At AKTO, key components of our educational philosophy are our connection to industry and the market, through collaborations with professionals, academics, as well as art and cultural organizations. Through your studies at AKTO, you’ll meet and connect with professors, other students, university staff, academics, and professionals in the field. Expanding your network will help you identify potential career options, develop your professional skills, and gain understanding and critical thinking in your field of study.

During your postgraduate studies, your fellow students share the desire to specialize in a specific field, and this in itself is an active network that you’ll have the opportunity to get to know, influence, and make use of in the future. You’ll be surrounded by professors, professional artists, academics, and fellow postgraduate students, who are motivated to achieve their goals. The academic team will guide you and offer you excellent study material and references in the fields of arts and design, always in line with the most recent technologies used in the market.

In addition, you’ll get to know members of AKTO’s Art and Design community, guest speakers, experts, professionals, like-minded artists, and future collaborators. After graduating from AKTO, you have the opportunity to become a member of AKTO Alumni, the largest graduate community in Art & Design. Through the alumni community, you’ll have the opportunity to network with other professionals and businesses in the field. AKTO Alumni also includes AKTO’s Careers Office, which dozens of businesses turn to every year looking for collaborators.

Postgraduate study programmes are more independent than undergraduate ones. Members of the postgraduate student community put in more personal effort into the learning process. They take the initiative to develop new personal and professional skills in specialized fields of their choice, such as independence, time management, decision-making, and others. Meeting other members from different cities, different ages, different portfolios, and different fields helps develop social skills, as well as build confidence in communication. Expanding your network of contacts will help you identify further options regarding your career, as well as gain deeper understanding and critical thinking in your field of study.

Every year, the job market places its trust in graduates from an educational institution with the standing, processes, consistency, and history of AKTO. With multiple practical and symbolic benefits, studying at AKTO gives all graduates the prestige of a nationally recognized educational institution synonymous with the arts and design. By choosing AKTO, students join the largest art & design community in Greece and become, after graduation, lifelong members of AKTO Alumni. Graduating from AKTO is a significant competitive advantage when seeking any kind of professional collaboration. Naturally, employers and future collaborators in general prefer to work with well-trained, up-to-date professionals — something that studying at AKTO guarantees. That’s why, for over 50 years, businesses have been choosing AKTO Alumni members to work with.

Read here all the reasons to choose AKTO

Academic innovation
The programme is the only cross-disciplinary Master’s in Design in the country with many years of presence and contribution to research and professional specialization. It is designed around the most contemporary theories and applications, in order to meet the needs of our times while also standing, through research and critical thinking, at the threshold of the new paths opening up before us. The study programme includes, as full-semester modules, subjects not found in any other Design Master’s programme in Greece, such as the Philosophy of Design and Anthropology in Design. The programme is approved and validated by the UK state education system and by Middlesex University London, which confirms and ensures that AKTO’s level of study is equivalent to that of UK universities.

Academic & professional specialization
Students have the option to choose a direction depending on their research and professional field. The direction stated on the Master’s degree title is as follows:

• Visual Communication

Critical thinking & analysis
The programme’s goal is to shape strong designers with critical thinking, a research mindset, and both individual and social responsibility. Our students go on to master new knowledge in order to apply it professionally in new contexts that broaden the horizons of design, both in content and in form.

Environment & sustainability
In the MA in Design: Visual Communication programme we also help the environment — we research and design always within this framework.

Professional prospects
The school supports and constantly strives to help its graduates find employment through its careers office and its network.

Academic team
MA in Design has highly important professors with significant academic knowledge and outstanding professional experience. It successfully combines instructors of many different specialties and generations, creating a well-rounded educational community whose key characteristics are freshness, strength, knowledge, and wisdom.

High satisfaction rates
Our students are extremely satisfied with their studies and their relationship with the educational community, something demonstrated by their annual evaluations.

The content of the programme gives students the opportunity to specialize in the subject area of their choice, through their own personal research and individual project work, as well as through developing their research questions, within a cross-disciplinary academic environment. At the end of the 1st semester, students are asked to choose the direction they wish to follow. Specialization arises through the choice of direction, the completion of the Final Project, as well as the research stages that precede it. The MA in Design (MAD) leads to a Master’s Degree in one of the four (4) directions, providing in-depth study in one or more areas of specialization.

