San San is a design director who seeks to serve, collaborate and lead influential businesses and organisations, with a common goal to add value for humans by realising the full potential of creativity, art, technology, empathy and design thinking. Her active involvement as co-chair of AGDA VIC Council takes her on a fascinating journey into the possible trends and opportunities for the future of design. This event and its visual design communication has been proudly created & directed by San San Truong in a collaborative effort of the speakers, contributors, the team at AGDA and JMC Academy to build this event for Melbourne Design Week, to reflect the ability of design shifters and thinkers to ‘Create Change’.

Zoë is the design lead at The Conversation. As a UX specialist, Zoë is passionate about technology’s ability to support positive human impact. Zoë has managed the Wilderness Society’s brand and website launch to raise awareness of nature conservation; founded Ain’t no Planet B to inspire 14k loyalists to live waste free; and evolved The Conversation’s brand as the world’s leading publisher of research-based news and analysis.

Alex is an advertising creative director, a social activist, a co-author of The Right-brain Workout Volumes 1 and 2 with Russel Howcroft. He’s created advertising campaigns that have run all over the world for clients such as the AFL, Cricket Australia, Wrigley’s, The University of Melbourne, Gatorade, and Schweppes. He’s raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for a range of charities, was the driving force behind the Nicky Winmar statue, and is the co-creator of Future Landfill. He is obsessed with using creativity to try and make the world a better place. Sometimes he succeeds.

Mel is a designer whose experience spans design studios, tech startups, not-for-profits and freelance work. She currently works as a Brand Designer for Smiling Mind, a not-for-profit working within the prevention space of mental health with a focus on youth. Smiling Mind is most known for its app which is Australia’s leading mindfulness app, which has so far been downloaded over 5.9M times. Mel has a passion for meaningful design and hopes to create work that is able to positively impact
the lives of others.

Rachel is the senior design director at Push Collective, where she helped build a team of creatives collaborating with artists from across Western Australia to create a greater sense of place for Perth Airport, reframing Australian Catholic University’s values to resonate with prospective students from all backgrounds, and creating the I’M CHANGE campaign – a rallying cry for everyone to show up and demand climate change action.

Charlie is an artist, designer and the creative director at Five Creative. Co-founded by Charlie and James Baker in 2009, the brand and web design agency has studios in both Melbourne and the Mornington Peninsula, working with a range of clients both locally and abroad. In their response to the COVID-19 Crisis, Five Creative self-funded a free online directory and campaign to support SMBs in the Mornington Peninsula region of Victoria, called ‘Hopen for Business’. As well as a positive and unifying national campaign called ‘V for Victori (V for Victori-a)’ that accompanied with strong visual designs, promotes an ongoing message for ‘heart, hope and solidarity’ across the country. 

Gustavo is the creative director of creative, brand and advertising at Deloitte Digital. He has worked for leading creative agencies in Brazil and Australia. His work has won at all major advertising award shows – including 2 D&AD Black Pencils, 3 Cannes Grand Prix, and the ‘Champion for Humanity’ award at the UN’s Global Goals Week. In 2018 the Cannes Global Creativity Report ranked Gustavo the world’s number one Art Director, and the second most-awarded Creative Director. Gustavo is passionate about design, leading his team with collaboration, creativity and borrowing inspiration and knowledge from people and all facets of the world around him.

Emily is a creative user experience designer who champions design thinking in the development of a Software as a Service platform and immersive technology solutions at Snobal. Emily is interested in how emerging technologies can help solve problems, keep people connected and keep people learning in a rapidly changing environment. 

Eduardo is a creative technologist, researcher and senior lecturer at Melbourne University. His practice and research focus on interaction design for emerging technologies. Eduardo is interested in the novel user experiences that are enabled by the combination of novel input and sensing modalities, the design of new interaction devices and techniques, and the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning in interactive systems. 

Melbourne designers, artists and creators have contributed works of art in many different forms. Work will be curated from multidisciplinary designers, organisations, innovative thinkers and creators. The exhibition includes artwork from the speakers above and their collaborators as well as artist Serene Lau, The Wilderness Society campaign, Michael Davey from The Creative Works and many more.

In the name of doing good, entry is free to the exhibition with an optional $5 donation where proceeds will go towards a chosen charity by the contributors.

This event is supported by a number of dedicated members of AGDA VIC Council with special thanks to San San Truong, Simon Breese, Anita Lyons, Steve Robbins, Tereza Lee, Matt Brown and the rest of the team. It would not be happening without their hard work and dedication.

As an official AGDA Education Partner, JMC is proud to be supporting this event by providing support services.
We also appreciate the beautiful space provided by the Commons to host the talks.