Create & Connect : wearable stories

HANSON, Maria and LEVICK-PARKIN, Melanie (2014). Create & Connect : wearable stories. In: RGS-IBG Annual International Conference 2014, RGS, London, 26-29 August 2014. (Unpublished)

[img]
Preview
PDF (Positioning paper)
RGS_Create_&_Connect_-_Wearable_Stories.pdf - Supplemental Material
All rights reserved.

Download (2MB) | Preview
[img]
Preview
PDF (Documentation of Conference workshop)
Hanson&Levick-Parkin_RGS_workshop_2014-Documentation.pdf - Supplemental Material
All rights reserved.

Download (4MB) | Preview
Official URL: http://conference.rgs.org/AC2014/107

Abstract

As we navigate through our lives we often collect and keep mementoes, souvenirs and found objects that remind us of significant moments, times, places and experiences. However for the vast majority of people, making and material knowledge is limited and a sense of agency with our ‘stuff’ is missing. In his book ‘The case for working with your hands’ Matthew Crawford (2009) suggests that in order to be responsible for the world and our sense of being within it we need to feel that it is intelligible and the provenance of our things need to be brought closer to home. In this workshop we explored how different material objects can be used as cultural probes in order to articulate cultural identities and values. It used contemporary studio jewellery as a device to engage participants in a dialogue about the everyday and explored how sensory experiences with the material world define who we are. Design thinking and craft knowledge were combined in a practical co-creative workshop to interrogate the emotional connections between people, materials and body adornment. It used life experiences, storytelling and narrative structures to inform the making of a wearable jewel. It focused on the following two questions: How can the intrinsic preciousness of ‘things’ often discarded (but kept) be re-appropriated through creative making? How can objects, fragments and materials be beautified and re-contextualised through design thinking and processes of craft (reclaiming, reworking, transforming and relocating)?

Item Type: Conference or Workshop Item (Other)
Additional Information: This conference contribution was in the form of a co-creative participatory workshop. The unpublished paper positioned the workshop activity within a Participatory Action Research methodology and can be accessed here as a pdf. A photographic record of the workshop activity is also available here as a pdf.
Research Institute, Centre or Group - Does NOT include content added after October 2018: Cultural Communication and Computing Research Institute > Art and Design Research Centre
Depositing User: Maria Hanson
Date Deposited: 28 May 2015 11:01
Last Modified: 18 Mar 2021 11:40
URI: https://shura.shu.ac.uk/id/eprint/9805

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics