Talks
Text from the pamphlet for the lecture series:
Value for Nothing?
In the autumn studium generale programme we presented a series of lectures, focusing on the relationship between design and the production of value. The starting point was the question: “if design is about creating value, what are the values we should focus on today?” The lecture series explored this idea in a varied manner by looking at questions concerning tradition, cultural differences, durability, innovation and public interactions.
In this coming season’s series of presentations we want to go much deeper into this matter and to explore the nexus of value with process, collaboration, interaction, reaction and refinement. We have invited six designers who work in different fields and have diverse approaches to the design practice.
They will introduce one project and present it in a concise and objective manner. This will take between 20 and 30 minutes. The remaining hour will be dedicated to interview and discussion of the project. The moderator will question the designer about the design process asking questions that lead to an elaboration on the theme of the series. How does the designer work with others?
How do reactions to the design influence its production and refinement?
Does design create need and desire or meet need and desire?
How does that influence its perceived value from the designer’s perspective?
How does the designer identify a problem to address?
These and other questions will be reviewed in the moderated discussions.
Moderator and interviewer in this series is Tori Egherman. She studied at New York City’s Cooper Union and lived and worked in Iran for four years. In Iran, she worked on design projects of all kinds from internet-based to print and exhibit design. Tori has authored a number of articles on a wide variety of topics from the Weimar republic to the Islamic republic of Iran.
Wednesday, February 6
Sublime landscapes, tranquil urban scenes, frolicking children who would associate these images with Palestine? All too often the Western media show the country’s gloomy side and Palestinians as aggressors. It is this that makes identifying with them virtually impossible. If we are to relate to the Palestinians other images are needed.
Annelys de vet invited Palestinian artists, photographers and designers to map their country as they see it. Given their closeness to the subject, this has resulted in unconventional, very human impressions of the landscape and the architecture, the cuisine, the music and the poetry of thought and expression. These drawings, photographs and maps reveal individual life experiences, from preparing chickpeas to a manual on water pipe smoking, from historic dress to modern music. Pages containing humorous and caustic newspaper cartoons followed by colourful cultural diaries and moving letters from prisoners. All in all, the contributions give an entirely different angle on a nation in occupied territory.
In this subjective atlas it is the Palestinians themselves who show the disarming reverse side of the black and white image generally resorted to by the media.
Graphic designer Annelys de Vet - educated at the Utrecht School for the Arts and the Sandberg Institute Amsterdam - explores the role of design in relation to the public and political discourse. Next to her work for clients like Droog Design, KPN, TPG Post, Rijksgebouwendienst, de Appel art space and Thames & Hudson she has published several books. In her book The public role of the graphic designer (2006) she investigates the responsibility of graphic designers in the realm of cultural representation. She teaches at the Design Academy Eindhoven and is currently head of the ‘Man & Communication’ department.
Windmills And Landscape
Wednesday, February 13
The necessity and the call for the development of clean energy sources is growing. The fossil fuels are running out and the pollution of the environment is increasing worldwide. In the Netherlands a traditional way to generate energy is the use of windmills. However, for wind energy to be meaningful in the current situation, one thing is very clear: many hundreds of wind turbines of enormous proportions have to be erected in the landscape. This calls for another topic, how to define the place of the windmills in the Dutch environment, literally and figurative.
The rijkslandschapsarchitect (main government advisor for the landscape), Dirk Sijmons, was asked by the government to develop an advice to set goals for the long term generation of wind energy. Sijmons instigated a thesis which formed the base of an assignment for four architectural bureaus and a visual artist, to develop different views on this matter. On ground of these views wrote an advice, wherein he considered a great number of facts: technological possibilities and restrictions, assumed and felt damage to the landscape, environmental damage, public health, town and country planning, possibilities of signification and more.
Dirk Sijmons is a landscape architect and co-founder of the landscape architectural bureau H+N+S in Utrecht. Since 2004 he is assigned as the Rijkslandschapsarchitect and in this function he has to stimulate the quality of the development of the country-side in the Netherlands. He advises ministries and departments accountable for the landscape.
