Salvador Orara is the Director of Innovation and the Innovation Professor of Practice at the University of Portland. As an educator, he focuses on creative strategies and empathic skills to enable individuals and organizations to shape the practices of design into transformative forces of change, disruption, and innovation. He has served on the AIGA Portland Chapter Board of Directors as Content Director and recently as Chapter President. Salvador is a founding faculty member of the Interaction Design Program at Art Center College of Design; and also taught at Woodbury University and Otis College of Art and Design. Prior to University of Portland, Salvador was an adjunct at Pacific Northwest College of Art teaching Augmented and Virtual Reality, and Interactive Media. Salvador has spoken at numerous events large and small on topics ranging from the future of automotive and mobility, to destroying design methods and insinuating future practices of design.
Salvador is a practicing designer and consultant working on a wide range of projects (a good starting point: www.salvadororara.com) specializing in future studies, speculative design, and creative technology. His work has been recognized by AIGA’s 50 Books/50 Covers, AIGA’s 365 Annual Competition, the School of Visual Arts, Leonardo On-line, and IEEE VISAP. Prior to teaching, Salvador was a Senior Designer at The Map Office.
Salvador holds a B.F.A. in Graphic Design from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, and a M.F.A. in Media Design from Art Center College of Design.