Faculty of Design

En av de fremste norske representantene for denne utstillingstradisjonen er interiørarkitekt Aud Dalseg. I hennes bok Utstilling som form, 25, beskrives utstillingen som en formal komposisjon. 11 Program for kunstnerisk utviklingsarbeid, «Stipendiatprogrammet», gir kortfattet programbeskrivelse. 12 Frayling, Research into Art & Design 71 4. Formidling

Fashion is a statement, a stylised form of expression which displays and begins to define a person, a place, a class, a time, a religion, a culture, and even a nation. This interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary conference seeks to explore the historical, social, cultural, psychological and artistic phenomenon of fashion. Fashion lies at the very heart of persons, their sense of identity and the communities in which they live. Individuals emerge as icons of beauty and style; cities are identified as centres of fashion. The project will assess the history and meanings of fashion; evaluate its expressions in politics, music, film, media and consumer culture; determine its effect on gender, sexuality, class, race, age and identity; examine the practice, tools, and business of fashion; consider the methodologies of studying fashion; and explore future directions and trends.

Within the humanities and social sciences there is an increasing variety of scholarly approaches to design as a subject of historical and cultural study. The last decade has seen the establishment of a number of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, research schools, and associations connecting specialists and enthusiasts within and without the academic world. This growing and heterogeneous area displays commitments and affiliations to a plurality of-occasionally incompatible-theories, methods, literatures, and research traditions. The question of the empirical material adds another level of complexity to this meshwork. If we advance from the premise that the materials we collect and produce are not only determined by the theoretical frameworks we use, but also impinge upon those very frameworks, then our choices and convictions have radical implications.

Review of Curating and Politics Beyond the Curator: Initial Reflections, edited by Heidi Bale Amundsen and Gerd Elise Mørland with contributions by Andrea Phillips, Reesa Greenberg, T.J. Demos, Cecilia Sjöholm and Ekaterina Degot, Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2015 - for the Norwegian art history journal Kunst og Kultur no.2 2016, published by the Norwegian National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design and Norwegian University Press.

Current work in design history focuses on strengthening inter--and trans--national networks. This comes after decades attempting to define what histories of design can tell us about socio--historical contexts and those who engage with designed objects, systems and spaces. With cultural and educational institutions also attempting to launch reflexive and critical discourses that critique, de--colonize and pursue post--colonial narratives and mandates, what do these changes look like after and underneath this discourse? Power often manifests as a uni--directional flow of narrative within and across these producers, including institutions and those that operate within them: researchers, curators, educators, artists and designers. This panel considers the role and potential for collaboration as a method of neutralizing these power structures. The term collaboration provides a specific platform for thinking about structural, methodological and experiential exchanges in an effort to move away from power--laden vocabularies and timelines. The above question becomes: What does the implementation of critical collaborations that neutralize power look like? We welcome submissions that look to histories of art and design collaboration that confront and disarm power structures, be they institutional, research methods--based, or material. This panel aims to foster a dynamic discussion that will address projects that focus on histories of collaboration and engagement practices. Contributions focusing on non--Western contexts will be favored to consider not what history or design mean in various constituencies, but what present collaboration across geographies can afford the intellectual, social and cultural aspects of art and design.

E n designmatboks med eget rom til baesj? Jo da. Prosjektet Human Poo Energy Future: Lunch Box fra 2004 var et eksempel på såkalt «kritisk design» i form av et fiktivt forslag til hvordan energikrisen kan tenkes løst i en udefinert fremtid, som foregrep dagens diskusjoner som reevaluerer avfall. Critical Design in Context tar sikte på å gi en oversikt over feltet kritisk design. Designretningen betoner designens mulighetsrom ut over både trendy staesj og smart problemløsning -i form av mer kunstnaere, undersøkende, diskursive og eksperimentelle tilnaerminger. Hovedpoenget er å generere kritisk tenkning og å utfordre sosiale, kulturelle eller politiske paradigmer. Kritisk design som begrep dukket opp rundt årtusenskiftet, og selv om Matias Faldbakkens famøse harselas

‘Normcore’ was not only the most Googled fashion trend of 2014 but also the runner-up for neologism of the year by Oxford University Press. The phrase generated numerous headlines, such as “Normcore Is (or Is It?) a Fashion Trend (or Non-Trend or Anti-Trend)” in the Los Angeles Times in 2015 or “Everyone’s Getting Normcore Wrong, Says Its Inventors” in Dazed in 2014, indicating a multi-faceted and intriguing phenomenon. This article employs the timing of post peak normcore to investigate a trend that surely entailed more than meets the eye. Described as “a unisex fashion trend characterized by unpretentious, normal-looking clothing” by Wikipedia, normcore was in fact not meant to be a trend at all, nor was it meant to be used to refer to a particular code of dress. Initially a spoof marketing term coined by the art collective/trend forecasting group K-Hole in 2013, normcore was originally a subversive concept, anticipating an alternative way forward, proposing anti-distinction as the radical new, analysed here as a mode beyond luxury—as ‘post luxury’. Combining anthropology, consumption theory, and critical fashion theory with a practice-based insight informed by the author’s background in trend analysis and brand planning as well as the art school context, this article attempts to frame and unpack normcore in order to speculate about the future of luxury.