Biografie
Sarah Owens is an award-winning design educator and researcher whose work centres on social and anthropological aspects of visible language and visual cultures. In particular, she is interested in marginalised and hidden narratives, practices and epistemologies; in issues of alterity, affect and imagination; and in educating for uncertain times. Her work is driven by a belief in transcending the confines of disciplinary boundaries, in advocating for encounter and dialogue, and in working towards ways of being and knowing that resonate with the complexities of our contemporary existence.
She holds a Ph.D. in Typography and Graphic Communication from the University of Reading, a M.A.(RCA) in History of Design from the Royal College of Art/Victoria & Albert Museum in London, and a graduate diploma in Communication Design from the University of Applied Sciences Augsburg. In 2009, her dedication to the field was acknowledged when she was awarded a fellowship and artist residency at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, and more recently in 2021, when she received the prestigious Grand Prix of Design by the Swiss Federal Office of Culture for her long-standing and exceptional contribution to design education and research.
Her discursive practice brings together teaching, writing, speaking, publishing and social engagement, and serves as a catalyst for prompting post-disciplinary conversations within and outside the academic sphere. Alongside her academic roles, and roles as a speaker, moderator and panelist, she co-directs and co-organises cultural events with a focus on film, literature and fine arts, collaborating with artists, authors, curators, filmmakers, performers and educators, as well as leading cultural institutions.
Owens is currently tenured Professor of Visual Communication and Visual Culture, and Chair of the subject area Visual Communication at Zurich University of the Arts. Having taught for nearly 20 years at all levels of higher education, including supervision of Ph.D.s, she has influenced a new generation of designers, artists, researchers and educators. Her pedagogical approach supports multimodality and expanded practices, challenges dogmatism and encourages openness and curiosity. As chair, she has continuously shaped and reinvented the profile of her subject area by anchoring visual research and visual cultures as core study areas and by opening up the curriculum for explorative and inquiring processes. In addition, since 2020, she is president of the Swiss Design Network (SDN), an association dedicated to fostering scientific exchange and supporting emerging design researchers in Switzerland and abroad.
She has initiated, led and participated in several third-party funded research projects concerning design history, design sociology, images, typography, design pedagogy, hybrid publishing and aesthetic practices, including "Swiss Typography and Graphic Design Revisited” (2016–2020), which stands as the largest research project in design history funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation to date, and consolidated design history as a field of academic research in Switzerland. She has also spearheaded and organised a number of international symposia and conferences, most recently “Counterparts: Exploring Design Beyond the Human” (2022), which discussed the possibility of shifting away from human-centred and universalist views of design towards contemplating new ways of co-existence and co-emergence. Furthermore, she is a recognised expert on everyday design, a topic she has been exploring for over fifteen years by investigating the epistemic and praxeological conditions for design as an everyday action, the democratisation of design processes in the digital age, and the relationship between everyday and professional designers.
Sarah Owens’s work has been disseminated widely through numerous talks, journal articles, essays, edited books and monographs. As editor and publisher, she has in collaboration with Björn Franke recently launched “Seeing,” a series of books that contemplates the peripheries of what we consider visually perceptible, comprehensible or expressible.
Publikationen / Diskografie / Ausstellungen / Werke
Research Projects
2022–2025
Designgeschichte der SBB / Design History of the Swiss Federal Railway
funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, main applicant and project lead: Sarah Owens.
2018–2020
Cache: An Explorative Study on Open Access as a socio-technical system
funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, led by Nils Güttler (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology), project partner: Sarah Owens / MA Visual Communication.
2016-2020
Swiss Graphic Design and Typography Revisited
funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, Sinergia programme (main applicant: Arne Scheuermann, co-applicants: Michael Renner, Sarah Owens and Peter Schneemann)
2016–2018
Dynamic Branding for Cultural Institutions
in cooperation with Museum Rietberg Zurich (project lead: Sarah Owens)
2014-2015
Art School Differences
funded by the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation SERI (applicant: Carmen Mörsch, project managers: Philippe Saner, Sophie Vögele, Pauline Vessely, co-researcher: Sarah Owens)
2012-2014
Wolfgang Weingart: Typography in Context
funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, DORE programme (applicant: Sigrid Schade, project manager: Barbara Junod, research associate: Sarah Owens)
2009-2011
Making / Crafting / Designing
funded by Akademie Schloss Solitude, arts science and business programme (applicants and project managers: Sarah Owens, Björn Franke)
Conferences and Symposia
2022
Conference Co-Chair, Organizer and Member of Scientific Commitee, Counterparts: Exploring Design Beyond the Human, SDN Design Research Winter Summit, Zurich University of the Arts
2021
Conference Co-Chair and Member of Scientific Commitee, Design as Common Good, SDN Design Research Winter Summit, SUPSI University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland and HSLU Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts
2018
Conference Co-Chair and Member of Scientific Committee, Beyond Change, Swiss Design Network Design Research Winter Summit, Academy of Art and Design, University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland
2013
Symposium Organizer, Design Unfolds: Contemporary Creative Strategies from Appropriation to Collaboration, Department of Design, Zurich University of the Arts
2011
Symposium Organizer, Making / Crafting / Designing: Perspectives on Design as a Human Activity, Akademie Schloss Solitude Stuttgart
2010
Member of the Scientific Committee, Design Activism and Social Change, Design History Society Annual Conference, Universitat de Barcelona
Publications
Owens, S. (Forthcoming). When knowledges collide. In: The Participatory Image, ed. cielab (Critical Icono Ethnography Lab). Bielefeld: Transcript.
Owens, S. (2022). Teaching uncertainty, inviting the unknown. In: Lysianne Léchot Hirt, Regards croisés sur la recherche: Intelligences multiples du design, ed. Julie Enckell, 165–169. Genève: Metis Presses.
Fornari, D., Lzicar, R., Owens, S., Renner, M., Scheuermann, A., and Schneemann, P. J. (Eds.) (2021). Swiss Graphic Design Histories. 4 Volumes. Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess and Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Barbieri, C., Berthod, J., Delamadeleine, C., Fornari, D., and Owens, S. (Eds.) (2021). Swiss Graphic Design Histories – Volume 2: Multiple Voices. Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess and Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Fornari, D., Lzicar, R., Owens, S., Renner, M., Scheuermann, A. and Schneemann, P. J. (Eds.) (2021). “New perspectives on Swiss graphic design.” Special Issue. Design Issues 37, No. 1 (January).
Owens, S. and R. El-Maawi. (2021). Who Intervenes? Thoughts from the Perspective of Arts and Culture Activism. In: C. Binswanger and A. Zimmermann (Eds.) Transitioning to Gender Equality, 43–52. Basel: MDPI.
Owens, S. (2020). Keep feeling fascination: Design and open enquiry. In: B. Franke and H. Matter (Eds.) Not at your service: Manifestos for design, 125–137. Basel: Birkhäuser.
Owens, S. (2019). Undoing design / Odprojektowac projektowanie. Formy Journal of Design, no. 1. https://formy.xyz/en/artykul/undoing-design/
Owens, S. (2019). Foreword. In: S. Baum, C. Scheer, and L. Sievertsen (Eds.), notamuse: A new perspective on women graphic designers in Europe, 6–7. Salenstein: Niggli.
Owens, S. (2019). On the Professional and Everyday Design of Graphic Artifacts. In: M. Nygaard Folkmann, H.-C. Jensen, G. Julier, A. V. Munch and N. P. Skov (Eds.), Design Culture: Objects and Approaches, 145-156. London: Bloomsbury.
Owens, S. and Franke, B. (Eds.) (2018). 94 Strange Sensations. A Dictionary of the Unseen. Zurich: Zurich University of the Arts, VVK.
Botta, M., Mareis, C., Müggler-Zumstein, I., Owens, S., Scheuermann, A. and Sutermeister, A.-C. (Eds.). (2018). Unfrozen: Design Research Today. Zurich: Triest.
Owens, S. (Ed.). (2017). Design Unfolds. Contemporary Creative Strategies from Appropriation to Collaboration. Zurich: Zurich University of the Arts, VVK.
Junod, B., Owens, S. and Gendre, V. (2014). Wolfgang Weingart: Typographie im Kontext. Untersuchungen zu Tradition, Medienumbrüchen und Innovation im Werk von Wolfgang Weingart. In: Institute for Cultural Studies in the Arts and Design Museum Zurich (Eds.), Weingart Typografie. Zurich: Design Museum Zurich.
Owens, S., Meltzer, B. and von Oppeln, T. (Eds.). (2013). Design Exhibited. OnCurating.org, No. 17. Zurich: Dorothee Richter, Michael Birchall, Silvia Simoncelli.
Owens, S. (2012). Design is Ordinary. Lay Graphic Communication and Its Relation to Professional Graphic Design Practice. PhD Dissertation. University of Reading.
Owens, S. (2012). Zwischen Ideal und Realität. Das Streben nach gestalterischer (Un)vollkommenheit. DOC. Magazin der Fakultät für Design der Hochschule München, 4, 34-39.
Owens, S. (2009). A Study of Lay Graphic Communication. In: Proceedings of the 2009 ACM SIGCHI Conference on Creativity and Cognition, 341-342. New York: The Association for Computing Machinery.
Owens, S. (2009). Visual Continuity and Innovation in Editorial Design Practice. In: G. Julier and L. Moor (Eds.), Design and Creativity: Policy, Management and Practice, 191-203. Oxford: Berg.
Owens, S. (2008). Review of Active Literature: Jan Tschichold and New Typography by Christopher Burke. Journal of Design History 21(4), 393-395.
Owens, S. (2006). The Evolution of Type: Mutant Typography. In: T. de Rijk and J. W. Drukker (Eds.). Design History Society Conference. Delft: Delft University of Technology.
Owens, S. (2006). Electrifying the Alphabet. Eye, the international review of graphic design, 62, 38-43.
Selected Papers and Talks
Owens, S. (2021, July). Alternatives to be discussed – Zur Neukonfiguration ästhetischen Wissens im Design. Panel. Ästhetik und Erkenntnis, XI. Kongress der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Ästhetik, Zurich University of the Arts.
Owens, S. (2020, December). Das Museum von morgen – Ein Blick in die Zukunft. Interviewee. Podcast Rembrandt, habibi! Kunstmuseum Basel.
Owens, S. (2020, August). Making and Unmaking Expert Knowledge in Design. Locating and timing matter: Significance and Agency of STS in Emerging Worlds, Prague, European Association for the Study of Science and Technology.
Owens, S. (2020, May). The In/visible Woman: Thoughts on Representation, Presence and the Gaze, Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology.
Owens, S. (2019, April). The Dynamics of Graphic Design Practice. Design Migrations: Circuits of Graphic Exchange. University of Illinois at Chicago.
Owens, S. (2019, January). A Woman’s Work. Panel. Symposium on the occasion of Against Invisibility – Female Designers of the Deutsche Werkstätten Hellerau from 1898 to 1938. Kunstgewerbemuseum Dresden, Japanisches Palais.
Owens, S. (2018, November). Explorative Design. Kraków Academy of Fine Arts.
Owens, S., El-Maawi, R. (2018, November). Wer interveniert? Gedanken aus kunst/kultur_aktivistischer Perspektive. Panel on the occasion of War Games by Hito Steyerl and Martha Rosler. Convened by University of Basel, Culturescapes and Swiss Center for Social Research. Kunstmuseum Basel.
Owens, S., Brändle-Amolo, A., Gröbner, V. (2018, August). Madonna - Transversale Figur, Bild und Ikone. Panel on the occasion of Black Madonna by Theaster Gates, Kunstmuseum Basel.
Owens, S. (2018, June). Whose Gaze? Questioning the Representation and Visibility of Blackness. Academy of Fine Arts and Department Gender Studies of the University of Vienna.
Owens, S. (2018, March). Culture, Identity and Critique. Panel. Swiss Design Network Design Research Winter Summit. University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland.
Owens, S. (2017, September). Software as Co-Designer. DHWB Ravensburg.
Owens, S., Barnbrook, J., Bruinsma, M. (2017, March). Visual Languages for David Bowie. Panel. Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts.
Owens, S. (2016, November). Are You Good Enough? The Role of Good Design in Graphic Design Education. Workshop. Symposium Because It’s 2016! Researching Inequalities and Normativities in the Field of Higher Art Education. Zurich University of the Arts.
Owens, S. (2016, June). Undoing Design. Undesign Symposium. University of Applied Arts Vienna.
Owens, S. Lzicar, R., Fornari, D., Renner, N. (2016, April). Mapping Graphic Design History in Switzerland. Panel. Berner Design Stiftung.
Owens, S., Wenderoth, N., Gross, M. (2016, February). Die Welt in Zeichen und Bildern. Panel. Museum Rietberg Zurich.
Owens, S. (2015, September). The Graphic Design Canon: When History Gets Too Neat. Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI) Open Conference. Biel.
Owens, S. (2015, June). Click to Add Title: The Politics of DIY Graphics. University of Applied Arts Vienna.
Owens, S. (2014, September). On Professional and Everyday Design Practices. Design Culture: Object, Discipline and Practice. University of Southern Denmark, Kolding.
Owens, S. (2013, October). A Forest of Mediocrity? Investigating an Ordinary Understanding of Design. Academy of Art and Design, University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland.
Owens, S., Lehni, U. Meltzer, B., von Oppeln, T., Wagner, S. (2013, May). Design Exhibited. Panel. Corner College Zurich.
Owens, S. (2012, September). Flawed Mastery: Zur Gestaltung von Authentizität im Design. Workshop. Symposium Künstlerische Darstellungsformate im Wandel. Zurich University of the Arts.
Owens, S. (2012, May). Whose History? Graphic Design History in Context. Panel. Berne University of the Arts.
Owens, S. (2012, January). Von Laien und anderen Designern. Symposium Inside/Outside - Low/High. Zurich University of the Arts.
Owens, S. (2011, September). 12 pt Times New Roman: Considering Non-Specialist Approaches to Graphic design. Annual Conference of the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI). Reykjavik.
Owens, S. (2010, June). But, is it Design? A Study of Lay Graphic Communication. International Conference on Typography and Visual Communication. University of Nicosia.
Owens, S. (2009, October). A Study of Lay Graphic Communication. ACM Creativity and Cognition Conference 2009. University of California at Berkeley.
Owens, S. (2009, October). Aspects of Lay Graphic Communication. CDR Center for Design Research, Stanford University.
Owens, S. (2007, July). Locating Culture: A Reassessment of CCCS Models in Consideration of National Contexts. Cultural Studies Now: An International Conference. University of East London.
Owens, S. (2007, July). Continuity vs. Creativity. Strategies in Editorial Design Practice. Symposium Counting Creativity: Understanding the Systematization of Design Practices. Leeds Metropolitan University.
Owens, S. (2007, June). In a League of Its Own? The jetzt Magazine (1993-2002). 3rd International Conference on Typography and Visual Communication. University of Macedonia.
Owens, S. (2007, April). Design and the DIY Aesthetic: Bridging the Distance Between Professional and Amateur. London Metropolitan University.
Owens, S. (2007, April). The Construction of Identity and Lifestyle amongst Contemporary German Youth. Social History Society Conference. University of Exeter.
Owens, S. (2006, September). The Evolution of Type: Mutant Typography. Annual Design History Society Conference. Delft University of Technology.
Owens, S. (2006, April). Electronic Typography: Typeface Design from 1965 to 1983. 14th Symposium of the Decorative Arts and Design. Parsons the New School of Design and the Cooper Hewitt National Museum of Design, New York.