Cross Connections 2024: International Exhibition

September 3–November 15, 2024
HGA Gallery, Rapson Hall

Cross Connections is an international design event and conduit for contemporary currents across design academia since 2009. Now in its fourth edition, the 2024 program includes a design competition, a juried exhibition, and a webinar series on design thinking. Project leadership is rooted in Texas, led by the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, the International Museum of Art and Science in McAllen, and the Brownsville Museum of Fine Arts in Brownsville.

This year’s competition welcomed 525 entries of digital design in the areas of Visual Communication Design from Emerging Media Design from both faculty and students at 20 institutions around the world: from the United States and Mexico, to Portugal and Belgium, to China, Taiwan, and Korea. An international jury selected 100 print-based artworks and 88 screen-based multimedia pieces spanning diverse visual applications. These have been exhibited at higher education institutions around the world concurrently in Spring 2024 and this Fall. 

This installation presents a selection from the full exhibition, curated by Zenas Seiji Ikeda. Rather than being distinguished by geography, discipline, or faculty vs student creation, the works here are organized to blend across these borders. Examples include posters, print design, infographics, branding, packaging, typography, UX/UI design, and AI-generated artworks. Four works on view are by UMN College of Design faculty, Terresa Moses and Zenas Seiji Ikeda.