KEYNOTE LECTURE + FILM (5’20”): for EU-funded design futures pedagogy event + UAL design management staff & students

This page sums up two design events I was invited to headline in June 2022: a design pedagogy event by European consortium FUEL4Design: Future Education and Literacy for Designers as International Respondent (07 June), and as Keynote Lecturer for Deep Meaningful Conversations of the Design Management course, London College of Communication, University Arts London (09 June). The central hypothesis for both is that, in order to
take a genuine step forward and an imaginative leap into the future, we must dismantle the monuments — including the invisible ones — as well as re-design the tools, structures and mechanisms, that uphold the so-called ‘master narratives’ and built the master’s houses; and that to shake us out of our ‘unconscious’ and conscious (because bias is by design) gatekeeping processes, we must re-position so-called ‘non-users’ of art and design education
and ivory towers as true ‘masters’ and leaders, who hold the key to future-facing design solutions, because how else could they have survived the adversities of dominant systems which have not been designed
for, with or by them? Scroll down for details, shared gallery and corrected transcript.

FUEL4Design PROVOCATION

On Whales Wailing, Dog-eating Dogs, Elephants in the Art and Design Studios, and Octopuses and Tentacular Pedagogy is a short and bitter-sweet and sour piece was created in response to an invitation as international respondent and provocateur by European consortium FUEL4Design: Future Education and Literacy for Designers, and premiered on 7th June 2022. FUEL4Design is a 3-year  project jointly delivered by the European consortium of leading HEI partners: Oslo School of Architecture and Design (NO), Politecnico di Milano (IT), Elisava (ES) and University of the Arts London (UK). The event, entitled BUILDING PEDAGOGICAL FUTURES IN THE PRESENT: How to imagine an otherwise, showcased powerful provocations by members of the consortium, as well as by other international provocateurs including the outstanding Tanveer Ahmed – Senior Lecturer in Fashion and Race at Central Saint Martins, UAL, and Dr. Kush Patel – Faculty and Head of Studies (MA in Technology and Change) Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design, and Technology, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), India. My own piece drew on ideas from my keynote lecture on Tentacular Pedagogy (which premiered for the European League of Institutes of the Arts’ Teachers Academy /ELIA, a European Network for higher arts education with >300,000 members in 282 institutions in 48 countries Europe, N and S Americas, and Australia and Asia, in November 2021) as well as How to Thrive in 2050 (my commissioned film with ‘adult themes’ like ‘neurofuturism’ and anti-colonialism which is playing on BBC iplayer). Read corrected transcript here of my video clip. It was delightful to see how the notion of ‘tentacularity’ has had legs, with fellow provocateurs and participants alike running with the motif/metaphor. In particular, Design Futures Lexicon was a tremendous joy, with tape-wormed terms like ‘octopatlas’, as well as ‘introspeculation’ and ‘ballusion’, which are witty and pungent! In my workshop group, we ran with Tanveer’s powerful provocation about brick walls + using tentacles, and collectively came up with a response about the foregrounding of sand as material and metaphor: malleable, shifting and not ossified, and referring to the hourglass sand that seem to align more with Kafer’s crip time and less to a linear, neo-capitalist and ableist timeframe, and enabling reflection, digestion and mutual support. Feedback received include:

That was great yesterday – I can’t remember an online event that was so engaging and powerfully provocative, so generously full of tools and resources for participants to draw on and so expertly organised and facilitated – ever!

KEYNOTE LECTURE, LONDON COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATION

I was invited to give this keynote lecture for the Deep Meaningful Conversations series led by the Design Management on the theme of ‘Trajectories’. The context (taken from the LCC website) is that the world is ‘reconfiguring. Systems, organisations, communities and humans are re-emerging, re-learning, re-connecting, re-balancing’. The series explores ‘how the next generation of design graduates can help shape systems, connections and self-care to chart their own career and life trajectories in authentic and sustainable ways’. The session is framed as ‘inspiring lightning talks, provocations, a mini-workshop and networking with industry luminaries as we celebrate our newest graduates for 2022’. First launched in 2020, Deep Meaningful Conversations is a ‘series of discussions and panels that brings together diverse thinkers and doers from design, research, business, start-ups, activism and the public sector’. I showed How to Thrive in 2050 in a cinematic condition in the lecture theatre, prefaced that with a few questions similar to those raised in the video clip for FUEL4Design, followed by questions and answers, and advice for graduates (‘use your privilege’, I said). It was also great to see some of the ideas picked up by audiences in a Mentimetre survey, such as on the need to learn from those from the margins (see slideshow above). Feedback include:

‘Poetic, hilarious and moving lecture’

tweet by Anna Nolda Nagele, designer/researcher/writer/consultant and design management lecturer

Loved having you down to UAL to see us and your film was thought provoking and presentation was perfect for our students – thank you!

robert Urquhart, Acting Course Leader, BA (Hons) Design Management 

The audience clearly enjoyed your insightful thoughts

Dr Janey Deng Klingelfuss, ASSociate lecturer

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