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PHOTOGRAPHY

The Indecisive Moment

with Jaya Pelupessy

This exhibition presents the outcome of a five-day workshop led by artist Jaya Pelupessy, where students explored the unstable terrain between creation and reproduction. Through hands-on experiments with various duplication methods and strategies of appropriation, the workshop invited a reconsideration of the image—not as a final product, but as a process, a question, a site of continuous transformation. Embracing moments of uncertainty, trial and error, and unexpected discovery, participants focused on what Pelupessy calls The Indecisive Moment: the in-between phase where outcomes are unclear and intention is disrupted by chance. These works reflect a shift from the pursuit of fixed meaning toward an image in flux—unfinished, open, and relational.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Applied Photography

with Calypso Mahieu

ZOOM IN ZOOM OUT This course, both practical and technical, required students to develop a true photographer’s eye. Its goal was to introduce them to or help them refine their skills in various photographic genres, such as still life, portraiture, architecture, as well as documentary and staged photography. These disciplines demanded particular attention and great rigor in selecting models, locations, and objects. Mastery of composition, framing, and light management—whether natural or artificial—was essential for achieving successful shots. Throughout the course, students were encouraged to sharpen their sense of observation and their ability to create images that were both precise and expressive.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Workshop with Thomas Rousset

with Thomas Rousset

The aim of this workshop is to explore the boundary between docu-fiction and magic realism in photography, using the architecture and spaces of the ECAL as a narrative framework. Both approaches are rooted in reality, but differ in the way they inject fiction.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Visual Identity BA3 S1 2024-2025

with Gilles Gavillet

Through the prism of visual identity, this project addresses issues of graphic language and artistic direction. Each stage of the project examines an aspect of the development of a visual identity: research, concept, visual language, design and communication.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Genius Loci - Spirit of the place

with Nicole Udry

Genius Loci, or the spirit of the place, refers to the unique identity or essence of a location. In architecture, this principle suggests that the specific characteristics of a place should be reflected and extended in a design. In the case of the second-year graphic design students, they have applied this principle to communication projects focused on promoting or extending the identity of a particular place through design. Their work likely explores how to visually capture and communicate the essence of a space, using graphic design elements that resonate with the architectural features or history of the place.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

So, how can we live better?

with Nicole Udry

Beyond questions of functionality, comfort and individual or collective well-being, the built environment is capable of responding in a stimulating way to societal, energy and environmental challenges. Workplaces, homes, public spaces, interiors and streets are all driven by real statements of intent that motivate their design. The 2nd year Graphic Design students worked on a communication based on one of these principles (or others) and on the architectural creation that refers to it in order to promote it.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Dynamic Identity - 2024

with Angelo Benedetto

First-year students explored the creation of dynamic identities for fictional places. This project, part of the Dynamic Display course led by Angelo Benedetto, challenged them to imagine graphic universes reflecting the essence of each invented location.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

PHOTOGRAPHY

SYNC SCREEN

with Charlotte Krieger, Jean-Vincent Simonet, Florian Pittet (Sigmasix), Vincent Jacquier, Julien Gurtner, Matthieu Minguet, Cédric Duchêne, EPFL+ECAL Lab, Giacomo Bastianelli

For a week, the first-year visual communications students worked on an installation consisting of 15 screens, accompanied by a 360° sound system developed by EPFL+ECAL Lab. This chandelier, five metres in diameter and suspended from a height of three metres, served as a support for their experiments. Using music specially composed and spatialised for the occasion, the students explored the dynamics of sound both visually and in movement.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Retinaa workshop

by Candice Aepli, Amélie Bertholet, Coraline Beyeler, Delphine Brantschen, Léa Corin, Matteo Cortesi, Mathilde Driebold, Eliot Dubi, Marc Facchinetti, Emilie Müller, Dorian Pangallo, Paul Paturel, Hugo Scholl, Diego Steiner, Cyprien Valenza, Alfredo Venti, Arnaud Wenger, Constance Mauler, Flora Hayoz, Lidia Molina González, Vladislav Tschumi

