Ahn Sang-soo obtained his BFA and MFA in 1981 from Hongik University in Seoul. He also received an Honorary Doctor of Design in 2001 from Kingston University, London. After college, Ahn worked for an advertising agency for five years. From 1981 to 1985 he worked as an art director for Madang and Meot magazine. Subsequently he started Ahn Graphics design firm, and in 1991 he began his professorship in Typography at Hongik University, his alma mater. He has also been the editor and art director of the underground artculture magazine <report /report> since 1988.

Internationally, Ahn was Vice-President of Icograda 1997-2001, and the Chairman of Icograda Millennium Oullim Congress 2000 as well as TypoJanchi 2001. Ahn has also done various individual and group exhibitions in many countries around the world. He is the 1998 recipient of the Grand Prix of Zgraf8, and the 2007 Gutenberg Award from Leipzig, Germany.

His major projects include new design system for the Korean Buddhist Chogye Order (2004), Ssamzie Art Book (1997), Life-peace movement Symbol (2004) and cultural posters. One of his most notable contributions is his continual development of new Hangeul typefaces.

www.ag.co.kr

Freeman was born in Hong Kong in 1958 and studied at the Hong Kong Polytechnic. He has won well over 300 international and local design awards. In 2004, Freeman’s design for Watson’s Water, which won the international Bottled Water World Design Awards, successfully created a symbiosis between art, culture, design and business, significantly increasing the brand’s share of the market while contributing to the local art / cultural movement.

Freeman is also recognised in the fine arts world for his intriguing sculptures and public art. His iconic Chairplay series has been exhibited in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Taipei and Holland, and auctioned at Sotheby’s.

Freeman is currently the Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of Hong Kong Design Centre, Secretary General of Hong Kong Federation of Design Associations and member of the Design Management Institute (DMI) Advisory Council.

He has been awarded the Bronze Bauhinia Star by the Government of HKSAR in recognition of his contribution towards enhancing Hong Kong design globally and in promoting design education. In 2007, he became the Director of Beijing Creative Centre, sharing his vision and experience with the practitioners of China’s Creative Industries.

www.kanandlau.com
www.freemanlau.com

Tanzil graduated from California College of the Arts in 1985, worked in the US and Indonesia before establishing LeBoYe (from the French Le Beaux Yeaux or “The Good Eye”) in 1990.

In 1996, Tanzil created Boeatan Indonesia Asli—Authentic Indonesian project with the objective of demonstrating to his fellow countrymen that Indonesian cultural heritage was immensely rich, unique and vital. The response was overwhelming—for the first time people related graphic design to real life and that it was embedded in our everyday culture from the time of our ancestors.

Tanzil’s aesthetic reflects an original blend of Eastern influences, paying homage to the wealth of Indonesian philosophy, myths, traditions and art forms, presented with a modern sensibility. LeBoYe have won many national and international design awards including Type Directors Club of New York, Communication Arts, and featured in publications such as Progetto Gravico Magazine and the recent art4D Magazine, Thailand. LeBoYe’s works have been exhibited in Rio de Janeiro, Tokyo and Toronto.

www.leboyedesign.com
leboye.wordpress.com

Upon graduation from the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts in 1996, Little spent the next three years working as an independent graphic and interactive designer, photographer and illustrator.

At the end of 1999, Little founded fFurious, a critically-acclaimed design agency with the notion that creativity should not be bound by medium. Relentlessly multi-disciplinary, fFurious expanded the initial boundaries of graphic / motion / interactive design, illustration and photography to a diversity of work that, almost 10 years later, have included live video performances, art exhibitions, experimental short films, a comic series, toys and merchandise design, and most recently, interior design for an upcoming concept hotel.

“From banners listing up-coming shows at the Esplanade to touch-screen kiosks at the National Museum, evidence of fFurious’ quirky-cool aesthetic can be found all over Singapore”—The Straits Times Singapore.

www.ffurious.com

Sudhir graduated from the National Institute of Design, India, in 1989. His passion is to inspire organisations to innovate and transform using design processes. He believes that ideas, innovations and processes from emerging markets are the only future of sustainable growth for businesses.

As co-founder, director and COO of Elephant Design, Sudhir worked with some of India’s biggest clients. Recent projects include strategic branding for 3rd Commonwealth Youth Games in the city of Pune, as well as pro-bono city branding of Pune, initiating a full programme without any commissioning—possibly the first of its kind in the world.

Sudhir is a frequent speaker at many international design and innovation seminars and has published three books. He often appears in the media as a spokesperson for Indian design and was featured as a ‘Young Turk’ in CNBC’s series on young achievers.

Sudhir has been on the Automobile Awards Jury for five years and a jury on the prestigious inaugural Cannes Design Lions 2008. He recently attended the Sustainability for Tomorrow’s Consumers workshop (part of the World Economic Forum) as an Expert.

Sudhir is about to launch a new collaborative network initiative that will be a new form of design service offering for clients around the world.

sudhirelephant@mac.com

Tarek Atrissi was born in Beirut and has worked in Lebanon, The Netherlands, Qatar, UAE and the United States.

His work has been exhibited at the Guggenheim Museum in New York and is in the permanent Design Collection of the Affiche Museum in Holland. His numerous awards include the Type Directors Club, The Dutch Design Award, and two Adobe Design Achievement Awards, to name a few. In 2005 he was selected by Print Magazine’s Twenty under Thirty jury as one of the most achieved visual artist below the age of 30.

Tarek lectures widely across the globe and is the founder of www.arabictypography.com, the online communication platform for Arabic type. His studio is highly respected for cross-cultural design, and research and development of contemporary Typo / Graphic Arabic Design. The team designed Qatar’s country visual identity in 2004, and for clients such as BBC, MTV, Georgetown University, Etisalat Telecommunications and Al-Ghad newspaper in Jordan.

Tarek was a creative director with Meta Design in Germany, and has consulted with international brand consultancies such as Wolf Ollins and Futurebrand.

www.atrissi.com
www.arabictypography.com