Communication Strategy: FESPACO Local Editions
Contents:
1. Reflection on communication theory in the field of design 2. Presentation of the FESPACO Local Editions festival for a broad audience 3. Presentation for a professional audience (designers) 4. How the strategy was developed (linking theory and practice)
1. Reflection on communication theory in the field of design
In the contemporary understanding, design is not only an aesthetic practice but also a form of communication. Any visual object: a logo, poster, visual identity, interface, or space, participates in the process of transmitting meanings, shaping perceptions, and constructing social reality. Communication theory makes it possible to consider design as a systematic process of exchanging meanings rather than as neutral visual decoration. Within the course, communication theory is defined as a symbolic, systemic, and context-dependent process in which participants jointly produce and interpret meaning. This means that communication is not reduced to the direct transmission of a message from sender to receiver: meaning is always formed through interpretation and depends on cultural, social, and historical context. Design, as a visual language, follows the same principles.
According to Robert Craig’s classification, communication theory includes seven traditions, each offering its own analytical perspective. For the analysis of design, those traditions that consider communication as a process of producing meanings, cultural norms, and power relations are especially important. Visual design becomes a field where rhetorical, phenomenological, cybernetic, socio-psychological, semiotic, sociocultural, and critical traditions intersect.
Thus, communication theory allows design to be understood as an active communicative practice involved in the production of meanings, cultural identities, and social representations. The semiotic tradition reveals design as a system of signs, the sociocultural tradition as a tool for forming collective experience, and the critical tradition as a space of representation and ideological choice. Together, these approaches provide a basis for analyzing visual strategies not only in terms of form and aesthetics, but also from the perspective of meaning, context, and social responsibility. It is within this theoretical framework that the communication strategy of the FESPACO Local Editions festival is further examined.
2. Presentation of the FESPACO Local Editions festival for a broad audience
Our Brand
FESPACO Local Editions is a film festival which travels across Africa and brings together thousands of directors, producers, actors, and viewers from all over the world. Since its creation, it has been conceived as a platform for African stories told by Africans themselves.
Target Audience
- People aged 29–45 - Residents of Africa - Emerging filmmakers - Curators searching for new talents and visual styles
Positioning
FESPACO Local Editions is not just a film festival, but a key platform for showcasing African cinema in all its diversity. The festival brings together unique stories, bold ideas, and promising directors and actors from across the continent. It is a space where Africa’s cultural heritage and contemporary creativity enter the global stage, drawing attention to the continent’s unique cinematic perspective. In this way, FESPACO Local Editions does not simply screen films but promotes African cinema as an important cultural phenomenon and a tool for social dialogue.
Mission
The main goal of FESPACO Local Editions is to support the development of African cinema. The festival creates a space where film industry professionals and creative individuals can exchange ideas and experiences, as well as explore the cultural diversity of Africa. FESPACO aims to strengthen and promote African cinematic identity and contribute to its recognition at the global level. It is a platform that stimulates innovation and the development of new talents, contributing to sustainable growth.
Brand Values
- Support for cultural diversity — FESPACO Local Editions values and presents the diversity of African cultures through cinema, showcasing different languages, traditions, and historical contexts. - Inclusivity — the festival is open to everyone, bringing together creators and audiences regardless of their background, gender, or social characteristics. - Innovation — a commitment to finding new forms of storytelling and using contemporary technologies and methods in film production. - Talent development — active identification and support of young filmmakers, providing opportunities for professional growth and international recognition. - Inspiration and unity — through films, FESPACO Local Editions encourages respect and understanding between cultures, creating a global community of like-minded people.
Thus, the FESPACO Local Editions brand is an integral part of Africa’s cultural and creative identity, a driving force for the continent’s film industry and its global recognition, while also giving young talents the opportunity to express themselves and enter the international scene.
3. Presentation for a Professional Audience (Designers)
Festival Platform and Positioning
Category Cultural film festival and communication platform
Format Local edition of an international African film festival
Positioning FESPACO Local Editions is a cultural platform that translates African cinema into the language of local, culturally rooted visual communication, allowing cinema to be perceived not as an abstract global product but as part of everyday social and cultural life.