During this week, the students had to create Obi Strip, a strip of paper surrounding the cover of a vinyl. A visible layer representing the world of their vinyl and an invisible layer creating a security raster. The result was screen-printed, using visible ink and UV ink for the security design.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

So, how can we live better?

with Nicole Udry

Beyond questions of functionality, comfort and individual or collective well-being, the built environment is capable of responding in a stimulating way to societal, energy and environmental challenges. Workplaces, homes, public spaces, interiors and streets are all driven by real statements of intent that motivate their design. The 2nd year Graphic Design students worked on a communication based on one of these principles (or others) and on the architectural creation that refers to it in order to promote it.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

PHOTOGRAPHY

Anthracite

by Emma Grosu, Seraphine Sallin-Mason, Rebecca Alfandary

The Anthracite project aims to raise public awareness about the dangers of light pollution, which threatens the survival of nocturnal insects and impacts biodiversity in Switzerland. Through a carefully crafted edition blending scientific outreach and photography, the project strikes a delicate balance between poetry and urgency. Anthracite also takes shape in two additional formats: a visual installation made up of striking images, and a teaser video. These mediums of awareness immerse the audience by adopting the perspective of an insect, inviting viewers to directly experience the effects of human-caused pollution. Ultimately, the project seeks to inspire greater protection for the vulnerable insects at risk.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Aude Gunzinger – Les Résidences nomades

with Guy Meldem, Nicole Udry

When the usual limits of publishing are pushed back, our senses are confused. We are confronted with new perspectives. Les Résidences Nomades engages the reader in a narrative through movement and body in a 9-meter pictorial language. It depicts a particular place and the customs of those who frequent it. Step by step, we discover a subtle reflection on fantasy, variations in perception and the limits of language.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Ella Paleni – Trait de caractère

with Guy Meldem, Gilles Gavillet

The place of the graphic designer in the age of technological advances: today’s world is in constant technological evolution, which raises questions about the place and role of the graphic designer. In this graduation project, I set out to explore this issue by adopting a resolutely manual and artisanal approach. I created a book from A to Z, using traditional manufacturing techniques, from the elaboration of the paper to the final binding. By moving away from the omnipresent process of digitalisation, I sought to express a need to return to the very essence of the graphic design profession. This project highlights the advantages of an artisanal approach in an increasingly digital world. It encourages reflection on the specific skills that graphic designers can bring to the table.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Louis Roh – Les chemins perdus

with Guy Meldem, Diego Bontognali

Millennia ago, humankind discovered electricity and never stopped exploiting and reinventing it, unconcerned, considering this resource to be infinite. This book, Les Chemins Perdus, opens up new horizons, between dream and fiction, through realistic and poetic notions. What if all the lights went out? It stimulates the imagination and offers readers light, childlike speculation. Interest in illustration, storytelling and printing techniques brings this graphic tale to life. This journey of colours and images appeals to a multi-generational audience, tapping into the potential of children’s books in these tense and confusing times.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Hugo Jauffret – Red Sea Last Hope

with Nicole Udry, Jonathan Hares

Recent scientific studies reveal that Red Sea corals are more resilient than average to rising water temperatures. This unique coral refuge on earth gives great hope to scientists and allows them to analyse factors of coral resistance before they to eventually disappear. Red Sea Last Hope combines scientific reports, expedition accounts and geopolitical archives, aiming to raise awareness about the gradual disappearance of corals while highlighting the influence of the geopolitics of the Red Sea, which is delaying research.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Ianka Jean-Marie – HYPER-OBJETS

with Gilles Gavillet, Nicole Udry

Part art book, part science textbook, this meta-encyclopaedia evokes the risks of global warming. Going beyond the usual paradigms of the Anthropocene era, these phenomena are known as HYPER-OBJECTS. Through the reading of a simplified language, this system of mental maps conceptualises these complex phenomena. In the context of the ecological crisis, the materialisation of this ecological thinking allows us to measure our impact, while reinterpreting the phenomenon of the end of the world in a more tangible way. Through this visual archaeology, we search for traces of our contemporary civilisation, questioning our relationship with the future. In truth, doesn’t this object bear witness to the destructive movement of the end of the world?

