World Hope Forum DDW
work by Hella Jongerius
Dutch Design Week
A special edition curated by Lidewij Edelkoort
Join Lidewij Edelkoort and renowned figures from the design industry to discuss hope, disruption, and creativity in today’s ever-changing world. Li will be in conversation with Hella Jongerius, Victor Sonna, Brynjar Siguròarson, Cynthia Hathaway, Bokja, Julia Lohmann, and others. This session is part of Dutch Design Week 2022 and celebrates the acquisition of the Edelkoort Collection by the Van Abbemuseum.
PROGRAMME
The Collection Is... by Lidewij Edelkoort, trend forecaster & design collector
Hella Jongerius, designer, in conversation with Lidewij Edelkoort
Steven ten Thije, curator of collections, Van Abbemuseum
Huda Baroudi & Maria Hibri, designers, Bokja
Victor Sonna, artist
Lorraine Legrand, artist
Cynthia Hathaway, designer & founder, Wool March
Dick van Hoff, designer of warmth
Borgar Sveinsson by Brynjar Sigurðarson, designer, Studio Brynjar + Veronika
Bori Csiszar & Alexandra Polakova, Practice Held In Common masters, ArtEZ, introduced by Petra Janssen, designer & founder, Social Label
Chai Dienn, graduate, Design Academy Eindhoven
SPEAKERS
Hella Jongerius
Hella Jongerius’s research on colours, materials, and textures is never complete. All her questions are open-ended, and all her answers provisional, taking the form of finished and semi-finished products. These are part of a never-ending process, and the same is essentially true of all Jongeriuslab designs: they possess the power of the final stage, while also communicating that they are part of something greater, with both a past and an uncertain future. The unfinished, the provisional, the possible – they hide in the attention for imperfections, traces of the creation process, and the revealed potential of materials and techniques. Through this working method, Jongerius not only celebrates the value of the process, but also engages the viewer, the user, in her investigation.
Steven ten Thije
Steven ten Thije is research curator at the Van Abbemuseum and is currently working on a PhD at the University in Hildesheim supported by the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven on the genealogy of the exhibition curator. He recently co-curated Spirits of Internationalism (2012), part of L'Internationale and was part of the team that organized Play Van Abbe (2009-2011). Aside of this he is coordinator of The Autonomy Project and has published various articles and reviews, among others in Exhibiting the New Art, 'Op Losse Schroeven' and 'When Attitudes Become Form' 1969, (2010). He has studied art history and philosophy at the University of Amsterdam and is a member of the DAI faculty.
Useful Art The Autonomy Project Situating Artistic Practice Today
Bokja
BOKJA was established in the year 2000 and founded by Huda Baroudi and Maria Hibri, born from the female duo’s shared passion for furniture, textiles, art and design. While Huda has spent her life collecting fabrics from the Silk Road, Maria is an expert in antique pieces of furniture with a hidden beauty. The two married their expertise and knowledge of traditional craftsmanship and started Bokja by reupholstering vintage furniture found in antique stores and flea markets with precious fabrics from the region. Since its inception, Bokja has grown into a multi-level design studio building the story of Beirut’s numerous co-existing cultures through their famous assemblage aesthetic, establishing itself as a disruptive and innovative brand, breaking down barriers and weaving human connections. A Beirut-based design studio, crafting meaningful narratives through embroidery and textile to create personable objects, from furniture to fashion. Their signature is its assemblage aesthetic, bringing together textile fragments of a time and place, situating them in unusual arrangements to communicate a unified message. The integrity of each piece is upheld as it is connected, layered and ultimately integrated and juxtaposed. It is through the juxtapositions of disparate surfaces that the importance of each component becomes magnified; a rich and unexpected visual language is created.
