Two artworks from the Dept. of Visual Communication at AU were granted the Japan G-Mark International Design Award, which are regarded as the “Oscar Design Award” in the world. The G-Mark Award (also called the Good Design Award) has been set up for fifty years, and is recognized globally as one of the top four design awards in the world. And for a half century, this is the first time university students from Taiwan won this award in Japan. What a splendid achievement of AU!

The titles of the two works are “Fruit Snack Package of “Ji Yuan Guo” Jiji Mountain Banana Fruit Snack” and “Visual Design of Asia Museum of Modern Art Opening Ceremony Gift.” They are works designed by two groups of students from the Dept. of Visual Communication: (1) L. W. Lin, Y. C. Chiu, Y. T. Chen, T. E. Chang, and Y. Y. Huang; (2) Y. T. Chang, Y. L. Lin, and W. R. Lin.

Chair Professor Pang-Soong Lin pointed out that to be a G-Mark Award candidate, the work should be a commercial product for use by the industry, and this sets a high entry barrier for students in Taiwan to win the award. He said that this year the two groups of AU students based their designs on the architecture of the Asia Museum of Modern Art designed by the world-renown architect Tadao Ando for AU as well as on the idea of peeling bananas; and that this award winning is a record of students in Taiwan in the G-Mark Award contest.

The G-Mark Award this year attracted 801 companies/institutions from all over the world, including Sony, Panasonic, Muji, Motorola, Asus, Toyota, and also some universities, and so on. Winning such an award is really a great honor, and this time AU students won two such awards! This is really a great step of AU of its effort toward establishing a world-famous university.