12-week remote collaboration project about the diffferent notions of food culture(s) in Cologne/Germany and Hongkong/China.
How relevant are local cultural heritages to the challenges of food production/consumption, waste and safety? How could a food preparing, cooking or dining experience at home become enjoyable yet meaningful at the midst of (and after) the COVID-19 pandemic? How does digitization affect production, presentation, distribution and consumption of food in cties like Cologne or Hongkong? How would such experiences be eco-friendlily, effectively, efficiently, and economically conducted and promoted among family members, friends and personal social network? How does digitalization influence the way we prepare, enjoy and share food/ meals and which new opportunities, practices and habits emerge?
Professors
Prof. Philipp Heidkamp, Prof. Benny Leong and Stefan Sonntag
Guest lecturers
John Thackara, France and Danielle Wilde, Sweden
Project partners
PolyU Design, School of Design, Hongkong
Time
October 2020-February 2021
Setting
A pilot collaborative online course between the BA/MA Integrated Design program, KISD and the BA(hon) in Design, PolyU Design.
Aims
Through this transcultural design collaboration we aim at facilitating and enabling the students…
- to obtain knowledge of the correlations of traditional, contemporary, local and alien/different/strange cultures (Germany/Europe and China/Asia) (Asia)
- to understand food as a cultural phenomenon with huge social, economical and ecological impact and relate it to current trends and tendencies (societal, technological…)
- to understand how food and cities are related and explore opportunities of transformation
- to address both a macro (systemic) and micro (event, context, product, situation, interaction) level in process and outcome
- to experience cross-cultural, cross-geographical team and project management digitally and virtually.
- to understand the significance of design making (or embodying) with various bodily senses and hands-on practices during the research and making process of the project
Participants
17 students from Hongkong, 15 students from Cologne
Exhibition
The project was exhibited at The Five Senses of the Future, Hong Kong Pavilion for Biennial Countless Cities “People Live Here – A More Human Approach”, Farm Cultural Park,Favara, Italy in March 2021 (see video)
Images: Excerpts of the presentations, by Marcela Mity Costa, Janek Weidenbrücher, Dominik Christian Gottfried, Estelle Corban and Andrew Artajaya, Ph. Nadia Castronovo – Padiglione Prato – Countless Cities