Studying Material Interactions to Facilitate a Sense of Being with the World: Bilge Aktas & Camilla Groth — Proceedings of Design Research Society 2020 Conference

Aktas, B., & Groth, C. (2020). Studying Material Interactions to Facilitate a Sense of Being with the World. In Proceedings of DRS2020 (Vol. 4, pp. 1659-1676). Design Research Society.

Material interactions are fundamental to design and craft education; however, they might also provide opportunities to reflect on sustainable behaviour in general. In this paper, we present an interdisciplinary undergraduate course in which students interacted with clay and wool. By engaging novices in material-based craft processes, we examined renewed ways of experiencing the materials to reconsider our everyday material interactions and our dependency and responsibilities in regard to materials in general. Through this example, we discuss the potential of craft practice as an educational platform to discuss materiality and to facilitate a deeper and more holistic understanding of the consequences of our material behaviour beyond the creative practices. The students’ reflections over the five weeks touched upon their renewed appreciation of materials, and their changed interactions with materials – moving towards a dialogical stance rather than only using them as a means to an end.