#ethicsindesign

[designforsocialimpact]

22 - midterm week, 3d printing, and first draft thesis submissions

This week fast-forwards. It’s post Spring Break, it’s midterm week and it’s go time for thesis drafts!

Monday started it all off with our thesis writing class where everyone debriefed their difficulties. Lilian covered the requirements for the writing and the bibliography. We each had particular misgivings and questions but the overall attitude was just to get it done.

Tuesday Rica and I went to 3d printing class to see how the equipment in 303 worked and didn’t work…and then worked again. These 3d printers are quite fickle. It reminds me of when the internet was a thing and loading one page could take an entire day. After 3 hours Rica managed to print a mock-up of his final project. He was pretty chuffed! Later that night we had a makeup class on Ethic and Social Responsibility. Half of the lecture was wrapping up arguments about how capitalism takes the shine, drains the drive and can sometimes warp design. How does one work in legitimate projects without playing the fiddle to capitalism?  The other half of the lecture was an intro to Man vs. Nature with a William McDonough TedTalk about circular design. Oh cradle to cradle for the win! I wish we had started here since THIS is what tugs on my mind. Wednesday we had a visit with Sabine about our individual projects. [I do a skype call since Wednesdays are my workshop days and I’m normally testing prototypes at PCA.] By the end of the day messages on whatsapp slowed way down and keyboard tacking sped up. Tackity-tap-tap. We all worked to spiffy up our thesis drafts in time for the Thursday submission. Thursday the Sprout Workshop hosted the final lecture. Our group presented a future forecast of Ikea becoming IKEA-gro in the future scenario where we all live in solar punk communities and IKEA provides a nature consultant for in-house gardening and biomimicry products. Other teams present on Uber, IBM and even H&M. Who knew that we could all future forecast something beyond Black Mirror dystopias? [Hang tight for final presentations and posters at end-of-year show!] The future looks bright and green.

Thursday night the lecture series brought in a leader from the social business sector. Her name is Caroline Delboy and she is the Global Happy Team Leader for the social business accelerator MakeSense. Her lecture was mostly about her personal journey. She started in business background but new opportunities brought Disco Soup http://discosoupe.org, makers movement and finally into joining MakeSense community where she switched careers. She gave advice to all of the artists/photographers/social-impact-designers in the room to be true to your passions (what makes your heart break) and try to sync it with how you work best (when do you find yourself in the flow). Crossing my fingers we are all that lucky! After lecture there was an exhibit in the PCA gallery where our colleagues in Transdisciplinary New Media were presenting their work in a show called “Sound/Speech/Noise” with students from  ESAT (Escuela Superior de Arte y Tecnologia) in Valencia. So we got to walk through, talk with our friends, hear their ideas and see folded paper dresses, cubes for communication and gestural sound emotions.

Friday morning was another round of edits and visits with Lilian for the thesis drafts. It’s a safe space in a meeting with Lilian and she gives great advice for writer’s block. Afterwards the weekend finally drifted into view. I pounced on a real escape from non-stop studies, prototypes and work. It’s time to see an exhibit, take in a movie (Black Panther!), and take a walk outside - it’s almost springtime!

#smartigraphicdesign #paris #pca #pariscollegeofart #masterstudents #thesiswriting #futureforecasting #ethicsindesign #3dprinting