西岸 | BEST BUND

About 2016 Shanghai Art & Design

2016 “TRANS-DESIGN” Shanghai Art & Design Show will be held at Shanghai WestBund Art Center from January 10th to March 15th, 2016. It is hosted by Shanghai Federation of literary and Art Circles, Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture, Radio, Film and TV; Shanghai Municipal Education Committeeand sponsored by Shanghai Designers Association.

Tans-Design attempts to identify the possibilities for future design amid relatively obscure phenomena. It will be divided between four sections on the sub-themes of Fusion Power, New Genes, Ideas in Action, and Future(s) by Design, and its aim is to examine the connotative and denotative significance of the changes occurring in the design community, to reveal the power of design and to predict the direction in which design is headed. 

The show will be curated by Ding Yi, with support from a team comprising Bu Bing, Feng Feng, Beatrice Leanza, and Ben Hughes. This curatorial team looks into the drivers behind the evolution of design through these four sections with a focus on the media and phenomena of changing designs, or specifically, the context of a macro multi-disciplinary system where cultures mix to generate the impetus for the development of design, and design experiments stemming from an illumination by the mutation of genes. Such an arrangement of sub-themes is geared towards a prediction of the direction in which design is headed in the future.  

Fusion Power 

Curator Bu Bing

The word fusion means the process of combining two or more distinct entities into a new whole. It may refer to the nuclear fusion reaction, which can generate enormous power. It is also used in recent years to describe the combination of elements of various cultural traditions, started from culinary field. 

New Gene

Curator Feng Feng

"New Gene" will scan and scrutinize contemporary design and art, in an effort to lay bare the lively and exciting developments in design that have been hidden from view by globalization and consumerism. A biological point of view will be borrowed to examine and represent design in evolution. For this section, a new generation of sustainability-minded designers from around the world, inspired by new materials and technological advances, are sharing their questions and thoughts on the relationship between design, living and social progress.

Ideas In Action

Curator  Beatrice Leanza

"Ideas in Action" brings together multidisciplinary projects linking conceptual and practical strategies of design enactment that mobilize extant relations of production, inheritance and place into new conformations. The exhibition aims at offering a critical look at forms of integrated thinking found in, inspired by or echoing across contemporary scenarios of change in China that span from object-to-city making by way of rerouting connections across the social, cultural and spatial givens of uneven or unattended frameworks of development.

Future(S) by Design

Curator Ben Hughes

This exhibition allows us to escape from this binary opposition and celebrate a third direction where technology remains a key part of our life but as an enabler rather than an oppressive force. This is a playful, diverse and interconnected world where devices developed by multinationals interface with locally developed solutions by enthusiastic amateurs, artists and designers.

Special Sections

Apart from the exhibition, three special sections will be held inside and outside the main exhibition area at same time.

Zero-Carbon Building from England

-A White Collar Apartment in a Car Park

Curator: Angela Tang

The innovative light-weight zero-carbon building-----white collar apartment in a car parking, designed by ZEDfactory and introduced by UK Creative Arts Centre, will make his debut in Shanghai Art & Design 2016.

Reset Design

-New Working Models

Curator: Marcelo Leslabay

To show these new work models, we have organised ResetDesign, an exhibition made up of ten manufacturers of productsfor the home that have been founded in Spain in recentyears. This heterogeneous group of designers and entrepreneurshave created their own companies in order to develop, produceand market their projects. 

Swiss Graphic Design

Curator: Erich Brechbühl& Noël Leu

It is an overview of the vivid graphic design scene in Switzerland of the last five years. After it’s initial show in Seoul, the exhibition received a broad positive feedback.

TWO JOINT SPACE

Design Fuelling Station

Curator: Liu Yi

Design evolves with advances in science and technology, and changes the way we live. Contemporary design derives abundant metabolic energy from technological innovations, upgrading of design materials, reflections on traditional values and explorations of existing service models, to become ever more sophisticated as it moves into the future. At Trans-Design 2016, "Design Fueling Stations", which symbolize a source of power for design, will feature 12 mini exhibition spaces focusing on design production and design services that highlight the overarching topic. They are intended to take stock of the needs of designers and inspire discussions on new design resources that may emerge in the future. 

Local Design Beat

Today, local Chinese design has been a constant source of new ideas and inspirations for the world’s design community. Local Design Beat includes over 70 pieces of work by local designers practicing in a myriad of fields, demonstrating the uniqueness of Chinese design born out of a convergence of multiculturalism and information technologies. In creating these works, the designers, who are steeped in local culture, sought to push the limits of their familiar fields and break new ground in new disciplines, in order to unleash the endless power of design. Hear the pulsating rhythm of Chinese design at Local Design Beat!

A SERIES OF EVENTS

Apart from the core exhibition areas of the Center, the show will be held in smaller venues around the West Bund Art Center, such as design centers, art centers, galleries, architecture design studios, artwork shops, makeshift exhibition stands on the pedestrian promenade, design facilities, former industrial sites, and small experimental art buildings. In addition, a third space will be displayed as part of the show, which includes design halls, institutions, centers and shops; creative industry parks; art design areas; and famous studios littered around the city. These design venues will give a glimpse of the city’s design industry, and provide the basis for an “urban design map of Shanghai”.

About Curators