MFA Visual Narrative
A refreshed visual identity and comprehensive website design and build that prioritizes a story first perspective.
Client:
The School of Visual Arts
Project Components:
Brand Identity, Digital, Editorial Design, Illustration
Website Development:
One Trick Pony
Logo Animation:
Tommy Korad
The MFA Visual Narrative (MFAVN) program at the School of Visual Arts in New York was founded in 2015 with the goal of helping students realize their story telling potential by building and honing their visual language and narrative skills while prioritizing a story first perspective. Over the course of 10 years the program has continually increased its reach into new and evolving story telling spaces, including game design, immersive digital experiences, augmented reality, as well as animation, film and video works. The MFAVN department worked with us on a comprehensive visual identity refresh and overhaul of their website presence to establish a more engaging showcase of the work and ongoing activities and developments of the program, its students, faculty and collaborating mentors.
With the visual identity refresh, the MFAVN team, wanted to achieve a more elevated expression that could clearly communicate the programs strength of a combined visual and verbal skillset development that sets it apart from other MFA competitors.
The program’s new wordmark express a more editorial perspective through a high contrast serif typeface, while also achieving a visual wink through the integration of apostrophe glyphs in place of the letter “I” dots, and through the use of implied line in the word “visual.” A coordinating monogram housed in the apostrophe holding shape is used for situations where there is limited real estate, and where a more bold graphic statement is beneficial.
The apostrophe brand mark can function as an independent graphic device that serves as a dynamic window into the world of MFAVN. The intentional use of a monochromatic black and white palette allows the student work and the stories about the program to be prioritized and for ease of implementation across communications.
We worked with the team at One Trick Pony to develop and launch a robust WordPress site that balances clarity, utility, and visual emotion. The design system of components and design patterns empowers the MFAVN team to publish posts for program news, events, and student work with consistency and authoring autonomy—allowing the team to focus on the content. During the site development process we worked with the team at the School of Visual Arts Press and Level access to achieve ADA compliance—our decision to focus on using black and white for the typography and UI elements across the site helped to streamline this achievement.
During the initial authoring phase of the site, we supported the MFAVN team with a series of authoring guides for each of the key post types to help guide their process in populating new content as well as updating legacy content.
Using SVA’s preferred email marketing platform MyEmma, we developed a custom newsletter design and authoring guideline for the program.
