Call for Papers

Prisms: The Illustration Education Symposium at ICON13 

Symposium Dates: July 15–16, 2026
Venue: Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD
Deadline for abstracts submission is June 30, 2025
Acceptances will be announced in August, 2025

What is Prisms?

Prisms, The Illustration Education Symposium at ICON13, brings together educators, professionals, scholars, and students to interrogate connections between history, research, and practice in the field of Illustration.

Call for Submissions

We invite abstracts for 20 minute presentations that broaden the understanding of how illustration is changing in the classroom, practice, and research. Unusual avenues of practice and inquiry are encouraged, including both theory and practice-based research. Academics, illustrators, typographers, designers, painters, artists, and multidisciplinary practitioners are welcome to submit.

Abstracts submitted for consideration should fall under one of the following areas:

• Illustration Pedagogy & the Classroom
• Education through Museums, Archives & Special Collections
• Translating Research Interests into Teaching & Practice
• Envisioning Illustration Futures

Graduate students* are also invited to submit abstracts for 10 minute presentations about illustration research, pedagogy, and practice.

* Accepted students must be currently enrolled in a graduate program OR have graduated from an MFA or MA or masters program between 2025 and 2026.

Possible topics could include (but are not limited to):

• Articulating Research Methods
• Unpacking ‘Process’
• Making and Using Archives
• Research Beyond Reference
• Meaning and Representation in Visual Language
• Visual Culture and Visual Literacy
• Cultivating Conceptual Depth
• Critique and Criticality in the Classroom
• Broaching Difficult Topics with Students
• Theory and Research Based Illustration Projects
• Pedagogy in Action: Assignments, Exercises, Workshops
• Teaching Writing to Illustrators
• Defining and Emphasizing ‘Craft’
• Grappling with AI
• Integrating Authorship and Audiences

Abstract Format

Initial submissions should take the form of an abstract of up to 300 words, submitted through this Google Form.

Submitted proposals and selected presentations will be juried by ICON13’s panel of peer reviewers, including Prisms Co-Chairs Shreyas R. Krishnan, Washington University in St. Louis, and Ryan Hartley Smith, SUNY Fashion Institute of Technology. If accepted, in lieu of a paper, presenters will need to submit a draft presentation with presentation notes or script for review. Final presentation files will be collected at least a month prior to the symposium.

Deadlines

• Receipt of the Abstracts | June 30, 2025
• Notification of Acceptance | August, 2025
• Receipt of Draft Presentation (with presentation notes) | January 1, 2026
• Final Presentations Due | May 31, 2026
• Presentation Dates | July 15 -16, 2026

With permission of the authors, abstracts will later be archived and shared online.