Nelson Mandela University

The Department of Visual Arts is part of the School of Visual and Performing Arts in the Faculty of Humanities at Nelson Mandela University. As the oldest art school in South Africa, established in 1882, we have a rich and proud history.

A comprehensive selection of programmes is offered, including a Bachelor of Visual Arts, Bachelor of Visual Arts Honours, a Master of Visual Arts, and a PhD in Visual Arts. All our courses offer a blend of theoretical studies, practical studio-based skills, and entrepreneurial practices.

The following Bachelor of Visual Arts degree majors are available:

  • Ceramics
  • Fashion and Textile Design
  • Graphic Design
  • Painting
  • Photography
  • Printmaking
  • Sculpture

Visual Arts Postgraduate Studies:

Bachelor of Visual Arts Honours

Our Honours programme cultivates and promotes elevated creative and professional development levels within the visual arts. Over one year, students will embark on a self-directed project, which culminates in a group exhibition.

Master of Arts: Visual Arts

The master's degree program spans two years and involves conducting advanced research independently. This research culminates in a written dissertation for a theoretical or empirical study or a research report and a significant body of creative work for practice-based studies.

PhD in Visual Arts

A PhD in Visual Arts is a research-focused program that offers advanced training to students interested in pursuing a career in academia or the arts. Through rigorous coursework, critical analysis, and creative production, students develop their artistic practice while engaging in contemporary debates in the field.

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Textualising visual stimulus: A visual methodology to encourage innovation in fashion design education

AuthorInstitution
anse van Rensburg, MiekeNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design
JansevRensburg - Textualising visual stimulus A visual methodology.pdf

Fashion design and its pedagogy is fundamentally centred around visual representation. A core conceptual component of the fashion industry and design education is mood boards, concept boards or trend boards, which purpose is to communicate design direction or intent and to provide a starting point for the design process. Content for these boards relies predominantly on visual data; due to the internet and social media, students and designers have unlimited access to visual stimulus. Reflecting on personal design constraints and teaching experiences in fashion design at a leading South African design education institution, it became clear that the influx of visual data, both through the use of these boards and freely available images on social media, affects original design thinking.

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Celebrating Afrikanness: Proposing a design approach that foregrounds Afrikan cultural identity and Afronowism

AuthorInstitution
Cadle, BruceNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Cadle - Celebrating Afrikanness Proposing a design approach that foregrounds Afrikan.pdf

Starting in the 1990s in South Africa, according to Sauthoff, designers in general and graphic designers in particular have sought to create an inimitable design style that is imbued with a recognisable (South) Afrikan cultural identity. This is in reaction to the entrenched hegemonic influence of Euro-American design practices. Names like Saki Mafundikwa, Karabo Poppy, Garth Walker, and Sindiso Nyoni are on the influential list of designers bracketing a so-called African design aesthetic. How is this ‘aesthetic’ related to design that is culturally significant, according to Twigger Holroyd, and that lends authenticity to an artefact, positioning it as representative of Afrikanness?

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BIM as an alternative architectural teaching device

AuthorInstitution
Basson, Jean-PierreNelson Mandela University
Allen, ChrisNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Architecture & Built Environment
BIM as an alternative architectural teaching device

Are traditional architectural studio-based teaching methods and tools still applicable, or are they causing a communication barrier between a student and a lecturer? In architectural design studios, promptly submitting projects is a problem. The paper is based on a study conducted by the author between 2016 to 2018 and aims to determine whether information technology (IT), such as building information modelling (BIM), opposed to the conventional method (CM), can improve informed design communication during conceptual design critique sessions. Therefore, contribute to prompt studio-based design project submissions. The research's objectives include understanding BIM as a design tool compared to a visualisation tool to facilitate early design decision-making.

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Towards a Pragmatic Code of Ethics for Design Research

AuthorInstitution
Munro, Allan JVaal University of Technology
Economou, IngeNelson Mandela University
de Lange, Rudi WTshwane University of Technology

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Research
Towards a Pragmatic Code of Ethics for Design Research

Research ethics committees (RECs) at universities evaluate applications for ethical clearance through ethical research lenses shaped by positivist and interpretivist paradigms and cultural constructivist thinking. Such lenses predominantly follow reasoning strategies that could include inductive or deductive reasoning. Research ethics committees further interrogate applicants’ methodology and monitor their actions to determine whether they meet extant research ethics principles.

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From Experiment to Social Action: The shift in critical design

AuthorInstitution
Cadle, BruceNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
From Experiment to Social Action: The shift in critical design

Critical design has been philosophically positioned as that which opposes the affirmative role of design as the status quo, offering itself as social critique located in the formalised spaces of museums and galleries. This paper contests that reasoning by firstly showing that in the contemporary sphere, criticality in design now resides in a more socially aware and humanistically engaged space. Design propositions can be expressed from the perspective of modes of enquiry that ask both What if? and How else? questions in the vein of Malpass and Slotnick. These then propose alternative ways of considering design not as a way of seeking answers but as a way of asking questions.