Victor Sonna
Victor Sonna (b. 1977) is a visual artist born in Yaoundé, Cameroon. He graduated from Design Academy Eindhoven and St. Joost School of Art & Design in 2008 and now lives and works in the Netherlands. His artistic practice is formed and informed by his genealogy, negotiating between Cameroon and the Netherlands, constantly occupied with the struggle of holding onto his African roots on the one hand, and integrating a European home on the other. The experience of being in-between cultures is alive in Sonna’s work, which is often born from tensions arising between cultures and styles, resulting in artworks that de-familiarise and test the boundaries.
Julia Lohmann
German-born designer and researcher Julia Lohmann investigates and critiques the ethical and material value systems underpinning our relationship with flora and fauna. She is Professor of Contemporary Design at Aalto University, Finland, and directs her eponymous Helsinki-based design practice. Julia studied at the Royal College of Art, where she has also taught and completed an AHRC-funded collaborative PhD scholarship between the RCA and the Victoria & Albert Museum. As designer in residence at the V&A in 2013, she established the Department of Seaweed, a transdisciplinary community of practice exploring the marine organisms' potential as a design material. Julia Lohmann’s work is part of major public and private collections worldwide and has received awards, bursaries and support from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, the British Council, Jerwood Contemporary Makers, D&AD, Stanley Picker Gallery, the Arts Foundation, Wellcome Trust and Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum.
Lorraine Legrand
The French ceramic artist Lorraine Legrand has spent the last years venturing deeply into the formal and artistic possibilities of clay. For her BREAD Project, she takes on the adjacent art of making bread with the eye and hand of a ceramicist. Her own approach is closed to crafts. Lorraine believes that the practice and the relationship built with the material bring value and strength to the work, and the ability to master something and make good work takes time. The difference is that she develops pieces that can express a kind of beauty that is more important than mastering techniques which enables her to make functional objects. Beauty rather trumps function, knowing that beauty has nothing to do with aesthetics.
Dick van Hoff
Dick van Hoff and Timon de Klein are designers who put on their overalls, take orders and load products onto the DK&VH van. A barn converted into a workshop in Werkhoven is their operating base. This is a “nursery” where they devise, test and perfect their prototypes. Sawing, welding, rolling and hammering are done here. As “builders” they understand how to put things together and the know-how involved.
The Insulation Sweater is designed to retain existing body heat for as long as possible. This makes heating the environment, both inside and outside the house, of less importance. The Insulation Sweater RD 0.52 is made of 100% pure ecological virgin wool. While wool by nature already has a strong insulating capacity, this specifically developed knit increases the insulation value of the wool even more. The design is a response to our current times when innovation is needed to be able to live more sustainably and energy-efficiently. Be inspired for a more sustainable future.
@dekleinenvanhoff
Purchase a sweater: https://www.dekleinenvanhoff.nl/collections/producten/products/isolatietrui?variant=42740017397924
Cynthia Hathaway
Hathaway Designs is led by designer Cynthia Hathaway. Hathaway Designs focus includes participatory artistic research (in location and with communities), concept development, prototypes and designs based on social themes such as community and local industry regeneration (Car Mecca), food and city production (XXL City Harvester), design methodologies for social sustainability (The Mennonite and Amish Design Methodology) and the production of public space (The Department of Search). Hathaway Designs designs meeting spaces for marginalized voices and productions that are not always heard and acknowledged, but are vital for the development of resilient communities. The productions of Hathaway Designs are working prototypes placed in a context to reveal and celebrate local material and knowledge resources (human, natural and animal), and kick start self-organization. The prototypes (whether it be a sweatershop and wool organization, a corn field or a miniature train track), are built in collaboration with local inhabitants, and upon shared values. Hathaway's designs create open, public spaces for interaction, production and debate, and a new sense of citizenry in places of disconnection.