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Alice Moor – Baraonda

with Aurèle Sack, Guy Meldem

Baraonda is a playful system designed to help run creative activities. The workshop is based on a wheel of fortune made up of several circles that determine the characteristics and rules that will be put in place. Nine stages have been devised, starting with the widest circle and working down to the narrowest. A working theme is determined, followed by a technique, different materials, colours, and so on. In addition to the series of circles, I developed various materials to support the workshops: wooden stencils, a collection of images and self-adhesive letters. The development of the project and the results of the activities carried out in primary school classes in Lausanne have been brought together in a printed edition. The whole package comes in a cloth-covered cardboard box.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Michelle Zadio Villarroel – Nativo+Latino

with Gilles Gavillet, Jonathan Hares

Nativo+Latino reinvents the heritage and syncretism of the South American continent. Long shaped by the evangelisation of the indigenous people, the consequences of this mix of identities bears witness to the cultural and religious alienation of Latinos. Gradually, awareness of the indigenous condition has pushed their descendants to honour and revive their cult. This project is a place where Latin communities, who aim to reclaim this heritage that was until now regarded as pagan beliefs, to come together, confront one another and express themselves. Nativo takes the shape of ancestral memories and a collective imagination that reflects a reinterpretation of the practice of Catholicism in Latin America in order to restore power in a hybrid vision of identity.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Marjolaine Rey – Ici prochainement votre appartement

with Aurèle Sack, Diego Bontognali

Ici Prochainement Votre Appartement is the transition from private property to public space. On the eve of moving out of the family home, but especially in view of its imminent demolition, I have placed La Maison (The House) in a brand-new space, i.e. a book. This book, more than a personal monologue, is an invitation to enter through text and image. From the gate to the garden to the door, all the way to the attic, where the library lies. Iconography drawn from this library has an impact on the layout of the entire volume. The space of the book is my playground. The quarto format conceals half of the content between the pages. It is up to the readers to decide whether or not they want to enter each room of La Maison when they visit. Welcome to my home, soon to be yours…

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Laeticia Jakob – Sabina?

with Nicole Udry, Guy Meldem

The “Neovertebra” population continues to decline, decimated by high temperatures and food shortages. Nothing grows outside the greenhouses. To remedy the attacks that threaten the plantations, Sabina and Greg develop a dandelion-based fertiliser. Sabina? is a graphic novel in response to the possible collapse of civilisation. Faced with a certain sense of helplessness and passivity, the technique of hand collage appears as a palimpsest through which history can assume new perspectives. Collected images and personal creations accumulate and decay over the course of this dystopia, encouraging the reader to project and assimilate this information.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

LA POSTE × ECAL

with La Poste, Vincent Jacquier, Angelo Benedetto

For the Swiss Post Office, students from ECAL's Bachelor Graphic Design and Bachelor Media & Interaction Design are creating a postage stamp based on artificial intelligence. Thanks to augmented reality, Metascape transports Swiss Post users into an imaginary and poetic universe on the way to a destination that remains elusive.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Remix

by Candice Aepli, Amélie Bertholet, Coraline Beyeler, Delphine Brantschen, Léa Corin, Matteo Cortesi, Mathilde Driebold, Eliot Dubi, Marc Facchinetti, Sébastien Follet, Emilie Müller, Dorian Pangallo, Paul Paturel, Adam Saragoussi, Hugo Scholl, Diego Steiner, Cyprien Valenza, Alfredo Venti, Arnaud Wenger

Workshop with Helmo During this week, the students created a new version of vinyl cover by remixing their graphic elements.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Création d'image

with Guy Meldem

During the image creation course with Guy Meldem, the students had to develop an editorial project around the faux. Each student chose an artist trying to reproduce his or her style through the creation of a 16-page booklet.

