Graphic Design (BFA)

Angela Riechers is an award-winning writer, art director, and educator. She writes primarily about typography in her weekly column for the AIGA blog Eye on Design, as well as for numerous design-related publications including Wallpaper, Metropolis, Print, and Design Observer. Prior to her arrival at UArts, she founded the TypeLab summer residency at the School of Visual Arts in New York, taught design at the Fashion Institute of Technology, Queens College, and SVA, and developed an online learning program, The Complete Typographer, for SVA. Angela is the recipient of an AOL Artists grant for Sites of Memory, a multimedia project that reattaches historical narratives to their original locations in New York City through audio guided walking tours and map-based visual archives. In her previous incarnation as an art director, she created concepts and page layouts for everything from Harper's Magazine to iPad apps for O, the Oprah Magazine, with stops at Dr. Oz the Good Life, Condé Nast Portfolio, The New York Times, and Martha Stewart Living. 

She holds a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA from the School of Visual Art's Design Criticism Program.

Visit Angela Riecher's website

Ana Villarreal, a first generation Mexican-American was born in Rochester Hills, Michigan, and grew up in Metepec, Mexico, and Seoul, South Korea—she is truly a world citizen. Not surprisingly, a wide range of cultural influences is present in her design work.

Though she comes from a family of engineers and business-minded individuals, she was creative from a young age and a design career felt like a natural choice for her. Ana has focused on social causes when it comes to her internships, and is passionate about the power of design and innovation in driving social progress.

Since age 4, I had always been drawing, painting, animating or designing something. It was only natural that I stumbled upon UArts. What I didn’t know was that I was fortunate enough to end up at a university with a Graphic Design program with a 50-year tradition of success. The program almost stretched me beyond my limits and, by the end of it all, I knew it had changed me for the better. I became more aware and respectful of my creative process. I never knew how my projects would evolve, and to me that is greatest gift of design thinking: It highlights endless possibilities while guiding you towards the truest path.

As a senior designer now at Superunion, a global branding agency, it’s patience and the willingness to be comfortable with doubt that yields some of my best creative work. These successes have resulted from a beginning where I never forecast the end, but trusted my creative process to arrive at an inventive solution.

Aubrey Fink got into graphic design by accident. She says, “I thought it was the same thing as advertising. I was wrong, so, so wrong.”

Aubrey used the skills she learned in the Graphic Design program and a financial grant from the Corzo Center for the Creative Economy to create a passion project called The Bridge, a new kind of women’s magazine. She was inspired by the intergenerational relationships among the women in her family, who meet twice a year to discuss things that women actually talk about: sex, menopause, telling your gyno you’ve been sleeping around, addiction and the latest skincare routine. Aubrey shares 25 percent of all proceeds from The Bridge with Girls Inc. of Greater Philadelphia, to support the organization’s mission of inspiring all girls to be smart, strong and bold. 

Meet Graphic Design alum Mike Tyson '12, a graphic designer at Siegel + Gale in NYC.

Mike Tyson