M+ / Design Trust Research Fellowship Public Talk: Changing Winds in Education and Technology

2023 M+ / Design Trust Research Fellows Leah Hsiao and Flora Weil will present the conclusion of their research with the event "M+ / Design Trust Research Fellowship Public Talk: Changing Winds in Education and Technology", on Feb 8, Saturday, 2025, from 1:30 pm to 4:30pm at the Grand Stairs of M+ Museum.

The event consists of two talks: "How to translate 'Design'? The Dissemination of Design Education and Culture from Asia to the Greater Bay Area, 1978–1990s" by Leah Hsiao followed by "Design in Rising Winds" by Flora Weil.

Leah Hsiao investigates the formation of design education at the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts (GAFA) and design practice of the affiliated Jimei Design as entry point to identifying the characteristics of the design culture that emerged in the context of China’s economic reform, an era in the late twentieth century when China first started to play a role in the global economic development while retaining its national socialist strategy. The establishment of design pedagogy at GAFA, the earliest of its kind in China, could trace its origin to active exchanges and translations, between the design agents in Guangzhou and abroad, in particular, Hong Kong. between the late 1970s and early 1980s. This was a period of creative ferment that seeks further contextualisation, perhaps as the beginnings of a design culture grounded in both locality and porousness in the region of the Pearl River Delta.

This presentation will be followed by a dialogue with respondents Dr. Kan Tai Keung and Professor Yang Yan, moderated by M+ Curator of Design and Architecture Shirley Surya.

Flora Weil explores the dynamics between dust storms and how digital technologies have transformed the interactive possibilities for rural inhabitants, as well as how apps have allowed for the gamification of terraforming at the edge of China’s Gobi Desert. How might the movement of wind, people, and organisms that compose and recompose these landscapes inform our approach to navigating increasingly complex systems? Through her fieldwork that stretches from Gansu to Inner Mongolia, Weil’s research seeks to identify new forms of orientation where cognitive technologies and climate urgency define the future.

This presentation will be followed by a dialogue with Professor Ruishan Chen and Dr. Travis Klingberg, moderated by M+ Curator of Design and Architecture Sunny Cheung.

Hsiao and Weil's presentations will be the final public talk of the M+ / Design Trust Fellowship, marking ten years of fruitful collaboration between Design Trust and M+ on the research fellowship program. Design Trust Thanks Lars Nittve, Aric Chen and Alan Lo and other supporters for establishing the programme together with Marisa Yiu in 2014. Stay tuned for the researchers’ feature articles to be published in M+ Magazine and past fellows’ projects to be available online soon.

M+ / Design Trust Research Fellowship Public Talk: Changing Winds in Education and Technology

Date: February 8th, Saturday

Venue: Grand Stairs of M+ Museum

Registration is now open via link here.