Sebastian Aravena-Ortiz

I am Visual Designer and a PhD Researcher in Media and Communication at the University of Leicester. I hold a MA in Communication Design from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and a BA in Graphic Design from the University of Chile. My research addresses the ways visual communication is co-designed by different organizations to form social and political identities, and the processes and visual resources used to create meaning. 

Before my arrival to the UK I taught Visual Design for 7 years at the University of Chile (Design Project I y II, Design Workshop I) and worked as visual designer in my studio. I have also participated in over 50 International Socio-Cultural Poster Exhibitions and Biennales in more than 20 countries, such as China, France, Mexico, Poland, Russia, Spain, and the United States.  

My PhD research delves into the collaboration and production of visual discourses by environmental civil organizations through digital media in the Chilean context. It aims to understand how different processes of design work together in the construction of ideas and concepts regarded with nature and its socio-political dimensions.

Also, I participate in the research team of the CLIMADISINFO project, funded by the Institute for Environmental Futures of the University of Leicester, which is focused on the study of communication strategies to mobilise action and counteract disinformation on digital networks by environmental actors. 

Aravena-Ortiz, S. (2023). Resistencia visual en los muros de Santiago: protestas de Chile en 2019. [Visual resistance in the walls of Santiago: demonstrations in Chile in 2019]. Cuadernos.Info, (56), 44–65. https://doi.org/10.7764/cdi.56.63013 (SPA-ENG) 

Aravena-Ortiz, S; Villota, O. (2023). Editorial: Perspectivas del potencial integrador del diseño. Expansión a través de la convergencia [Perspectives on the integrative potential of design. Expansion through convergence]. RChD: creación y pensamiento, 8(14), 1- 3. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-837X.2023.71156 (SPA) 

Aravena-Ortiz, S., & Gatica-Ramírez, P. (2022). El rol de la perigrafía en la comunicación visual medioambiental [The role of perigraphy in the environmental visual communication]. Revista FAMECOS, 29(1), e43260. https://doi.org/10.15448/1980-3729.2022.1.43260 (SPA)

Aravena Ortiz, S. (2021). ¿Marca-fenómeno? Identidad visual para sucesos en desarrollo. El caso COVID-19 [The role of perigraphy in the environmental visual communication]. grafica, 9 (18), pp.165-174. https://doi.org/10.5565/rev/grafica.194  (SPA)

Contributor:

(MS7310) Strategic Communication Management
(MS7086) Global Media: Structures and Representations

• 2023, Jun 5-9 Visual and Digital Discourse Mapping of Chilean Environmental Organizations. Conference of Communication and Environment (COCE) 2023, Harrisonburg, US. The International Environmental Communication Association (IECA).

• 2023, Apr 25-26 Visual Discourses of Chilean Environmental Organizations through Digital Media in the context of the referendum for the New Constitution of 2022. Doctoral College Researcher Conference, University of Leicester, UK.

• 2022, 11-15 Jul. Visual Design as Complement for Photography in Conservationist Digital Communication in South America. Communication Research in the Era of Neo-Globalisation: Reorientations, Challenges and Changing Contexts, The Politics of the Online World. International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR), Tsinghua University, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Beijing, China/Online.

• 2021, Dec 13-15. Public walls as collaborative canvas: Scribbles on the walls of Santiago of Chile in the protests of 2019.. 7th International Visual Methods Conference (IVMC), hosted online by the Department of Applied Design, Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT), Cape Town, South Africa.

• 2021, Jun 16. Digital Environmental Communication for the new Chilean Constitution. New Directions in Media and Sociology (NDiMS), University of Leicester, Leicester, UK.

• 2020, Jul 27-31. El retrato intervenido en la gráfica callejera como resistencia política. El caso del Estallido Social de Santiago de Chile de 2019.. XV Encuentro virtual Latinoamericano de Diseño, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

• 2019, Nov 7-8. Resistencia Visual: Marca Socio-Cultural transformada en crítica política, es caso de Buenos Aires.. Seminario de Investigación en Diseño, Universidad del Bío-Bio, Concepción, Chile. 

MA in Communicational Design, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.
BA (Hons) in Graphic Design, University of Chile, Chile.