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    • Milan – June 19, 2018
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  • About
    • XXII Triennale
    • Concept
    • Advisory Committee
    • Online Platform
  • Posts
  • Exhibition
    • Checklist
    • Thank you
    • International Participations
  • Public program
    • Milan – June 19, 2018
    • New York – January 14, 2019
    • Milan – March 1, 2019
    • Milan – May 2019
  • Readings
  • Links
BN_symposium_FB_250518-09

Tuesday, June 19, 2018
9:30am–6:15pm

In anticipation of the upcoming XXII Triennale, Broken Nature: Design Takes on Human Survival, Triennale di Milano hosted its first public symposium, divided in four chapters—Restorative Design, Magic Pragmatism, Complex Systems, and Long-Term Attitudes—that act as investigative angles for the exhibition. The XXII Triennale will present design approaches that encourage a multifaceted and comprehensive reading of the issues threatening our planet and our collective existence, stimulate an appreciation of the systems in which individuals live and operate, and galvanize attitudes that consider life beyond the next few generations. Gathering an international group of designers, architects, scientists, curators, and thinkers from diverse backgrounds, the symposium has offered a dynamic exchange of opinions on these issues through individual presentations, panel conversations, and video contributions.

Welcome by Stefano Boeri, President of La Triennale di Milano
Introduction by Paola Antonelli, Curator of the XXII Triennale

 

Restorative Design
The relationship between human beings and their habitat is an intricate weaving composed of numerous strands. The pace at which negative change is happening––in other words, the pace at which natural resources are being depleted, displacement is occurring, ocean levels are rising, urban populations are growing, and xenophobic sentiments are spreading, to name just a few virulent developments—suggests that some of these bonds might be broken beyond repair, while others, although frayed, remain in place. In order to restore the ones that still have hope of survival and rebuild some of those that have been lost, humans must move to make reparations. What strategies can designers, architects, artists, and scientists propose in order to make tangible amends to the world humans inhabit and mold?

Sarah Ichioka
Lorenzo Pezzani
Khaled Malas
Conversation moderated by Ala Tannir
Gabriella Gómez-Mont
followed by a conversation with Stefano Micelli

 

Magic Pragmatism
In a world that is at once increasingly jumpy, unstable, and lethargic, creative endeavors are a testimony to the revolutionary potential of imagination. In fact, designers, artists, and architects operating in a favorable space as mediators between theory and practice can be active participants in the reorganization of established systems. By revealing radically new possibilities, and therefore proposing alternative ways of living and existing on the planet, their visions can inspire positive change in people and move them to take a critical stance on their shared experience, and to work toward better conditions for all. How does design embrace utopian ideals as a guiding force to transform the world, and at the same time commit to materializing such principles into being, without lingering in speculations or getting trapped in naïve optimism?

Introduction by Paola Antonelli
Video contribution (Ayesha Hameed)
Mariana Pestana
Maholo Uchida
Video: Formafantasma
Respondent: Rania Ghosn
Conversation moderated by Paola Antonelli

 

Complex Systems
In evaluating distinctions between humans and nature, discourses around the Anthropocene tend to flatten humanity into one single entity, and often risk obscuring the disparities and injustices that individuals and societies across the globe suffer from. The reality is that resource depletion, ecological degradation, and technological advancements do not affect people equally. Artificial Intelligence reveals deeply rooted social, racial, and economic biases; warming oceans are wiping out maritime resources on which native populations—human or otherwise—depend; and water is used to exert pressure on besieged populations in areas of conflict, to name just three examples. Yet, a rising trend to isolate global challenges and immunize—through indifference or orchestrated denial—oneself and one’s community from all that is not immediately visible reigns. What tools are available to weave a more nuanced and interconnected understanding of the world? How does one achieve such complexity and fullness without risking assimilation of the personal and the specific?

Video contributions (Dominique Chen, Justinien Tribillon)
Introduction by Adam Bly
Michael John Gorman
Koyo Kouoh
Marina Otero Verzier
Conversation moderated by Adam Bly

 

Long-Term Attitudes
Present actions—sometimes informed by previous attitudes—carry in them important intergenerational repercussions. Despite noble intentions toward other humans and animals, plants, and places, people are still—as individuals and within communities—tracking a course of destruction through overconsumption and disregard for countless forms of life, including their own. Such rapidly forming patterns pose serious tensions with ecological as well as sociopolitical processes that are inherently slower and more gradual. Beyond anxious accounts of a dystopian future, can design serve to readjust human rhythms into better alignment with long-term environmental considerations? At a time when many species are going extinct while other organisms trapped in ice sheets and permafrost for centuries may make their comeback, how long do national borders last? And what is the duration of smell? How does one adopt a harmonious understanding of such different yet coexisting temporalities in order to attempt survival?

Introduction by Paola Antonelli
Video contributions (Oliver Morton, Gavin Schmidt)
Closing remarks by Paola Antonelli
Stefano Boeri
Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg
Elisa Pasqual
Jamer Hunt

 

The event was followed by a screening of Fabrizio Terranova’s documentary Donna Haraway: Storytelling for Earthly Survival (2016).
Synopsis: Donna Haraway is a prominent scholar in the field of science and technology, a feminist, and a science-fiction enthusiast who works at building a bridge between science and fiction. She became known in the 1980s through her work on gender, identity, and technology, which broke with the prevailing trends and opened the door to a frank and cheerful trans species feminism. Haraway is a gifted storyteller who paints a rebellious and hopeful universe teeming with critters and trans species, in an era of disasters. Brussels filmmaker Fabrizio Terranova visited Donna Haraway at her home in California, living with her – almost literally, for a few weeks, and there produced a quirky film portrait. Terranova allowed Haraway to speak in her own environment, using attractive staging that emphasised the playful, cerebral sensitivity of the scientist. The result is a rare, candid, intellectual portrait of a highly original thinker.

Strano Boeri, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Paola Antonelli, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Khaled Malas, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Khaled Malas, Lorenzo Pezzani, Sarah Ichioka, and Ala Tannir, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Gabriella Gómez-Mont, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Gabriella Gómez-Mont and Stefano Micelli, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Rania Ghosn, Paola Antonelli, Maholo Uchida, and Mariana Pestana, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Adam Bly, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Elisa Pasqual, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Lorenza Baroncelli, Elisa Pasqual, Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, Jamer Hunt, and Stefano Boeri, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
Adam Bly, Michael John Gorman, Koyo Kouoh, Marina Otero Verzier, June 19, 2018. Photo: Gianluca Di Ioia
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Broken Nature
 
The XXII Triennale di Milano, Broken Nature: Design Takes on Human Survival, highlights the concept of restorative design and studies the state of the threads that connect humans to their natural environments––some frayed, others altogether severed. In exploring architecture and design objects and concepts at all scales and in all materials, Broken Nature celebrates design’s ability to offer powerful insight into the key issues of our age, moving beyond pious deference and inconclusive anxiety. By turning its attention to human existence and persistence, the XXII Triennale will promote the importance of creative practices in surveying our species’ bonds with the complex systems in the world, and designing reparations when necessary, through objects, concepts, and new systems. Even to those who believe that the human species is inevitably going to become extinct at some point in the (near? far?) future, design presents the means to plan a more elegant ending. It can ensure that the next dominant species will remember us with a modicum of respect: as dignified and caring, if not intelligent, beings.
 
Broken Nature is composed of a thematic exhibition and a number of international participations solicited through official channels. It will run from March 1 to September 1, 2019.

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© Fondazione La Triennale di Milano, 2018-2019 | Privacy policy | Cookie policy

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