Rebeca Méndez

Rebeca Méndez is a highly influential interdisciplinary artist, designer and educator who has achieved excellence and distinction in all three fields. She is founder of Rebeca Méndez Studio whose clients and projects in both art and design fields have garnered Rebeca an international reputation as a leading voice in the production of socially-grounded, aesthetically rigorous design, innovative media-inflected arts, and monumental permanent public art. Rebeca has received three of the most significant awards in design and her work is in the permanent collection of major museums, including LACMA, SFMOMA, and the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. She is a leading industry voice, regularly speaking to audiences across the globe. Rebeca is tenured professor at UCLA, Design Media Arts where she is founder and director of the Counterforce Lab, a research studio that harnesses the power of art and design to engage with the reality of the global ecological crisis and its ties to environmental injustice.

“Rebeca has won the three most significant awards in the field of design: The Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award in Communication Design, 2012, the AIGA Medal in 2017, and induction to the One Club Hall of Fame in 2017. This triple crown would be worthy enough on its own, more than worthy, absolutely exceptional, but when you add in that Rebeca is the first and only Latina to win each one of these, much less all three, the achievement is towering.”

— Dr. Peter Lunenfeld, 2018.