Digital + Material

Innovation + Engagement

Combine cutting-edge digital practices with internationally-renowned art and craft studio disciplines in the Bachelor of Design.

Design students will benefit from deep immersion in digital, manual and theoretical studies and a wide overview of creative practices. From coding, to making, to manufacture, students apply hands-on design to digital and physical materials. Students delve into web design, data visualisation, and interaction design, and experiment in studios to develop expertise in the latest digital form and fabrication processes.

This degree prepares students with transferable knowledge and skills required to make their mark on a rapidly changing world.

When undertaking the Bachelor of Visual Arts at the ANU, you will be immersed in a program of rigorous scholarship and intensive studio practice, tailored to your aspirations and informed by internationally renowned art practitioners within Australia’s top-ranking university. You will graduate with the essential creative skills and critical knowledge to address the grand challenges of a rapidly changing world.

You will develop deep disciplinary knowledge and learn specialist skills offered across the School of Art and Design studio disciplines, including ceramics, glass, painting, photography and media arts, printmedia and drawing, sculpture and spatial practice, and textiles. You will extend your study through access to courses in the Centre for Art History and Art Theory, combined with access to electives from across the ANU.

Employment Opportunities

Graduates of the Bachelor of Design may find careers in fields including object design, visual communication, data visualisation, user experience design, graphic design, web design, interface design, design thinking and strategic design.

Graduates of the Bachelor of Design may find careers in fields including object design, visual communication, data visualisation, user experience design, graphic design, web design, interface design, design thinking and strategic design.

Learning Outcomes

1. demonstrate skills and knowledge of the practices, languages, forms, materials and technologies in their relevant discipline;
2. research, develop and evaluate design concepts and processes by thinking creatively, critically and reflectively;
3. apply skills and knowledge to the creation, visualisation and production of design projects;
4. work independently and collaboratively on design projects and respond to project demands;
5. interpret, communicate and present ideas, problems and arguments in modes suited to a range of audiences; and
6. recognise and reflect on social, cultural technological, environmental and ethical issues of creative practice and design considering local and international perspectives.

1. apply technical skills and specialist knowledge to realise artworks, artefacts and related forms of creative expression;
2. demonstrate skills and knowledge of the practices, languages, forms, materials, technologies and techniques in the visual arts;
3. recognise and reflect on social, cultural and ethical issues, and apply historical and theoretical perspectives to practice in the visual arts;
4. develop, express and evaluate ideas, concepts and processes by thinking creatively, critically and reflectively;
5. interpret, communicate and present ideas, problems and arguments in modes suited to a range of audiences; and
6. work independently and collaboratively in response to project demands.

Admission Requirements

Adjustment Factors

Adjustment factors are additional points added to an applicant's Selection Rank (for example an applicant's ATAR). ANU offers adjustment factors based on performance and equity principles, such as for high achievement in nationally strategic senior secondary subjects and for recognition of difficult circumstances that students face in their studies. 

Selection Rank adjustments are granted in accordance with the approved schedules, and no more than 15 (maximum 5 subject/performance-based adjustment factors and maximum 10 equity-based adjustment factors) can be awarded. 

You may be considered for adjustment factors if you have:

• applied for an eligible ANU Bachelor degree program
• undertaken Australian Year 12 or the International Baccalaureate
• achieved an ATAR or equivalent at or above 70
• not previously attempted tertiary study.

Please visit the ANU Adjustment Factors website for further information.

Scholarships

ANU offers a wide range of scholarships to students to assist with the cost of their studies.

Eligibility to apply for ANU scholarships varies depending on the specifics of the scholarship and can be categorised by the type of student you are.  Specific scholarship application process information is included in the relevant scholarship listing.

For further information see the Scholarships website.

Program Requirements

The Bachelor of Design flexible double degree component requires completion of 96 units, of which:

A maximum of 42 units may come from completion of 1000-level courses

The 96 units must include:

36 units from completion of the following compulsory courses:

DESN1002 Visual Communication: Design and Production

DESN1003 Contemporary Design in Context

DESN1004 The Past as Prototype: History, Ethics and Concepts for Design in the Twenty-First Century

DESN2008 Design Thinking: Human-Centred Design Methodologies

DESN3010 Design Studio: Independent Practice

DESN3011 Design Studio: Engagement and Collaboration

A minimum of 6 units from the completion of foundation courses from the following recommended list

ARTV1020 Figure and Life

ARTV1033 Hold Everything: Studio Foundation

ARTV1034 Foundations of Contemporary Arts Practices

DESN1005 Precise Drawing and Model Making

Or any other 1000 level ARTV course.