MA Design: Visual Communication

• Branding, Graphic Design, Visual Communication Design, Typography
• Publishing, Advertising, Online Communication & Social Media
• Photography, Advertising Photography, Fashion Photography, Reportage – Street Photography, Constructed Photography Reality
• Conceptual Art, Sequential Art, Mixed Media Art (using 2 or more media)
• Comics, Character creation, Illustration, Storyboard

Contact us at admissions@aktocollege.gr so we can send you the Detailed Study Guide.

Here you can view the Programme Specification And Curriculum Map For Master Of Arts In Design.

This programme was developed and is delivered and assessed by AKTO, awarded by and quality assured by Middlesex University London.

Semester 1 – core modules

• Practices of Visualisation & Contextual analysis
• Critical Perspectives & Design Management
• Design Enquiry & Definition

Semester 2 – specialization modules

• Design in Context: Visual Communication (optional)

Semester 3 – core module

• Design in Action: Major Project

Contact us at admissions@aktocollege.gr so we can send you the Detailed Study Guide.

Our Master’s programme is today the only cross-disciplinary/interdisciplinary Master of Arts in Design. With a significant research heritage and 20 years of experience, we consistently maintain the view of interdisciplinarity as the most complete educational method in design. This character runs through our programme from day one to the completion of your studies and research. Graduates from all creative fields of design and beyond enthusiastically experience and share contemporary teaching and research practice, within an educational framework of feedback and interaction. In the Master’s programme you will develop professionally, enriching your knowledge with cutting-edge theories concerning the development of contemporary design. Always seeking a fertile research mindset, we encourage innovation and new thinking. We get excited about ideas that trigger radical change, directly affecting everyday reality as well as the future. We look toward design that provides solutions to our world, guided by social benefit, ecological democracy, and sustainability.
We are constantly seeking the cutting edge of knowledge and we invite you to join our creative community. There, we will all research together, and we believe that in this transformative environment your goals and vision for design will find vital space for expression and realization. We look forward to welcoming you with enthusiasm.

Giorgos Theodorou
Programme Leader, MA in Design

At AKTO, distinguished Greek designers, visual artists, and art theorists teach, recognized for both their academic and artistic work. Specialized professors and PhD holders, together with research staff, pass on innovative and in-depth knowledge to students, responsive to the changing needs of society, technology, and the market. AKTO’s academic team helps students express themselves through a free and bold spirit of inquiry and research, aiming for social benefit both domestically and internationally.

Programme Academic Team Members

Theodorou Giorgos (Program Leader)
Altouva Anna
Anastouli Popi
Gkinosatis Dimitris
Dimitra Anastasia
Zouridakis Markos
Kanellopoulos Evangelos
Kondyli Antonia
Koulias Spyros
Konstantiou Athina
Laskari Anna
Martakis Panagiotis
Mpaka Panagiota (Polina)
Mpelegrinou Dora
Nanou Dimitra
Panteleon Giorgos
Patrikios Dimitris
Skamagkis Aristotelis
Skiada Virginia

The MA Design: Visual Communication postgraduate programme is aimed at professional designers and artists who wish to develop in the field of Visual Communication. It is aimed both at people at the start of their professional path and at people with many years of experience, who seek to update their knowledge, deepen their understanding of contemporary developments in design, and specialize in new fields.

Through studying on MA Design: Visual Communication, you can enrich your professional path to date in the direction you already follow.

You have the opportunity to change direction and explore new fields in the broad field of design.
The programme gives professionals of all specialties the opportunity to develop through personal research and interaction with the student community, in a cross-disciplinary, creative environment.

The balance between specialization and collaboration is achieved through analysis and synthesis assignments, individual or group-based. Through discussions, critical analysis, and the exchange of ideas, members of the student community deepen their expertise, while also identifying common ground and opportunities for synergy between the different branches of design.

At AKTO, you redefine your creative future and claim the place you deserve in Design and Visual Communication!

AKTO subsidizes students with discounts or even full subsidies, depending on the enrollment period, available places, and social criteria.

Read detailed information here

Contact us at admissions@aktocollege.gr for more information.

For the Postgraduate Study Programmes, the academic year has two (2) intake periods. The first period is in October, followed by the second period in February.

