news

New Smart Design masters courses at NTU

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 15:47:16 +0100

A suite of new interdisciplinary masters courses have been validated at Nottingham Trent University: Ma/MSc Smart Design, MA Creative Technologies, and MSc Advanced Product Design Engineering.
The Smart Design routes in particular are very exciting, with modules in Horizon Scanning and Futures challenging students to contextualise their work against a rich backdrop of invited specialist speakers and live projects. There is also the chance to win a scholarship from PepsiCo

image of slide by Mel Wood, DJCAD

Portage: crossing points

Thu, 3 Jun 2010 08:21:19 +0100

The exhibition opened at the weekend at the Bonhoga Gallery, featuring Mutsugoto, developed at the Distance Lab, Hazel White’s Hamefarer’s Kist, and my Friendship Jewellery and ensemble. For this show, I worked with Genevieve White, a writer based in Shetland, to replace the existing soundscape with local ‘soons’ or dialect. Follow the exhibition on the digital visitor book, feeding to twitter.
Exhibition catalogues with essay by Bill Gaver are available from jono.sandilands@shetlandarts.org

friendship jewellery featured

Sun, 28 Mar 2010 20:46:17 +0100

Courtney Lee Weida has written about how networked communities are emerging as structures underpinning global craft practices, and covers some of the friendship jewellery as part of it. Weida deftly negotiates the false borders drawn by notions of craft as inarticulate, demonstrating how the enlarged thinking space of the computer is a welcome extension of physical artistic processes.

I hadn’t heard of the NAEA (National Art Education Association) before, but was impressed by the scope of this publication:
list of contents

Weida, C. L. (2009). Chapter: Subversively Discursive Digital Communities of Craft. in: G.L.O.B.A.L.I.Z.A.T.I.O.N: Art & Education Anthology. Co-Editors: Alice Arnold, Ann Kuo, Michael Parsons. Reston: NAEA.)
Purchase a copy here.

Tangible & Embedded Interactions at MIT

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 10:51:33 +0000

Sharp eyes will have noticed I’ve backdated this entry - you know you’re busy when you don’t get round to blogging the media lab...but of course it was completely mind blowing, from the MIT Museum to the demonstrations, to the hands on workshops as an integral part of the conference, to the papers themselves.

Aeolia went down well with comprehensive online coverage from the likes of MAKE, Fashioning Technology and formundzweck, and heavy viewing of Yann’s rehearsal video during the three days of the conference.

There were some amazing studios, and I was really happy to be storyboarding with the lovely people from gravitytank, overcoming some old drawing fears. A video was put together by the organisers to show the range of activity going on, set to music by our very own Yann Seznec:

rehearsals with Aeolia cello garment

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 19:18:09 +0000

A week last Friday, Yann Seznec, Peter Gregson and myself got together to see if we couldn’t take the proof of concept cello garment with integrated knit sensors any further in terms of performance. This was the rehearsal, shot and edited by Yann. We’re pretty pleased, and are thrilled to be taking it TEI 2010 this week (hosted, did I mention, by the Media Lab at MIT....?). Here’s the extended abstract by Martha Glazzard and myself (NB this isn’t the published version - a link follows for proceedings).

TEIKnitSensorsDRAFT.pdf