Mario F. Bocanegra Martinez
Graphic / motion Designer + Educator
Born in
🇲🇽
Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, México.Based in
🇺🇸
Auburn, Alabama, U.S.A.Instagram ︎︎︎
LinkedIn ︎︎︎
Vimeo ︎︎︎
My creative research builds on chance operations, incorporating both digital and analog strategies while embracing the beauty that emerges when “Inexactness” becomes a design tool.
The camera is central to this process. Rather than using it only to document, I use it to explore how we see. This connects to filmmaker Stan Brakhage’s notion of the “Untutored Eye”: “an eye unruled by man-made laws of perspective … an eye unprejudiced by compositional logic … an eye which must know each object encountered in life through an adventure of perception.”
In the studio, I place found materials and transparent, reflective, or porous objects in front of the lens to disrupt and transform the image. Through this playful, hands-on, and iterative process, I build a growing collection of images and footage exploring time, space, light, and movement.
Arts ATL, Graphis, Creative Quarterly Journal, Graphic Design USA Magazine, Slanted Magazine 2022+2026 Experimental Type 4.0, Visual Art Journal, Mastering Type-2nd edition, The Society of Typographic Arts (STA), and Abstractics: The Journal of Abstract & Nonrepresentational Art. Student work featured in PRINTmag ︎︎︎.
The camera is central to this process. Rather than using it only to document, I use it to explore how we see. This connects to filmmaker Stan Brakhage’s notion of the “Untutored Eye”: “an eye unruled by man-made laws of perspective … an eye unprejudiced by compositional logic … an eye which must know each object encountered in life through an adventure of perception.”
In the studio, I place found materials and transparent, reflective, or porous objects in front of the lens to disrupt and transform the image. Through this playful, hands-on, and iterative process, I build a growing collection of images and footage exploring time, space, light, and movement.
FEATURED IN
Arts ATL, Graphis, Creative Quarterly Journal, Graphic Design USA Magazine, Slanted Magazine 2022+2026 Experimental Type 4.0, Visual Art Journal, Mastering Type-2nd edition, The Society of Typographic Arts (STA), and Abstractics: The Journal of Abstract & Nonrepresentational Art. Student work featured in PRINTmag ︎︎︎.
EDUCATION
2016-19
Oklahoma State University / MFA, Graphic Design
2013-16
Oklahoma State University / BFA, Graphic Design
2008-13
Tulsa Community College / AAS, Web Design & AAS, Liberal Arts
2007-08
Tulsa Technology Center / Web Design Certification
ACADEMIC EXPERIENCE
2026
College of Architecture, Design and Construction Outstanding Teaching Award
Recognition from the School of Industrial + Graphic Design at Auburn University.
2022-present
Auburn University / Assistant Professor of Graphic Design
Instructor of Record ::: Graphic Design 1, Image 1 + 2, Photo Communications, Typographics 1, Special Topics in Motion Design.
2019-21
Eastern New Mexico University / Assistant Professor of Graphic Design
Instructor of Record ::: Design 1, Digital Media, Motion Design 1 + 2, Web Design 1 + 2, Graphic Design 1, Typography 1.
2016-19
Oklahoma State University / Graduate Teaching Assistant
Instructor of Record ::: Motion Design 1, Graphic Design 1.
Courses as TA ::: Motion Design Studio, Interaction Design 1.
Full CV upon request.