PHOTOGRAPHY

PRATIQUE PHOTOGRAPHIQUE

with Maxime Guyon

"Sculpture" is an intentionally broad theme to give this semester project in order to stimulate experimentation and freedom of realization. Sculpture is an artistic medium that allows for the realization of volume forms forms in volume thanks to innumerable techniques that have been used since the Paleolithic era to our contemporary society. This is an ambitious project where each student will have to complete a series of images highlighting their creations through advanced techniques of composition and light in the studio. Creating a sculpture is for some artists, for others it is a spontaneous way to elaborate a body of spontaneous way to develop a body of work.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Encyclopedia of Demons

with Atlas Studio

After choosing a demon from Theresa Bane's Encyclopedia of Demons, each student had to visually reinterpret the characteristics of their demon in several ways. A stencil printing technique (cutting a sheet of paper) allowed students to create their visuals on the spot and independently.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Bichromix

with Guy Meldem

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Communication of an architecture

with Nicole Udry

Create a communication of a chosen building (a school, a religious space, an office building, a theater, etc.). Second year course of graphic design in context, centered on image creation and editorial design.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Projet de création

with Guy Meldem

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Communication of an event

with Diego Bontognali, Nicole Udry

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Fanélie Muselier – Whodat

with Guy Meldem, Nicole Udry

Whodat is a music video for the group Nola is Calling, which took shape in New  Orleans. The album was produced locally and is inspired by the musical culture of the city. The group is made up of six artists from three different countries; they have created a sound mix that comes from every corner of the world and from a time somewhere between the past and the present of the instruments they play. The song I worked on is characteristic of the city and was inspired by its colourful atmosphere. The video proposes a stroll through its most emblematic districts. I used a felt-tip pen cartoon technique.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Mathilde Avogadro – It's OK

with Guy Meldem, Nicole Udry

How do social media have an impact on individuals? How can this constant flow  of information nourish me, shape and influence my own personality and feelings? How can it have an impact on self-esteem and be self-empowering at the same time? There is a gap between the constant feed of images and texts and my own loneliness.  I stop the clock to draw attention to a global mode of communication that also produces inner communication as the result of every single feed echoing within us.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Federico Barbon – Alessandro Calabrese — The Long Thing

with Jonathan Hares, Guy Meldem

I had the opportunity to collaborate with the Italian artist Alessandro Calabrese on a monograph of his latest work. In this work the artist used a flatbed scanner to create all the works that are part of this project. Initially I was faced with this gap between photographic production and manual photographic composition. I was spontaneously inspired to take over the artist's production codes to design the book. In fact the entire book is composed through the use a scanner by hand.

GRAPHIC DESIGN

Moins Zéro

with Denis Roueche, Prune Simon-Vermot

During 4 days, the students in the first year of the Bachelor's degree in Graphic Design and Photography were confronted with the weather in the Far North of La Chaux-de-Fond and presented the results of their work in the form of a giant calendar at QUARTIER GENERAL. With the participation of students: Pauline Baldinetti, Ines Barrionuevo, David Benito Py, Alexandre Brunisholz, Emma Chapuis, Lucien Grandjean, Hugo Hectus, Elena Najdovski, Julie Neuhaus, Laetitia Paroz, Guillaume Pavia, Caroline Perrenoud, Amanda Puna, Alizée Quinche, Clara Roumegoux, Steven Rüthy, Julie Ryser, Guillaume Schilter, Samuel Schmidt, Timo Tiffert, Laura Trummer, Adeline Vermot, Loris Wahler, Justine Willa Teachers: Denis Roueche, Prune Simon Vermot Assistants: Amaury Hamon, Clément Lambelet, Olivia Schenker