Sarena Nicole Thurairatnam - MA Graphic Design and Art Direction
Digital spaces shaped by human experiences.
I’m a multidisciplinary designer with a background in Product Design Technology and a newfound love for digital design within the realm of UX and UI. I believe our work reflects who we are and what we value. So what do I value? Simple, to better the lives of others. My practice lies in this gap. My Product Design roots hold function, clarity and design thinking strategies, while my desire is to harness altruism, creativity and innovation to craft experiences.
This leads to the question guiding my project: Can digital design carry complex human experiences and become a space for empathy and connection?
Don Norman’s writing on the reflective level of emotional design kept me focused on what remains after use and how meaning forms over time. Refik Anadol’s immersive installations showed me how time, motion and duration can be emotional materials. I approached it as an investigation rather than a single solution, using two directions to test the idea, and those influences guided each design decision and how I judged what lingered with the viewer.
For Direction 1 I chose one human experience to convey, languishing, and translated this state across three digital spaces and user experiences. A web experience for private reflection that unfolds through considered scroll pacing, an immersive projection sequence that invites a shared pause in a room and a LED piece for public contexts that interrupts routine. I produced the visual assets in TouchDesigner, After Effects and CMS tools, using cadence, density and transition as core variables so the work stays restrained, legible and emotionally present.
Direction 2 creates small screen based installations for everyday spaces, designed to resonate in homes and workplaces. They invite reflection and connection and can be collected like artworks after an exhibition.
See more in my portfolio and feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn!
