Pictured Ease of African Entrepreneurship, depicting the number of days required to start a business in different African countries (partial graphic)
Graphics Ivan Colic Words Annabel McLeod
This article is from the current issue of ARISE Magazine (issue 13), out now.
By day Ivan Colic is an art director for marketing and advertising giant Ogilvy. By night he researches and collates data, searching for hidden patterns, relationships and stories for Afrographique, his collection of African-centric infographics. “There’s a visual language that’s associated with Africa – it’s famine, war, Aids, civil strife,” says the self-confessed design nerd. “Afrographique is the total opposite of that it’s colours and data. And it’s unpretentious.”
The Cape Town-based designer only decided to blog in April. “The vastness of progress on the continent over the past year, five years, ten years has been immense,” he enthuses. “The media has covered the negative side of Africa very well, so I’m not looking to compete with that. I know we have our problems but the continent also has beautiful things that need to be shared.”
Colic is keen to take his data visualisations into the fields of arts, sports and politics. However, the challenge is finding the right and the most accurate data. “I’m constantly thinking about how I get the data,” he admits. “How do you suss out if the information is reliable, how relevant it is?”
As well as feeding curious minds, Colic’s infographiques provoke debate. One graphic, charting foreign investment on the continent, was challenged by users who questioned whether his visualisations were to scale. It’s this collaborative and constructive feedback that has helped Colic refine his work.
“I never thought a little blog that I started part-time for fun could have such an awesome impact. It’s been massively humbling,” he says. “I had a couple of teachers from Durban who printed them into big posters and put them up in classrooms. That is the coolest thing ever.
“Africa’s an exciting place to be because history is still to be made. As a 28-year-old South African and African with the opportunity to lend a hand, that’s amazing.”
For more visit afrographique.tumblr.com.