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Slow Design (Into Eyilwe Ngokwendeleyo): The Potential for a Decolonized Space Through Graphic Design

AuthorInstitution
Muir, MargotNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Graphic Design & Visual Art
Slow Design (Into Eyilwe Ngokwendeleyo): The Potential for a Decolonized Space Through Graphic Design

Abstract

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Student Perceptions on Curriculum Change: Art and Design Theory within a New Bachelor of Visual Arts Degree at Nelson Mandela University.

AuthorInstitution
Collet, RachelNelson Mandela University
Economou, IngeNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Student Perceptions on Curriculum Change: Art and Design Theory within a New Bachelor of Visual Arts Degree at NMU

This paper seeks to describe changes made to the Visual Studies course at the Nelson Mandela University in light of calls for the decolonisation of curricula, and to assess the impact of these changes by reviewing student responses to the revised curriculum. Using this course as a case study, the paper   reflects on students’ experiences of attempts at decolonisation, and seeks to contribute directions for further change.

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A Decolonial Academy? Addressing the Oxymoron: How a Series of Performative Art-Science Creative Encounters Might Serve as a Toolbox of Ideas

AuthorInstitution
Duker, MaryNelson Mandela University
Neustetter, MarcusNelson Mandela University
Cowling, Richard MNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
A Decolonial Academy?

Disciplinary practitioners are challenged to respond urgently and positively to calls to decolonize the academy. There is an expectation that the learning experience as well as the curriculum content needs to be fundamentally reshaped in response to the socio-political-economic realities of this century. To add to the complexity, as daily newscasts confirm, outside the ivory towers there is a growing sense that all is not well with the world, and that there is a need for radical social change.

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Re-representation: Addressing objectifying media portrayals of women in South Africa

AuthorInstitution
Economou, IngeNelson Mandela University
de Lange, Rudi WTshwane University of Technology

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Media & Communications Design
Re-representation: Addressing objectifying media portrayals of women in South Africa

Objectification imparts harm to women and sets a detrimental precedent for self-objectification. This is particularly true for young women who are seeking information to assist them in the process of identity construction. Experimental studies indicate that objectification in media causes negative body esteem, an unnecessary drive for thinness, eating disorders and related psychological problems. Globalised media trends emphasise and value women for their physical appearance. These trends de- personalise women, depict them as objects to be gazed at, and style them as decorative, rather than a person with a mind, aptitude, intellect, personality and a ‘voice’.

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The Myth of Unified Global Culture: transcoding national cultures within website interfaces

AuthorInstitution
Swanepoel, MikeNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Software, UX & Game Design
he Myth of Unified Global Culture: transcoding national cultures within website interfaces

This paper probes two areas relating to transcoding culture in a website interface development context. Firstly, culture is interrogated through the lens of current anthropological models of dimensions (traits/tendencies) of national culture. Secondly, transcoding anthropological models of dimensions of national culture into culturally adaptive website interfaces through the graphic design process.

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Problematic motifs: portrayals and identity construction of women in visual consumer media

AuthorInstitution
Economou, IngeNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Photography, Film & Multimedia

Considerable  criticism  has  been  levelled  at  problematic  visual  portrayals  of  women  in  consumer  and  popular media.  Current  Western  media  landscapes  feature  images  of  women  that  engender  problematic  ‘narrow’ identity constructs – marginalising agency and intellect, promoting physical idealisation, sexual objectification, and commodification  – and, as such,  reproduce  patriarchal  discourse.  Despite  the rise of feminism  and the resultant  increased  awareness   of  and  advances  in  the  area  of  gender  equality,  stereotyped   images  of sexualised,  objectified  and  idealised  women  seem  to  persist  globally  and  in  South  Africa.  Images  exert discursive power and have the ability to shape people’s identities, beliefs, and behaviour.

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Critical Design as critique of the design status quo

AuthorInstitution
Cadle, BruceNelson Mandela University
Kuhn, SimonNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Critical Design as critique of the design status quo

Contemporary design practice (and theory) is growing up. There is evidence to support the emergence of a new breed of designer who is able to reflect on her or his role in society, and to be critical of what they make and what the resultant consequences of that may be.

Design is often used as a vehicle to criticise and comment on issues, highlight problems and shortcomings in society, and present views and perspectives. This suggests that design is at a distance and impartial, but the truth is otherwise. Design is ideological and an expression of the values mediated by the designer and commissioned by others. This is the status quo: affirmative design. When design steps away from this position and critiques itself, critical design is the result.

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The Problem with Plagiarism

AuthorInstitution
Economou, IngeNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Graphic Design & Visual Art
The Problem with Plagiarism

This study examines the concept of visual plagiarism within a contemporary cultural context shaped by postmodern design theory and the digital information age, as a challenging concern for tertiary level graphic design education.

