Destroy All Humans: The Dematerialisation of the Designer in an Age of Automation and its Impact on Graphic Design—A Literature Review

Abstract Digital automation is on the rise in a diverse range of industries. The technologies employed here often make use of artificial intelligence (AI) and its common form, machine learning (ML) to augment or replace the work completed by human agents. The recent emergence of a variety of design automation platforms inspired the authors to undertake a review of the research literature on the impact of Automation, AI and ML on visual communication, and its subset practice of graphic design, with a view to understanding the implications for the education of practitioners entering that specific field. This review discovered that there was relatively little research published on the topic but what did exist noted that graphic design as we have known it has an uncertain future. Furthermore, the scant literature argued for a shift in educational and professional focus away from the aesthetic and technical skills required to design visual modes of communication and towards a deeper engagement with the softer, more human skills associated with negotiation, facilitation and judgement. The paucity of literature on this topic suggests to the authors that visual communication design education and the industry are poorly prepared for the impact of automation, AI and ML on them.