Marquis Love won the Peoples’ Choice Award from AIGA Saint Louis for this design commemorating United Nations Day. Visitors to the AIGA’s awards show voted for his piece to win the award. He has since started working for the digital media agency Manifest Digital.

Marquis Love is one of the latest University of Missouri–St. Louis students to find success and recognition for his graphic design work.

Love received the People’s Choice Award for his piece in the AIGA Saint Louis competition, which honors the best work by both students and professionals in graphic design. Visitors to the AIGA show at the Center of Creative Arts voted his piece their favorite of all the work submitted.

“The competition had work done by professionals that have been doing this for years,” Love said. “I was really humbled and taken aback by it.”

Love’s win was part of UMSL’s successful showing in the AIGA Saint Louis show.

Nermin Zimic won the Judges Choice Award for the best work overall, and Charlie Nowell won the award for the best student work submitted.

Love’s winning poster was designed for a United Nations Day contest sponsored by UMSL’s International Studies Program. The rectangular poster show’s London’s Tower Bridge uniting famous works of architecture on two banks that border the River Thames, along with flags from around the world.

Since his graduation in May, Love has already started work at Manifest Digital, a digital media agency with offices in Chicago and St. Louis. Love has already worked on promotional videos for Post Foods, and creative pieces for emails and websites.

Majoring in graphic design was an easy decision after Love took a class in the art form while he was a student at Parkway West High School in Ballwin, Mo. He had long been an artistic person, and was excited to find an outlet that was both creative and career-oriented.

“Graphic design merges my love of art and illustration with my love of computers,” Love said. “It’s the best of both worlds.”

Jennifer McKnight, associate professor of art and art history, said she has been impressed with Love since meeting him during his sophomore year at UMSL.

“For Marquis, excellence is always the bar, and he gets there through remarkable passion and hard work,” McKnight said.

As a new graduate of UMSL, Love is grateful that he chose the university’s graphic design program to pursue his education.

“I’m really glad I chose to go to UMSL,” he said. “The faculty and students there are one big community.”