Alessandro Segalini

In 2012 I designed the logo, CfP form, and collaborated with faculty and students on the identity of the event Balkan Locus-Focus: Long 20th Century Communication Design Histories — the first symposium on Balkan communication design histories organized by the Faculty of Fine Arts and Design, Visual Communication Design Department at Izmir University of Economics (IUE), Turkey, and the School of Art and Design History and Theory at Parsons The New School for Design, USA.

The two-day Balkan Locus-Focus symposium intended to offer first insights on the silent and poorly recorded histories of communication design in the Balkan peninsula, focusing on the period from the late 19th century to the present.

The logo was designed using the font FF Tisa by Mitja Miklavčič, and one particular historical map of the Balkans from J.G. Bartholomew’s Literary and Historical Atlas of Europe.​

The conference is notably important for being a first attempt to comprehensively map visual communication (in the areas of graphic design, advertising, typography, web design, media, and inclusive of non-commercial examples, private initiatives and state/civil service design) in the socio-political and mental territories of the region.

Consisting of heterogeneous cultural groups and diverse socio-economic structures, the Balkan region has had a turbulent history in the last century, marked by violent manifestations of ethnic conflict but also by regimes that fostered political integration. Its multiple design histories sometimes intersected, but often diverged to distinct national trajectories that looked for points of reference beyond the region’s geographical borders.

The book of proceedings can be viewed on ISSUU or dowloaded from Academia.edu.​