An mm affiliate! work in conversation and dialogue with the Material Matters team - individual projects and material explorations conducted in our labs as well as contributions to group research projects as an mm Research Assistant.

Jihyun Park (Author)

Emily Carr University of Art and Design Graduate Studies (Degree Granting Institution)

Hélène Day Fraser (Thesis Supervisor)

Design, Relationism, Ecology

Relational design, Ecological design, Other-than-human centred design, Critical design

Abstract: My research Perspective is Moving started with two questions. An internal one - how do I see the world? And a professional facing one - how can a design or design process contribute to shifting contemporary dualist, human-centered perspectives derived from modernity to ones that are more relational, pluriversal, and ecological? My research is a personal journey, to ponder how it is that I have been tamed by modern society, to mark out how I have adapted to these constraints and to find alternative approaches to counter them. As a way to shift my own perspective and assumption of the design process, I have applied epistemic artefacts found in modern world to my own process of cognitive recognition: Seeing-Refusing-Doing-Engaging-Embodying-Knowing-Becoming. Reflections at the end of each of these stages enabled me to identify my next steps. Generative, they became my way of finding a way forward. My early stages of research were developed through a cognitive design practice made up of actions for: Relating, Transposing, Merging, and Turning. In the second stage of my inquiry I embraced an empirical design practice made of actions that were: Engaging and Embodying. Outcomes from the early stages of my research trajectory show how flexibility and connectivity of my perspective and relationships can affect the process of designing artefacts. The second stage of my work demonstrates how I sought out ways to negotiate and communicate with nature. A specific tree, located in the public park of Vancouver plays an important role in this stage of my work – a way of connecting with nature. My work, detailed in this thesis document, provides other designers provocative tactics to think about how we live and be with nature and concurrently contribute through our work as designers. It is also an invitation to designers with limited first hand experiences in nature or ecological thinking: observe how my perspective has changed by trying the approaches and methods that I took on.

Link to thesis