If a great deal of epistemological uncertainty exists within the fields of visual communication and typography, it may be that this is due to the perspective from which visual and typographic material is approached in research contexts. This presentation will put forward an argument in favour of reorientating our epistemological understandings of visual communication and typography through a reframing of the ontological starting point from which both are apprehended. Here, it will be suggested that we might shift the focus from the object (i.e. the outcome) to the ways in which the object is experienced and interacted with by an audience (i.e. encountered in human terms). To this end, the author will introduce a methodological framework, developed in the course of doctoral study, which adapts a semiotically-informed theory of graphic representation put forward by Yuri Engelhardt (2002). To begin, the author will first detail Engelhardt’s vision of graphic representations as form of ‘graphic language’. Thereafter, the adaptions of this theory will be outlined. To end, the discussion shall at last turn to consider how—through these adaptions—the context-specific and culturally-specific meanings of graphic representations might be harnessed in order to drive empirical research in the field of visual communication and typography.