Contact us at admissions@aktocollege.gr for more information about intake periods.

Candidates for the Postgraduate Study Programmes must hold an undergraduate degree or have more than 5 years of professional experience in a field relevant to the Master’s programme they choose. Candidates for the programme go through an interview with an evaluation committee, following submission of the relevant application and the required supporting documents.

Read detailed information about the enrollment requirements at AKTO

AKTO, recognizing the pedagogical challenges and contemporary demands of education, offers its students a range of benefits to help them, both with their studies and with their social life. These benefits include:

• ISIC Student Card (International Student Identity Card)
  • Offers countless benefits and discounts to cardholders
• Counselling Centre
  • Specialized psychologists and counsellors
• VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) access
  • Microsoft Office 365
• Weekly Design Software workshops
• Technical Support
• Fonts from Fonts.GR
• E-Registrar’s Office

Read in detail about all the benefits AKTO offers

• Studies at AKTO are supported by modern, high-aesthetic building facilities, forming a contemporary environment ideal for learning and creation, across two state-of-the-art Campuses, the Athens Campus and the Thessaloniki Campus.

  At AKTO’s two Campuses, we give students access to state-of-the-art, specialized equipment in the fields of art and design, through:

  • Libraries
  • Computer Labs
  • Photography Studios
  • Fashion Labs
  • Fine Art Labs
  • Model-Making & Product Prototyping Labs
  • 3D Printing
  • Green Box Studio
  • Amphitheatre
  • AKTO Gallery

Visual Communication
“Design is thinking made visual.”
— Saul Bass

Design exists to create “solutions” to human needs and desires. Through the visualization and functional study of each “solution,” designers balance between effective service, socio-historical documentation, and aesthetic excellence. AKTO’s MA in Design is the only cross-disciplinary Master’s programme in Design in the country, with many years of presence and contribution to research and professional specialization, offering contemporary directions of study.

Visual Communication is the core of Design, combining creativity and strategy to convey effective messages through visual means. AKTO’s MA in Design: MA Visual Communication, the only cross-disciplinary Master’s programme in Greece specializing in Visual Communication, gives students the tools to create strong, innovative design solutions, based on contemporary theories and applications.

The programme aims to shape strong designers with critical thinking, a research mindset, and both individual and social responsibility. Our students go on to master new knowledge in order to apply it professionally in new contexts that broaden the horizons of design, both in content and in form. Our graduates gain deep understanding and training across all relevant fields of their studies. They learn the most contemporary theories and applications in order to meet the needs of today’s world.

As a member of the student community of the MA in Design: Visual Communication postgraduate programme, you can be professionally and academically active across a wide, dynamic range of Visual Communication fields – from branding and digital media, to advertising and illustration. Specifically:

• Branding, Graphic Design, Visual Identity
• Advertising, Online and Social Media Communication
• Illustration, Storyboard, Character Creation
• Photography, Advertising Photography, Fashion Photography
• Narrative Art, Mixed Media, Conceptual Art

At AKTO, you don’t just study – you create your future. As a member of AKTO Alumni, you gain access to a strong network of professionals and partners. AKTO’s Careers Office is always by your side, supporting you at every professional step: from writing your CV and building your portfolio, to interview preparation and connecting with the job market.

Begin your own journey in Visual Communication and become a creator who changes the world!

AKTO’s university Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees, awarded in collaboration with Middlesex University London, are recognized as professionally equivalent, in accordance with Presidential Decree 38/2010, as amended by Law 4093/2012, 4111/2013, 4205/2013, and 4635/2019. Middlesex University London is recognized by DOATAP as an institution equivalent to Greek Higher Education Institutions. AKTO’s postgraduate programmes are recognized in both the private and public sector for employment purposes. In accordance with Presidential Decree 38/2010, as amended by Law 4093/2012, 4111/2013, 4205/2013, and 4635/2019, professional equivalence is recognized by A.T.E.E.N., for university Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Greece. Holders of these degrees are able to take part in ASEP competitions, in accordance with Article 13 of Law 4148/2013.

See here some decisions concerning AKTO graduates (for personal data protection reasons, the graduates’ details and application reference numbers have been removed).

Read more about the Recognition and Accreditation of AKTO’s University Degrees