Maria Korkonea
mariakorkonea.co.uk
@mariakorkonea
@mariakorkonea
Hello, I’m Maria and I’m originally from Kalamata, a small town in South Greece. I have a great love for print, typography and photography. I have always been interested in other cultures, which is why I also majored in English Linguistics before pursuing a degree in graphic communication. I feel that my background has directly influenced my design practice, as I strive to adopt a global mindset in my projects. Visually, my work is characterized by its vibrant colour palettes.
It’s All Greeklish to Me
ISTD
Editorial Design
After World War II, over 160,000 Greeks migrated to Australia in search of a better life. One such migrant is my uncle Vaggelis, who moved to Melbourne in the late sixties and has been living there with his family ever since. Visiting them for the first time offered me the opportunity to experience the Greek Australian community at first hand. While observing their interactions with each other, I noticed that they would often use this unusual vocabulary which was neither Greek nor English; this was an ethnic dialect commonly used amongst the migrant community called Greeklish.
It’s All Greeklish to Me is a typography-focused project exploring Greek migration to Australia, the impact that it had on language and the emergence of the Greeklish ethnolect. The publication consists of two narratives: the main narrative is giving insight into the history of Greek migration to Australia and issues surrounding language and identity, and secondly, a series of supporting interviews with my uncle and my cousin. These interviews give context to the use of language and highlight their different relationships with it. In a world of movement, languages cannot remain static. Like every other ethnolect, Greeklish is a manifestation of the challenges migrants have to overcome to bridge the language and cultural barriers.
Like every other ethnolect, Greeklish is
a manifestation of the challenges migrants
have to overcome to bridge the language
and cultural barriers.
The project tells a story of loss, grief &
healing by following my own emotional
journey of dealing with my mother's
belongings after she passed away.
Stuff
Final Major Project
E ditorial & Exhibition Design
E
‘Value is a fluctuating, comparative or relative measure. In the sphere of personal life and spaces, objects attain, maintain or transform in both value and meaning through the life course and through events such as death and bereavement’. Stuff is a project exploring the transformation of objects and their value after death. It tells a story of loss, grief and healing by following my own emotional journey of dealing with my mother’s belongings after she passed away. The main outcome is a publication which would have been displayed alongside the most emotionally significant possessions of my mother.
The narrative discusses the daunting process of sorting through my mother’s stuff, what some of these items mean to me and how their value has transformed over time. As the story develops, the readers are going to experience how my feelings have evolved over the years. The core narrative is supported by memories of my mother which are often related to the objects discussed; these memories are concealed within folded pages in the publication.
