cultural signifiers to communicate who something is for. But culture is rarely that simple. So how do we design for identities that exist somewhere in the middle?

Humble Raja

Talk

Another World of Type

Imagine cities still brimming with sign painters. A place that has 22 official languages and uses 13 different scripts. Layered organically over decades, the streets are filled with hand-painted lettering, peeling posters, cheap vinyl decals and neon signs. These are the streets of India, a living museum of typography.

RYAN LASTNAME

Talk

Memento Memori

When a loved one dies a memento often left behind is their written word; notebooks, birthday cards, scribbles on a wall calendar. After the passing of my grandmother ('Granny') in April 2020 I wondered what makes a persons handwriting so distinctly theirs. This innocuous question opening up a wider philosophical and anthropological can of worms than I was prepared for.

The Office of Scott Boms

Talk

Zen and the Art of Laser Typography

We’ve learned how to design confidently for screens — but what if you had to design around a wildly different form of ephemeral interface that, in fact, you mostly didn’t want people to even have to use? What if the traditional design rules and constraints no longer applied? Where would you begin — and how would you gauge success?