The 2019 National Conference of the Italian Design Society will take place in Ascoli Piceno, at the School of Architecture and Design of the University of Camerino on June 13 and 14, 2019.
On the occasion of the centenary of the Bauhaus’s founding, SID has chosen to dedicate the Annual Conference to a reflection on design research starting from its ability to dialogue with the School that was the first pedagogical and didactic model for our discipline. Without seeking improbable elements of pure continuity, which the Ulm School had already radically questioned in the post-war period, the Conference becomes an opportunity to take stock of some issues present at the Bauhaus in very different forms and intensities, later enriched in subsequent experiences and reworked by contemporary research.
An essential contribution to the renewal of the Bauhaus legacy came from Tomás Maldonado. Throughout his career as an educator and scholar, Maldonado often took a stance on the “Bauhaus tradition,” ever since he was tasked, not alone, with founding the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Ulm. Then, starting from the effort to elevate design to the level of university education, he renewed previous models, opening the discipline to the realm of academic research. A few months after Maldonado’s passing, SID intends to pay tribute to him, not with celebratory attitudes but by highlighting his critical perspective on many of the events that have characterized our discipline, the educational system, and research.
Critically examining past models and the discontinuities that Maldonado impressed upon occasions when he designed design training courses (especially at the Ulm School and the Polytechnic of Milan) means having material to discuss not only the legacy of the two great Schools of the Twentieth Century but also the perspectives of research, as interpreted and conducted particularly by younger generations.
Based on these premises, three open issues have been identified, which still today represent scientific and cultural reference frameworks for design research.
- Design and Other Knowledge
- Design and Experimentation
- Design and Gender Identity
To stimulate the space for reflection on the current and future state of design research, SID proposes a Call to the scientific community to submit projects and research ideas that, regardless of the specific topics addressed, must be particularly coherent with one of the three cited scientific-cultural reference frameworks in which they must be placed.
The SID 2019 conference will welcome the presentation of candidate and selected projects and research ideas through a structured program of interventions, introduced, coordinated, and moderated by invited guests in the role of speakers and discussants.
