Graphic design students at the middle school are currently making stickers inspired by photographer Zora J. Murff who spoke at the special assembly Monday, Oct. 16.

Zora J. Murff is an artist and educator who teaches about the unfortunate history of anti-blackness and seeks to represent liberation from the former in his work. Through imagery, his work also explores stereotypes and misrepresentation of Black people. His work has been exhibited and collected widely by institutions like the Museum of Modern Art, LACMA, Studio Museum in Harlem, and the V&A Museum.

“He’s a photographer so students have used photographs from his work to create these stickers and each student’s created two or three different stickers and we’re gonna apply them outside,” Heather Trawick, head of the graphic design department, said.

In addition to the stickers, graphic design students will also be creating movie posters, branding and packaging. The students have the ability to choose what projects they want to work on based on their interests. In that respect, students certainly have much power over what they want to do in the class.

Designing, innovating, challenging your creative mind and getting to use the industry standard Adobe programs are all parts of the graphic design course and learning the skills taught in the class can be valuable for the future.

“You definitely have a good idea of what aesthetics look like, what’s good in design, what’s bad in design,” Trawick said. “Having these design skills is really, really beneficial especially if you’re someone that’s going into owning their own business, or anything like that.”