A minimum of 12 units from the completion of interdisciplinary concepts and theories courses from the following list:

ANTH1002 Culture and Human Diversity: Introducing Anthropology 

ANTH1003 Global Citizen: Culture, Development and Inequality 

ANTH2005 Traditional Australian Indigenous Cultures, Societies and Environment 

ANTH2009 Culture and Development 

ANTH2017 Culture, Social Justice and Aboriginal Society Today 

ANTH2025 Gender in Cross-Cultural Perspective 

ANTH2026 Medicine, Healing and the Body 

ANTH2132 Food for Thought: Anthropological Theories of Food and Eating 

ANTH2134 States and Citizens: Anthropological Perspectives 

ARTH1006 Art History and Curatorial Studies 1: Cultures and Meaning

ARTH1007 Art History and Curatorial Studies 2: Vision and Materiality

ARTH2001 Art History and Curatorial Studies In-Country 

ARTH2050 Photography and Art 

ARTH2052 Art of the Multiple 

ARTH2180 Fashion Histories

ARTH2098 Australian First Nations Art and Culture 

ARTH2167 Issues in Contemporary Craft and Design  

ARTH2169 Introducing Asian Modernisms

ARTH2170 Contemporary Asian Art 

ARTH2174 Art and the Body: Gender and Sexuality

ARTH2176 Cross Currents in Australian First Nations and Non-Indigenous Art and Culture 

ARTH3005 Art, Racial Politics, and the Public Sphere 

ARTH3057 Art and Politics of Collecting 

ENVS1001 Environment and Society: Geography of Sustainability 

ENVS1003 Introduction to Environmental and Social Research 

ENVS1004 Australia’s Environment 

ENVS1008 Sustainable Development 

GEND1001 Sex, Gender and Identity: An Introduction to Gender Studies 

GEND1002 Reading Popular Culture: An Introduction to Cultural Studies 

GEND2023 Gender, Sex and Sexuality: An Introduction to Feminist Theory 

GEND2034 Going Public: Sex, Sexuality and Feminism 

GEND2036 Excessive Appetites: Sociocultural Perspectives on Addiction and Drug Use 

GEND2057 Relationships, Marriage and Family 

HUMN1001 Digital Culture: Being Human in the Information Age 

HUMN2001 Introduction to Digital Humanities and Public Culture - Tools, Theories and Methods 

INDG1001 Country, Kinship and Continuities: An Introduction to Australian Indigenous Studies 

INDG1002 Resilience, Rights and Resurgence

INDG2001 Indigenous Cultural and Natural Resource Management 

MEDN2222 Exquisite Corpse - Insight into the Human Body 

PHIL1004 Fundamental Ideas in Philosophy: An Introduction 

PHIL1005 Logic and Critical Thinking 

PHIL1008 Introduction to Ethics 

PSYC1003 Psychology 1: Understanding Mind, Brain and Behaviour 

PSYC1004 Psychology 2: Understanding People in Context 

PSYC1005 The Wellbeing Formula: The Science and Practice of Making a Good Life 

SOCY1002 Self and Society 

SOCY1004 Economy and Society: Work, Care and Identity

SOCY1006 Society and Technological Change 

A minimum of 24 units from completion of design courses from the following list: 

DESN2001 Digital Form and Fabrication 

DESN2002 Foundations of Creative Code 

DESN2003 Creative Data Visualisation: Representing Data in Visual and Material Form 

DESN2004 Autonomous Agents

DESN2006 Front-End Web: Crafting Online Experience 

DESN2007 Design Fiction: Speculative and Critical Design 

DESN2009 Typography in Context: Digital Typographic Design 

DESN2010 Making Creative and Critical Technologies: Physical Computing for Art and Design 

DESN2012 The Ethics of Making: Design for Reuse and Repair 

DESN2015 Supporting Bodies: Now that we're here, where do we sit?

A maximum of 18 units from completion of studio courses listed in the:

Visual Arts Practice Minor

The Bachelor of Visual Arts flexible double degree component requires completion of 96 units, of which:

A maximum of 48 units may come from completion of 1000-level courses

The 96 units must include:

36 units from completion of the following compulsory courses:

ARTH1006 Art History and Curatorial Studies 1: Cultures and Meaning

ARTH1007 Art History and Curatorial Studies 2: Vision and Materiality

ARTV1034 Foundations of Contemporary Arts Practices

ARTV3033 Creative Research Practice: Developing an Independent Work Proposal

ARTV3035 Creative Research Practice: Extending and Consolidating an Independent Project (12 units)

A minimum of 12 units from completion of ARTV 1000-level courses, and/or courses from the following list:

DESN1002 Visual Communication: Design and Production

DESN1003 Contemporary Design in Context

DESN1005 Precise Drawing and Model Making

A minimum of 18 units from completion of ARTV 2000-level courses, and/or courses from the following list:

ARTV3507 Open to Influence: Studio Research

DESN2001 Digital Form and Fabrication

DESN2002 Foundations of Creative Code

DESN2003 Creative Data Visualisation: Representing Data in Visual and Material Form

DESN2004 Autonomous Agents

DESN2006 Front-end Web: Crafting online experience

DESN2007 Design Fiction: Speculative and Critical Design

DESN2009 Typography in Context

DESN2010 Making Creative and Critical Technologies: Physical Computing for Art & Design

DESN2012 The Ethics of Making: Design for Reuse and Repair

DESN2015 Supporting Bodies: Now that we’re here, where do we sit?

MEDN2222 Exquisite Corpse - Insight into the Human Body

6 units from completion of an engagement course from the following list:

ARTV2027 Professional Practice: Economies and Ecologies in the Australian Cultural Sector

ARTV2028 Professional Practices: Internship

ARTV2909 The Public Project: engagement strategies for artists, designers, institutions and communities

ARTV2921 Environment Studio: Field based Research and Studio Practice in Visual Arts

Minors

Bachelor of Visual Arts Minors

Bachelor of Design Minors