Every competition has its own particular characteristics, its own thematic orientation and, over time, develops its own tradition and reputation. TITAN in contrast is new, launched for the first time this year but with no lesser degree of ambition than to carve out its own particular identity.
The original impetus for the competition comes from the Superior School of Art and Design (ESAD) and the fact of being a design school has orientated the kind of search that the competition represents. At the core of the schools’ philosophy is a belief in design as a social tool, with all the cultural resonance that this implies. Moreover, we understand that in order to be an effective tool design must also be a process; of thinking, of collaborating and often of imagining, in short, a process that turns ideas into actions, concepts into reality. We strive to encourage a practice that is capable of generating a physical and visual world which expresses our society’s deepest needs and desires.
It is for these reasons that our attention is drawn to the ways in which the special skills of image making – drawing upon unique interpretation and vision – combine with other graphic and visual languages to create narratives and identities. Thus TITAN is concerned, not simply with illustration as a self contained practice but with the fusion of illustration and design.
