Design and Communication: Digital Challenges and Dilemmas

Daniel Brandão holds a PhD in digital media, in the domain of audiovisual and interactive content creation, at the University of Porto (2014), where he developed the project Museum of Ransom (www.museudoresgate.org), a participatory website that collects videos made by citizens about the city’s daily life, aiming at legitimizing their cultural heritage vocation. He also co-coordinated the project Citadocs: creation of collaborative mini-documentaries, born in Future Places Medialab for Citizenship. He holds a degree in communication design (2004) and a master’s degree in multimedia art (2008) both at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto. He is assistant professor at the Department of Communication Sciences at Institute of Social Science, University of Minho, and integrated researcher at the Communication and Society Research Centre. He is co-principle investigator of the project bYou: Study on Children and Young People's Experiences and Expressions of the Media (PTDC/COM-OUT/3004/2020), and integrates the teams of the research projects ECHO: Echoing the Communal Self (EXPL/ART-DAQ/0037/2021) and HERIC 2D: Health Risk Communication (2022.06008.PTDC), all of them funded by Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology. He is co-chair of DIGICOM (International Conference on Design and Digital Communication), has co-edited several books on design and has participated in several scientific committees of international conferences and journals. With vast teaching experience in public and private universities in the areas of communication design, audiovisual and multimedia, he has worked in Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, Escola Superior Artística do Porto, College of Art and Design — Matosinhos, Universidade Católica Portuguesa — Braga. He has worked with several institutions in the area of culture, with particular emphasis on the Serralves Foundation, and its Museum of Contemporary Art, with which he collaborated for six years.

Nuno Martins holds a PhD in digital media (2013) at the University of Porto, having been a PhD fellow of the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology’s UT Austin-Portugal Programme; a master's degree in multimedia art and a degree in communication design at Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto. He is adjunct professor at the School of Design of Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, where he is director and lecturer of the master in digital design, also teaching in the degree in graphic design. He is a full researcher at the Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture. Currently he is the principal investigator of the project ECHO - Echoing the Communal Self: Designing the Dissemination and Replication of Self-initiated Practices in Underprivileged Urban Communities in a Post-pandemic World (EXPL/ART-DAQ/0037/2021) and co-principal investigator of the project HERIC 2D - Health Risk Communication: Design and Digital Communication of Official Public Health Sources to Guide Citizens in Pandemic Situations (2022.06008.PTDC), both funded by Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology. He is the founder and chair of DIGICOM — International Conference on Design and Digital Communication, he has also co-edited several scientific books on design and integrated scientific committees in numerous international journals and conferences. As a designer, he was awarded several national and international prizes and some of his projects appear in over two dozen books on communication design, published in Hong Kong, Germany, Spain, United States, Austria, Netherlands, France, China and United Kingdom.

Rachel Cooper’s design research work began in the 1980s with a PhD on technological change in graphic design. She went on to become a professor at Salford University, before being appointed as the founding director of Lancaster Institute of Contemporary Arts (Lancaster University) in 2006. She is distinguished professor of design management and policy at Lancaster University. She is founding director of ImaginationLancaster (https://imagination.lancaster.ac.uk), an open and exploratory design-led research centre conducting applied and theoretical research into people, products, places and their interactions. Her research interests cover: design thinking; design management; design policy; and design across all sectors of industry, with a specific interest in design for wellbeing and socially responsible design. She has published extensively on these topics, including books, Designing Sustainable Cities, The Handbook of Wellbeing and the Environment and Living in Digital Worlds; Designing the Digital Public Space. An academic leader with 20 years research experience and collaboration with industry partners. Rachel Cooper has led large interdisciplinary research programmes related to design. She has attracted over £25.000.000 in research funding in the past 10 years, much of which has focused on the future of cities and human and planetary wellbeing in the digital and physical world. Professor Cooper has undertaken several advisory roles to national and international universities, government and non-governmental organisations. She was a lead expert for the United Kingdom Government Foresight Programme on the Future of Cities (2013–2016), was on the United Kingdom Academy of Medical Sciences Working group addressing “the health of the public 2040” (2015–2016), a United Kingdom representative on the International Science Council Scientific Committee for Health and Wellbeing in the Changing Urban Environment (2017–2022). She is also series editor of the Routledge series Design for Social Responsibility. She was founding editor of The Design Journal and also founding president of the European Academy of Design. She is currently president of the Design Research Society.