Excerpts from Sanath Kumar’s photo essay on his ancestral village near Kundapura, in coastal Karnataka
1-YEAR PG Diploma Program
Information Arts and Information Design Practices - PGDP Bridge
Course Overview
Information shapes how we live, connect, and make decisions. From social media to artificial intelligence, from ecological challenges to cultural change, our personal and collective lives are increasingly mediated by complex information systems. The one-year Postgraduate Diploma Program in Information Arts and Information Design Practices (IAIDP) at Srishti Manipal Institute is a bridge platform between UG and PG curricula, introducing the field to aspiring art and design practitioners. On one hand, with information arts, you will explore the role of art in the current information-driven age by breaking down disciplinary boundaries and initiating conversations on artistic practices. On the other hand, with information design, you will engage in the practice of presenting information effectively and meaningfully by combining principles of design and communication. As part of the IAIDP course, you will be introduced to storytelling, illustration, board games, systems design, data visualisation and will be prepared for entering the world of information art and information design.
Vision
The course equips artists and designers to live, think critically, and create in this age of information. Bridging art, sciences, technology, and design, the course trains reflective practitioners who not only navigate information but also interpret, question, and reshape it through storytelling.IAIDP is “media agnostic” (i.e. independent of any specific medium), which integrates social design, ecology, design research and data science to equip students with the ability to transform raw data into meaningful, accessible, and visually rich narratives. Training spans diverse media—drawing, painting, photography, film, creative writing, graphic design, multimodal design, interaction design, computer graphics, and more—while also emphasising practice-based and practice-led research along with ethical ways of working closely with communities.IAIDP is a space for students to master storytelling, visual aesthetics, and explore cognition, emotion, and experience through art and design. They create interactive, data-driven outputs that enable insight, support decision-making, and create new ways of understanding and engaging with our rapidly changing, information-driven world.
LEVEL
Postgraduate diploma
AWARD
Postgraduate Diploma (PGDP)
DURATION
1 Year / Full-time
Round 1: Last Day to Apply
March 14, 2026
Course Structure
The curriculum comprises different ways of learning as follows:
- The Studio introduces students to the IAIDP specialisation through a focused 7-week engagement that introduces them to working with information through storytelling, illustration, board games, systems design, or data visualisation.
- Theory and Understanding is a 3-week intensive research space where students critically engage with theories, practices, and discourses relevant to their disciplinary and interdisciplinary contexts.
- Disciplinary Project is a 5-week project undertaken by IAIDP faculty, enabling students to integrate and demonstrate their design capabilities, critical thinking, and independent inquiry.
- The Environmental Exposure Project offers the entire PGDP cohort an immersive experience in real-world contexts, fostering sensitivity to social, ecological, and cultural environments.
- Independent Studies enable students to pursue self-directed learning with any faculty member, deepening areas of individual interest and practice.
Capabilities
- To play, explore and experiment with ideas, material, media, forms and techniques and language to create
- To take initiative and build skill through repetition, reflection, and iteration.
- To leverage creative process of sketching, modelling, wire framing etc. as a way of expression, representation or problem solving
- To explore, experiment and reflect with art and design tools to engage with people and place and gather, organize, seek patterns in data and information
- To use multiple lenses to extract, interpret and engage with cultural, historical and socio-economic information, contexts and theories
- To take critical feedback for reflection and action
- To experiment, choose context-sensitive media and create meaningful work
- To emerge self-identity through ethical dilemmas, limitations and challenges
- To strategically intervene and innovate towards change communication
- To emerge practice with reflections on interdependence and symbiosis
Research and Collaboration
The program is closely linked with a wide range research and practice spaces:
Līla – Artist Research Studio
Centre for Reimagining Transitions (CRT)
Design EARTH
LeNS Lab
Srishti Films
UNESCO Chair
Centre for Reimagining Transitions (CRT)
Design EARTH
LeNS Lab
Srishti Films
UNESCO Chair
Disciplinary Intersections
The program in Earth Education is informed by the following learning disciplines:
Animation
Critical Geography
Ecology and Environment
Environmental graphics
Experimental Media Arts
Film
Information Technology
Language Arts
Mathematics and Physical Sciences
Photography
Policy Studies and Environmental law
Sustainable Studies
Systems Design
Textile Arts
Urban Studies and Design
Visual Communication Design
Critical Geography
Ecology and Environment
Environmental graphics
Experimental Media Arts
Film
Information Technology
Language Arts
Mathematics and Physical Sciences
Photography
Policy Studies and Environmental law
Sustainable Studies
Systems Design
Textile Arts
Urban Studies and Design
Visual Communication Design
Opportunities
To undertake an advanced degree program in Information Arts and Information Design Practices, Earth Education and Communication or related fields
To develop once own art and design practice with a focus on information communication, communities and environment in integrated holistic approaches.
Employment in art and design studios, research and development organizations, NGOs & social enterprises