This paper does not condone plagiarism, however it asks design lecturers to reconsider taken-for-granted assumptions that students operate in an unambiguous environment of 'wrong' and 'right' when it comes to the concept of visual plagiarism. It seems that graphic design students find it increasingly difficult to navigating the grey areas between plagiarism, appropriation, homage, inspiration, 'referencing, coincidence and 'accident'.

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From 'banking‘ to 'stockvel‘: a critical reflection on the development of literacies

AuthorInstitution
Duker, MaryNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
From 'banking‘ to 'stockvel‘: a critical reflection on the development of literacies

This paper presents an analytical autoethnographic reflection on the adaptations in approach to the teaching and learning of literacies that led to the writing and research-intensive literacies programme currently presented to first year visual arts students. It maps our practices to theory, and specifically to those of Freire, Lave and Wenger, Mezirow and the transformational education theorists.

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Are we there yet? Graphic design‘s next destinations

AuthorInstitution
Cadle, BruceNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Graphic Design & Visual Art
Are we there yet? Graphic design‘s next destinations

The diverse tautology applied to graphic design means different things depending on the perspective from which it is viewed and has become the topic for much debate in recent times. This is of particular relevance to the tertiary educational arena in South Africa, where universities (including Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) which provides the context for this paper) are faced with the dual spectres of programme re-curriculation and Higher Education Qualifications Framework (HEQF)1 level compliancy in the near future and graphic design programmes will have to reconsider their relevance in a changing/changed educational and business paradigm.

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Towards An Educational Strategy For Promoting Social, Environmental And Ethical Awareness In Visual Communications

AuthorInstitution
Joubert, NinaNelson Mandela University
Economou, IngeNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Media & Communications Design
Towards An Educational Strategy For Promoting Social, Environmental And Ethical Awareness

Visual Communications at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU), incorporating graphic design and photography, aspires to instil social, environmental and ethical sensitivity within students in order to meet a perceived increase in demand for these issues to be addressed at local and global level. To meet this imperative students are required to produce visual communications solutions for charitable organisations and participate in community-linked photographic excursions that expose them to social and environmental issues within real life scenarios.

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The Politics of Change, Craft and the Bauhaus Reborn: New Relationships in Design Education

AuthorInstitution
Cadle, BruceNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
The Politics of Change, Craft and the Bauhaus Reborn

South African education systems straddle the developed/developing world schism, an old-school-style Eurocentric view has long tussled with an Africanist dialectic. Educators struggle with access and upliftment issues whilst implementing outcomes-based learning programmes and simultaneously maintaining academic standards. At Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU), conscious of the need to build future capacity, innovation in teaching and learning is paramount and the issues identified above are constantly under debate. Experimentation is an ongoing aspect of teaching methodology.

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Nurturing The Personal And The Intuitive In The Design Studio

AuthorInstitution
Hardman, TheresaNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Graphic Design & Visual Art
Nurturing The Personal And The Intuitive In The Design Studio

The design process, like all creative activities, involves both rational aspects and other less easily-explicable non-rational aspects, such as the roles of intuition, imagination and personal insight. There are therefore different ways of knowing and learning involved in teaching design.

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Making Space For Identity, Diversity And Voice In A Transcultural Visual Arts Community Of Practice

AuthorInstitution
Duker, MaryNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Graphic Design & Visual Art
Making Space For Identity, Diversity And Voice In A Transcultural Visual Arts Community Of Practice

There is national and institutional pressure to transform education, to revisit curriculums and approaches to teaching and learning and to address issues around dominant worldviews, inclusiveness and diversity. Visual arts lecturer practitioners, like other academics, are being challenged to respond.

We know that the students entering our programmes, in all their growing diversity, provide new challenges, bringing with them as they do different and often complex social, cultural and familial identities, some of which they leave, wittingly or unwittingly, willingly or unwillingly, at the door, as they look to conform to the expectations of the disciplinary communities.

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Redesigning Design Education

AuthorInstitution
Hagen, MelNelson Mandela University

Keywords: 

Discipline: 

Design Education Strategy
Redesigning Design Education

Note: A full reviewed paper was not submitted after the conference.

The last 15-20 years has seen an explosion in design awareness worldwide, with a concomitant restructuring of design education curricula. Increasingly, national innovation strategies are beginning to integrate design, art, social sciences and the humanities into their programmes, and there is a corresponding developing integration of the creative and social disciplines in the curricula of science and technology.

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DEFSA conferences

DEFSA promotes relevant research with the focus on design + education through its biennial conferences, to promote professionalism, accountability and ethics in the education of young designers. Our next conference is a hybrid event. See above for details.

Critical skills endorsement

Professional Members in good standing can receive a certificate of membership, but DEFSA cannot provide confirmation or endorsement of skills whatsoever. DEFSA only confirm membership of DEFSA which is a NPO for Design Education in South Africa (https://www.defsa.org.za/imagine).