Wednesday, February 20
Photographer Nick Ut, who in June 2007 captured a sobbing Paris Hilton on her way to prison, took the famous photograph of the Vietnamese girl fleeing naked from a napalm attack exactly 35 years earlier. All that unites the two images is a weeping woman, without which the photographs are poles apart. The 1972 photo came to symbolise American defeat in Vietnam, while the mug shot of Paris is a portrait of interminable vapidity. It is a one-liner: Paris is going into rehab. And she’s not the only one. Britney Spears re-enters rehab almost every month and now the incorrigible Pete Doherty has reappeared - really and truly reborn.
reHAb is a project about a recent media phenomenon. A growing number of advertisements, commercials, reports, TV programmes and even everyday news items have become pure entertainment. Their boundaries and links to reality are eroding: they are becoming increasingly autonomous. This trend is most recognisable in the global interest in ‘celebs’ like Paris Hilton, and Pete Doherty. People we have come to associate with the vapidity and emptiness of contemporary life. Nonetheless, they grace the covers of glossy magazines almost daily and even pervade the serious media. Is this merely one of the traits of an aggressive omniscient media industry, or something closer to a modern morality tale?
Ben Laloua / Didier Pascal is a graphic design duo based in Rotterdam. They have been working together since 2002 fulfilling commissions for TNT Post, the Rijksacademie voor Beeldende Kunsten, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and various publishers, among other clients. They also work on autonomous projects. They exhibit in Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam (SMBA) from January 20 till March 10, 2008.
Art As Public Space
Wednesday, march 5
It is called the biggest hotel in the world, situated in demolition houses in the slums of The Hague, spread out in the area ‘Transvaal’, where the streets are the corridors and the local shops in the neighbourhood provide breakfast, night-life and other ‘hotel provisions’. Hotel Transvaal is decorated by artists and local shop owners and is constantly changing: mutating along with the demolition of the area.
Hotel Transvaal is a concept rather than a project. Through its experimental character, continuity and scale, the concept tickles to reflect in one way or another on issues in the cultural and social domain. because of the long-term of the initiative, the concept can offer clues to inhabitants, artists and designers and other stakeholders. By spending a long time considering the development of a certain space, the artist/designer becomes part of a complex and layered network of social, cultural and economical ingredients.
Sabrina Lindemann (1967) is visual artist, originator and (together with Annechien Meier) project leader of mobile project office OpTrek. This project office organizes art projects in the area Transvaal in The Hague, with a focus on the visualisation of the social and spatial changes in this area, while also investigating on the government policy. Before the demolition, OpTrek camps with its mobile office in a sequence of temporarily locations. With her activities she wants to contribute to the general discussion about the future development of city-space and questions the position of artists and designers in this situation.
The Holy Animation Platform
Wednesday, march 12
Holy is an online animation tool connected to public space through the Holy internet vending machine, the first vending machine with a screen and internet connection. Everyone can send his or her animation-clip to this unique machine. The clips are created online with the Holy Animator, an easy-to-use tool that allows anybody to make short animations, using personal pictures, text and sound. New clips are directly uploaded to the Holy archive and visible on the displays of the nine Holy Internet-vending machines. The now nine machines distribute biological snacks and fair-trade products.
This original platform for creative communication gives a dynamic and personal face to our daily environment by presenting the latest animations by colleagues, neighbours or fellow students: people who share a collective environment. 25 Communities varying from educational institutions, museums and community centres, to broadcasting stations, companies, campaigns and festivals, have already used the Holy platform successfully.
Merel Mirage is a multi-media artist/producer based in Amsterdam. After living and making personal video works in countries such as Nicaragua, Japan and Tibet. Mirage received her post-graduate degree in Media Arts with Honours from the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne, Germany. She has been creating and exhibiting a diverse body of works, including video and interactive installations, documentaries, websites, on-line software and public art. Her art works have been screened and exhibited at festivals, galleries and museums in more than 25 countries including the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the Reina Sofia Museum Madrid, the ICA London, the Rotterdam International Film Festival (Netherlands) and the Venice Biennale (Italy).
Economics And Symbolic Richness
Wednesday, march 19
For the rOc professional training school in Apeldoorn Design Studio Tjep. designed the new reception area of the economics department. The starting point of the design was the floor, which represents the complexity and diversity of economical processes in modern society. Tjepkema thought of this space as a temple for economics - in old temples you see a lot of symbols and references - and somehow this richness of meaning is seldom found in modern design and architecture.
in this project Tjepkema has tried to restore symbolic richness in the context of contemporary design and production techniques. The reception desk for instance is formed by abstracted crate shapes, a meeting table is in the shape of a five meter long key and a conference room in the shape of a factory. At the center of the floor design we find a student with a huge heart, a little reminder that the heart should be the starting point of economic decisions.
Frank Tjepkema is a Dutch designer based in Amsterdam. After studying at the Technical University of Delft for two years, he graduated in 1996 from the Design Academy in Eindhoven. Following this, he obtained a MA degree from the Sandberg Instituut in Amsterdam. Several of Frank Tjepkema’s products and furniture designs have been selected for the Droog Design collection.