ABSTRACT
Traditionally, the role of the graphic designer is to translate information for a target audience using cultural signs and symbols (Friedman, 1 35; Aneceshi, 8-9). S/he creatively designs various types of conventional and unconventional communication artifacts to transport messages to their respective audience. The communication artifact transmits information to the target audience through its visual language and aesthetics comprised of emotive signs and symbols, graphics, visual treatments, and other types of image-based information (that the graphic designer chooses traditionally). In this traditional context, information exchange occurs at the intersection between the communication artifact and the audience’s perception of its aesthetic makeup (i.e. its graphic design). First, the graphic design attracts the audience’s attention. Second, the target audience interacts with the communication artifact in order to retrieve a message. If the audience lingers to read the information in its entirety and/or returns for more information, it is then that effective communication occurs. Therefore, a communication artifact composed by the graphic designer succeeds in transporting the message to the target audience when the visual information emotionally induces the target audience to read it.