Brynjar Siguròarson
Brynjar Sigurðarson(1986) is one half of an Icelandic studio, currently based in Berlin, Germany. Since 2011 the studio has been creating a body of work driven by theatrical and natural references. Their practice may often link to anthropology and geology. They use various media such as drawings, photography, video, sound, and objects in order to convey their work in a fruitful and specific way. Currently, the studio is working on various projects ranging from self-produced objects sold from the studio, furniture, and a new instrument, and a musical performance with Fondation d'entreprise Galeries Lafayette, Paris.
Alexandra Polakova & Bori Csiszar
ArtEZ University of Arts students Bori Csiszar and Alexandra Polakova from the Practice Held In Common masters researched how to transform old discarded fishing nets back into a new product: a doormat. In collaboration with the people from ASVZ Care, and working with a manual loom, the students explored ways to reuse the discarded material. The nets are upcycled from shipping waste collected by Bek & Verburg in the port of Rotterdam. The project is supervised by Petra Janssen (co-initiator and designer at Social label, and PHIC mentor). Social label designs customized work and activities through the notion of "design by doing” for people who are disadvantaged in the labor market, creating a meaningful design collection that represents the world of tomorrow. At Social label, different groups of creatives work together in ateliers that refer to craft, assembly, story and move.
Petra Janssen
Since its start, the Dutch brand Social label has been striving with various designers for a different perspective on work and design. Initiators Petra Janssen (Studio Boot) and Simone Kramer (C-mone) consider design as a means to initiate a necessary system change. Petra: ‘We have established ourselves as creative entrepreneurs and pioneers and are now in the position to think about the future of our society. A designer has lots of tools at his disposal to increase people’s understanding.’ Simone: ‘The focus is on people and their environment, not on the profit and circulation figures.’ Together with renowned designers, Social label seeks collaboration with makers who still too often remain stuck in the margins of the labour process.
Chai Dienn
Chai Dienn is a British/Thai designer from London and a recent graduate from the Design Academy Eindhoven’s Identity department. His design practice as of now has been largely influenced by the world of theatre. Dienn is drawn to the stories, the comedy and tragedies that saturate daily life and broader society. He is intrigued by the strange habits and interests of people and how these manifest into characters that enact in the play of everyday life. Dienn seeks to give light to these stories and create satirical narratives that allow us to reflect on ourselves in a light-hearted manner. As Dienn asks, “I want to know why we do what we do?”
LIDEWIJ EDELKOORT
Co-Founder World Hope Forum
Li Edelkoort is a trend forecaster, publisher, humanitarian, design educator and exhibition curator. From 2015-2020 she was the Dean of Hybrid Design Studies at Parsons in New York where she founded a Textile Masters and the New York Textile Month festival. Her thought-provoking writings and podcasts have become increasingly popular at a time when she is regarded as an activist and champion for change. In 2020, she founded the World Hope Forum as a platform to inspire the creative community to rebuild a better society. She is also on the Creative Council for all of Gap Inc.’s fashion brands, advising the group on creative innovation and sustainable practice. In 2022, Edelkoort collaborated with Polimoda in Florence to establish an innovative new textile masters called From Farm to Fabric to Fashion.
PHILIP FIMMANO
Co-Founder World Hope Forum
Philip Fimmano is a trend analyst and consultant, contributing to Trend Union’s forecasting books, magazines and strategic studies for international companies in fashion, textiles, interiors and lifestyle. In 2011, Fimmano co-founded Talking Textiles with Li Edelkoort; an ongoing initiative to promote awareness and innovation in textiles through touring exhibitions, a trend publication, a design prize and free educational programmes – including New York Textile Month, a citywide festival celebrating textile creativity each September. He is the co-author of the design book A Labour of Love (Lecturis, 2020) and the co-founder of the World Hope Forum, a new platform for creative community building. Fimmano is the mentor of Polimoda's fashion forecasting masters and textile masters in Florence, and he is on the Board of Directors for the International Folk Art Market in Santa Fe. Fimmano is also on the Creative Council for all of Gap Inc.’s brands, advising the group on innovation and sustainable practice.