The festival is positioned not only as an event but also as a communication system that connects cinema, place, and community.
Theoretical «Lenses» (Robert Craig)
From Robert Craig’s perspective, the visual communication of FESPACO Local Editions is examined through several complementary traditions:
- Semiotic tradition — visual language as a system of signs and codes - Sociocultural tradition — communication as a process of producing and reproducing culture and collective identity - Critical tradition — communication as a space of power, representation, and resistance
These approaches make it possible to view the festival’s visual strategy not as decorative design, but as an infrastructure of meaning-making.
Visual Strategy (Semiotics + Visual Rhetoric)
The visual system of FESPACO Local Editions is constructed as a coherent language of signs, in which each element: color, form, ornament, photography, functions not in isolation, but as part of a shared rhetorical structure.
Color Palette
The palette is based on orange, white and black. - Orange refers to the African context through associations with the sun, hot climate, earth, and fire. It functions as a sign of vitality, movement, and collective action, enhancing the emotional perception of the festival. - Black is associated with the cinematic environment, the darkness of the screening room, the screen, night screenings, and performs a structuring function by creating contrast and visual focus. In combination with orange, it forms a strong and non-decorative visual code. - White functions as a neutral and balancing element. It creates visual breathing space, improves readability, and enhances contrast between graphic elements. In the context of the visual system, white supports clarity and structural order without introducing additional semantic load.
Logo
The FESPACO Local Editions logo is constructed from repeating vertical elements placed at the top and bottom of the layout, forming a stable framing structure.
From a semiotic perspective, these elements operate on two levels. On one hand, they refer to wooden poles traditionally used in Ouagadougou to support house roofs, acting as an index of everyday architectural practice. On the other hand, the same form functions as an iconic reference to film perforation — an essential technical element of cinema.
Thus, the logo simultaneously connects the festival to local material culture and to the cinematic medium itself, uniting everyday life and screen-based art.
Graphic Elements
The graphic elements of the visual system are based on ornaments traditionally painted on houses in the capital of Burkina Faso. These patterns do not serve a purely decorative function but operate as cultural markers referring to local visual memory and craft practices.
Within the semiotic tradition, ornaments function as cultural codes that are read within context and enhance the sense of authenticity and rootedness of the festival in a specific place.
Photography
The photographic material consists of black-and-white images created in a unified visual style. The photographs used are film stills from movies included in the festival program.
Black-and-white treatment reduces spectacle and emotional overload, shifting the viewer’s attention from visual effect to content and context. From a semiotic perspective, the photographs function as documentary evidence of cinematic expression rather than as advertising images.
Graphic System and Modularity
The entire visual system is built on a modular grid that establishes strict rules for the placement of elements. The logo, ornaments, text blocks, and images are integrated into a single structure and may change position only within the limits of the grid.
This modularity ensures visual consistency and reproducibility across different media while maintaining flexibility and variation. From the perspective of visual rhetoric, it creates a sense of order, stability, and professional communication.
Verbal Strategy and Message Structure (Rhetorical Approach)
The festival’s communication messages are structured using a classical rhetorical model of persuasion adapted to visual and cultural communication:
- Logos — the rational level of communication, including information about the festival program, film geography, screening formats, local editions, and participants. These elements provide clarity, structure, and functionality. - Ethos — the level of trust and credibility, formed through a consistent visual language, cultural rootedness of the identity, coherence in the use of symbols, and respect for the local context. The festival positions itself as an internal voice of African cinema rather than an external curator. - Pathos — the emotional level, built through visual imagery, color palette, ornamentation, and bodily involvement of the viewer. Communication appeals to feelings of belonging, collective experience, and cultural pride.
Media and Carriers
The visual system is designed as modular and adaptive, functioning consistently across different media:
- logo and sign system - posters and printed materials - merchandise and textiles - spatial and event formats
Instead of a rigid fixed form, the visual identity allows variation and reinterpretation, supporting participation and local adaptation while preserving semantic coherence.
