Executive Director of L’Ecole de design Nantes Atlantique
Honorary President of Cumulus International Association of Universities of design
BIOGRAPHY
Christian Guellerin has been the director of L’Ecole de design Nantes Atlantique (France). Under his leadership, the School experienced remarkable development creating branches in Shanghai, Pune, Sao Paulo and Montreal. In 2017, he created a school in Cotonou – Benin of which he is President, to meet the training needs of West Africa in digital and graphic design. In 2019, he was asked by the China Academy of Art to create an international program focused on strategic design and relationships with businesses. NACAA was born. He gives conferences in many countries, sharing his vision of design as a strategic discipline for managing complex issues, including economic, social and societal data. He has accompanied the evolution of the perception of design which goes from Applied Arts to the notion of ethical Leadership, which prevails today in the management of all private, public or associative organizations. He has written numerous articles placing design as a top-strategic discipline in the development of structures. He is a member of the Scientific Committee of DIID, Disegno Industriale Industrial Design. He taught at the universities of Paris VIII and Paris IX and in numerous schools and institutes.
Ethical Leadership, the new frontier for design and designers
The perception of design has evolved in recent years to finally become applicable to all issues and fields and to establish its strategic nature to support businesses and society in general. Design continues to reflect on the shape of objects, interior architecture, graphics… but it now embodies all the strategic concerns of transformation of economic and organizational models. By becoming strategic, design has become a management discipline to help organizations to produce and to sell products or services differently, designers are called upon to take management positions in all public and private structures. Universities and design schools will have to adjust their programs to observe and support this evolution.
“Not enough to imagine the future, built it”
CG