The first project of the CalArts Design MFA program has been historically allocated to a week-long Charette in which students work together in small groups to develop type-based, site-specific installations around campus. Not only is the annual Charette a great ice breaker, it helps students to start the year by thinking outside the box. The results are often incredible interventions into the architecture of CalArts and a great introduction into the program’s values.

Open Infinity, created by Shibo Chen, Minjoo Cho, Nadia Haile, Onyou Kim, and Kaveria Zachariah was a a multimedia investigation into the history and chronology of type in graphic design, and how advances in media affect aesthetic decisions.

Abandon Normal Instructions, a participatory game which was developed by Xiyu Deng, Ella Gold, Sam Jones, and Tracy Tran, attempted to explore the idea that generative prompts could be applied cross-discipline. The group left prompts and art supplies in the institute’s main gallery, and by the time of critique, the project had taken on a life of its own!

Time Flies, by Emma Berliner, Jisoo Han, Xuanyi Lin, and Paul Wheatley, explored themes of time, technology, hand-held devices, and mirroring with their installation of house-fly larvae in a plexiglas vitrine. The flies matured into adulthood throughout the duration of the project, emerging from acrylic letterforms which spelled out the word “time”.  A time-lapse video of the project can be viewed here.

Cootie Catcher, by Aisha Alkiney, Christina Huang, Yuchen Liu, and Vivian Naranjo playfully examined the idea of originality and failure within the institution through the creation of an oversized children’s Fortune Teller (or Cootie Catcher).