Professional Relevance
For the design community, FESPACO Local Editions demonstrates how visual identity can function simultaneously as:
- a semiotic system, - a sociocultural practice, - and a critical communicative position.
The project shows that theory-based design can create not only recognition but also a sustainable cultural presence, transforming visual communication into a collective social experience rather than a purely promotional tool.
4. How the strategy was developed (linking theory and practice)
Semiotic approach
We chose the semiotic approach for the FESPACO Local Editions festival because it allows communication to be treated as an exchange of meanings through a system of signs and symbols rather than as direct information transfer. Within this tradition, a message is understood as encoded meaning: the sender constructs it using signs, and the receiver decodes it based on shared cultural experience and contextual knowledge. Meaning is not communicated directly — it always requires interpretation.
From a semiotic perspective, the origin of the sign and the cultural code in which it exists are especially important. This is why the visual system of FESPACO Local Editions is based not on abstract geometric forms but on repeating vertical «sticks.» These elements carry a dual contextual meaning and refer both to African visual tradition and to the image of a film camera. This choice makes the festival’s visual language rich in meaning while assuming that the viewer possesses a certain cultural code for interpretation. Semiotic theory emphasizes that signs are interpreted differently depending on the audience’s experience and knowledge. If a viewer does not recognize African ornaments or does not read the image of a film camera, part of the visual message’s meaning is inevitably lost. This corresponds to a broader principle of communication: insider forms of communication are often unclear to external observers. Just as a person overhearing a conversation between close friends may misinterpret it due to a lack of shared context, a viewer outside the festival’s cultural field may not grasp all the connotations of the visual system.
Thus, the semiotic approach proved to be the most accurate for FESPACO Local Editions, as the festival addresses an audience familiar with African symbolism and cultural codes. For this audience, the project’s visual language is easily «read» and immediately conveys the intended meanings, turning the identity into a meaningful cultural statement rather than simple decoration.
Sociocultural Approach
We refer to the sociocultural approach because it considers communication not as an isolated act of information transfer but as a process that occurs within a specific cultural and social context. Within this tradition, according to Robert Craig, communication is understood as the way people create and reproduce culture and social order. In other words, communication does not simply convey information but shapes shared meanings, norms, and collective identities.
Within the sociocultural approach, communication reproduces culture, including through the use of traditional motifs in design. It is viewed as a symbolic process in which social practices are maintained and familiar forms of interaction are reinforced. For the FESPACO Local Editions festival, this means that the visual language functions not only as identity but also as part of a broader cultural process.
In this context, the festival’s visual practices become elements of cultural rituals. A key example is the tradition of printing fabric with FESPACO Local Editions symbolism for each festival, from which clothing is then sewn for the opening ceremony. This practice, common in many African countries, shows how a visual brand becomes integrated into everyday life and material culture. People literally wear the festival’s symbols, turning them into a sign of belonging to a community. Through such forms of interaction — discussing design, wearing the symbols, and collectively experiencing the festival’s aesthetics — collective meaning is formed. In sociocultural terms, FESPACO Local Editions appears not simply as an event, but as a space where communication supports and reproduces shared cultural identity.
Critical Tradition
Within the critical tradition, communication theory views interaction as a process inseparably linked to power, ideology, cultural inequality, and representation. This tradition focuses on analyzing whose voices become visible in the public space and which are marginalized, as well as understanding how communication can contribute to social change.
Historically, the FESPACO festival has existed as a platform for African cinema that for a long time remained outside the dominant Western media space. In this sense, the festival’s communication is initially aimed at reconstructing the global cultural narrative in which Africa is often represented through external, colonial, or exoticizing perspectives. The festival creates an alternative space of representation in which African authors and visual languages gain the opportunity to speak in their own voice.
Maria Mordvinova, Olga Solovyova «Communication Theory: Bridging Academia and Practice», Smart LMS [online course], 2025. (accessed 01.12.2025).
Alabuzheva E. Educational project «FESPACO festival» [Electronic resource]. — Available at: https://hsedesign.ru/project/fespaco-8224c016967a44438163d97e2d5da513 (accessed 01.12.2025).
