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Spring-Summer 2013
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perused the course catalogs for upcoming semesters, the stars seemed to align. “I saw God’s blessing at that moment,” Alcantara said. ”As far as any of my advisors remembered, the graphic design classes I needed to graduate had never lined up like they did that year. I took this as a sign and went with it. I finally felt at home in my studies.” After spending his senior year in his new department, Alcantara interned for Fossil in Richardson, Texas, then worked with Inprov, a Southlake-based Christian company providing marketing and development services to non-profits. He then applied to several Master of Fine Arts programs in graphic design, including one at the Maryland Institute College of Art, where he began his studies in 2010. Thanks to
ACU TODAY
CARLOS MACIAS
lthough Rolando Gutierrez Alcantara (’08) began his studies at ACU as a biology major, he eventually realized he might be happier in a different field. “Drawing all over my biology books was taking up most of my study time,” said the Mexico native. Alcantara also was involved with ACU’s International Students Association (ISA), which produces Ethnos, the annual culture show. While serving as ISA’s advertising director, Alcantara created print graphics and trailer videos for Ethnos. As he discovered a love for graphics and video, he changed his major to electronic media, eventually realizing he wanted to make the switch to graphic design. By then, Alcantara was nearing his senior year, and it was too late to change his major entirely. But former registrar Dr. David Merrell (’64) helped him create a tailored, interdisciplinary degree incorporating the biology classes he’d taken, as well as a number of graphic design courses. As they
his professors at MICA, he discovered a deep love of typography and fonts. “For more than a year I was knee-deep in letters: typography, type design, lettering and font fabrication were revolving around my head daily, as I tried to figure out what exactly I wanted to dive into for my M.F.A. thesis,” Alcantara said. “Finally, I arrived at Mutable Typography, a study of actively changing letterforms.” After presenting his thesis, which included hand-designing several complete alphabets of mutable type, Alcantara represented MICA at AIGA NY’s Fresh Blood event, and was later interviewed by Print magazine about his work. Several other interviews and publications followed.