Michael Venner

Communication Design (Honours)

Hi, I'm Michael, a diligent Design Honours student with a keen eye for detail. I particularly enjoy branding and any design that effectively uses simplicity and underlying structure to create impactful and innovative outcomes. During my studies I have also developed a great interest in exploring ways that user centred design can make design more accessible for people with disabilities. I think this is a particular area in which design has the potential to greatly expand.

Having previously graduated from Swinburne's three year Bachelor of Design course in 2019, and gained a valuable taste of an industry workplace during a 6 week design internship in Hong Kong, I decided it would be highly beneficial to add honours to my qualifications. This decision has enable me to gain highly rewarding group and real client based design experience.

I spent both semesters of 2020 working on a range of student-led client-based projects in Swinburne's Bureau Accelorator Program. Through this experience I gained great personal growth and confidence in communicating with clients and working in collaborative teams.

Having gained a wide range of design skills including illustration, branding, publication design, UI/UX design, as well as some exploration into animation and 3D design, I am now eager to further develop and positively utlise my design knowledge in industry.

Shaping Flags – Interactive Participatory Exhibit

Canine Cuisine – Premium Dog Treats Branding & Packaging

UnitingCare – Fleet Driver Safety

Around the World in Eighty Days – Classic Reboot Publication

Stop Turning A Blind Eye – Inclusive Exhibit & Gallery Experiences Research

Acknowledgement of Country

The School of Design and Architecture respectfully acknowledges the Wurundjeri peoples of the Kulin Nation as the Traditional Owners and knowledge-keepers of the lands, waters and sky that surround us, where we work, learn, create, communicate and make place. We recognise that sovereignty has never been ceded and this always was and will always be Wurundjeri Country. We pay our respects to Elders past, present and to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who continue to make a better world through design.

We extend our acknowledgement to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff, students, alumni, real-life clients, and knowledge keepers, who have contributed to our own education diversity and growth. We will continue to ensure that staff and students respectfully honour ancestral connection to Country and Place in everything that they do.

We are dedicated to the notion of design to make a better world and we acknowledge that making tools, shaping place, sharing stories, making meaning, wayfinding and collaborating have long been and continue to be both central and integral to First Peoples' cultures. We recognize that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ cultural contributions have continued relevance to design practice and commit to: reconciling ancestries of design and contemporary practice as well as pursuing culturally and professionally appropriate ways to engage with a diverse population of colleagues, industries and clients. In a time of treaty-making and voice we understand that there are overlaps between caring for Country and the sustainable production of goods, services, experiences, products and buildings.

Guided by the principles of respect, reconciliation, and reciprocity we undertake to indigenising and decolonising design practice by dismantling colonial structures and challenging biases that have marginalised Indigenous voices and design.

As students of SoDA you will be given opportunities to both engage with and educate yourself in Indigenous creative practices and cultural protocols through a lens of inclusivity, diversity, respect, mutual understanding, inter-cultural dialogue in all aspects of design practice. Indigenous people have been telling stories, making tools, and connecting to Country through visual media, placemaking and place marking for more than 60,000 years and these practices are part of an ongoing, evolving and live tradition.