DESIGN DEBATE/ LECTURE: 28 April
19.30-21.00 Auditorium
The Dutch government has in recent times looked to design as a partner in its struggle to deliver new services and to deal with complex problems that don’t fit into its organisational models. Political organisations and government agencies have asked designers to expand their traditional roles and help out with complex processes of re-structuring.
Policy makers have to find new ways to deal with current public-collective partnerships. We have seen all over the world that citizens have become more engaged in designing their own local environments and finding ways to shape their surroundings themselves – for instance through community gardens, local energy via solar cells or social work projects.
This so-called “do-democracy” is thriving, but the city councils are struggling to find ways to deal with these pro-active citizens, as are all governmental institutes. What role can creatives and more specifically, designers, play in this field? How can we redesign democracy?
Lecture by Max Cohen de Lara & David Mulder, XML architects, followed by public discussion
From its base in Amsterdam, XML is involved in worldwide cross-disciplinary projects and has a strong interest in the cultural dimension of architecture. The work of the office has received several prizes and grants among which a first prize in the European competition for architects under 40 and grants from The Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts for their contribution as emerging practice to the architecture field.
Max Cohen de Lara and David are also heading the Designing Democracy master at Sandberg
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