Graphic design foundation: A basic design education specific to Graphic Arts

The Basic Art Education or Basic Design courses, which take place in the first and second semesters of the undergraduate programs of the art and design faculties, are the courses where the students are introduced to the basic concepts of art and design. This intensive training, which can be compared to the preparatory foreign language education in terms of teaching a visual language, aims to create the infrastructure for all the other courses that future artist and designer candidates will take throughout their education. These courses, in which the foundations of undergraduate and graduate education are laid, aim to establish a solid ground for the rest of professional knowledge to be built on, to be accurate and permanent. Deficiencies on this ground may also cause disruption of the education to be placed on it. For this reason, basic education courses are among the courses that should be emphasized very carefully in art and design departments. The graphic industry, which is rapidly and deeply affected by changes in technology, informatics and social habits, needs an education that can respond to these changes at the same speed. This reaction can be easily seen by looking at courses such as interaction design, motion graphics design, media analysis, web design, data visualization, game interface design or digital modeling that have been included in the syllabuses of many graphic departments in recent years. It is very important for the integrity and success of graphic education to examine to what extent the basic education courses respond to this dynamic structure in graphics education, whether they need additions in their content and methods, to ensure that they are kept up-to-date. Keywords: Graphic Education, Graphic Design Foundation, Graphic Arts, Graphic Design, Foundation in Art, Basic Design Education