A selection of our seminars
Tessa Rixon: Eco-ethical design for theatre and performance pedagogy |
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Scenography and Performance design practitioner-researcher and More-Than-Human Futures research group member Tessa Rixon discusses recent work.19 September 2024, Z9 The Terrace, QUT Kelvin Grove |
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| Eco-ethical design for theatre and performance pedagogy
Ecoscenography – a framework that reconfigures traditional design processes and conceptualisations for theatre and performance – is a new and exciting lens to equip the next gen of performance design practitioners. Ecoscenography challenges established linear modes of stage production (from idea to performance to disposal), and instead offers a circular, deeply collaborative and place-orientated approach to conceiving, executing and circulating design ideas and products. In this talk, Tessa Rixon shares her ongoing research with international colleagues and partner education institutions to rethink how we train performance designers. |
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Theocharis Papatrechas: Sonifying Extremes: Creating Immersive Auditory Experiences through Data Sonification, Creative Practice, and Climate Awareness |
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Composer, sound artist and researcher Theo Papatrechas talks about his work in sonification of natural and extreme climate events19 April 2024, Z9 The Terrace, QUT Kelvin Grove |
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| Sonifying Extremes explores the intersection of data sonification and creative practice, interrogating how the acoustic signatures of underwater and terrestrial environments can be transformed into immersive auditory and musical experiences. Through converting ecological data sets from the depths of the Arctic Ocean to the Californian Wildfires, Sonifying Extremes highlights the hidden patterns and relationships within our ecosystems; making the unseen and unheard audible, advocating for climate awareness. Through highlighting my research as a fellow at UC San Diego’s Qualcomm Institute and Scripps Institution of Oceanography, this presentation will focus on the methodologies, case studies, and the transformative potential of data sonification in shaping environmental awareness and driving conservation initiatives.
Originally from Greece, Dr. Theocharis Papatrechas is a composer, sound artist, and researcher based in Brisbane, Australia. He has held appointments at California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Postdoctoral Scholar, AlertCalifornia Group) and Scripps Institution of Oceanography (Staff Research Associate, Whale Acoustics Lab), where his research focused on data sonification of extreme environmental events. Theocharis holds a Ph.D. from UC San Diego and is currently employed as sessional lecturer at the University of Queensland and Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University. |
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Sabine Carter: A story of love and loss: an investigation into ecological grief and artistic activism |
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Masters graduand Sabine Carter talks about her project and practice in eco-artivism20 February 2024, Z9 The Terrace, QUT Kelvin Grove |
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| In the global accelerating ecological and climate crisis, feelings of ecological grief and climate anxiety are on the rise. Environmental artists and activists such as the Extinction Rebellion, use art to express environmentally related feelings of love and connectedness as well as grief and despair. This practice-led study explores the effects of ‘eco-artivism’ on the mental wellbeing of artists, activists, and communities. It does so through creating handmade artefacts, engaging with communities and interviewing ‘eco-artivists’. The results show that in a business-as-usual scenario that leads to global heating and ecocide with negative effects on mental health, ‘eco-artivism’ has the capacity to give agency, connect communities and contribute to resilience and mental wellbeing. | ||
Brisbane Transformed: More-than-Human Responses to Meeanjin’s Future |
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A Community Symposium hosted by the QUT More-than-Human Futures research group held in conjunction with the Green Institute Conference 2023Sunday, 20th August 2023, 9am – 4pm; OJW Functions Space, S-Block Level 12, QUT Gardens Point campus |
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| This one-day symposium brings together local community members, academics, and politicians to discuss and explore pressing issues affecting Brisbane’s future. The symposium consists of four panel discussions that delve into specific topics of local concern, focusing on the Barrambin / Victoria Park redevelopment, the controversial Lumina light show proposed for Mount Coot-tha, the problem of excessive noise pollution from Brisbane’s flight paths, and the climate-positive approach to the upcoming Brisbane Olympics 2032.
The symposium seeks to engage participants in thoughtful conversations and promote more-than-human responses, considering the wellbeing of both humans and non-humans in shaping Brisbane’s future. Through collaborative dialogue and exchange of ideas, the event aims to foster innovative approaches and actionable solutions for a genuinely sustainable and inclusive Meeanjin (Brisbane). More: https://research.qut.edu.au/morethanhuman/events/brisbane-transformed/ |
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Pirjo Haikola: Urchins and Corals – More-Than-Human design for the ocean |
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Underwater designer and advocate Pirjo Haikola discusses her More-Than-Human, regenerative ocean, and experimental material design works2 June 2023, Z9 The Terrace, QUT Kelvin Grove |
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| Dr. Pirjo Haikola is an ‘underwater designer’, researcher, diving instructor, sailor, and ocean advocate. She is a Lecturer at RMIT University and a collaborator in the Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program for the Great Barrier Reef. In this talk Pirjo discusses her More-Than-Human and regenerative design projects, spanning from exhibitions and events aiming to increase ocean literacy, to collaborating in marine conservation projects through design and material innovation.
For Pirjo, marine species and ecosystems are stakeholders and clients. One of her recent projects, the Urchin Corals installation and films, commissioned for the NGV 2020 International Triennial, brings to the surface issues in Port Phillip Bay and at the Great Barrier reef showing transition from healthy, vibrant, and biodiverse ecosystems to barren wastelands. The Urchin Corals is also an example of how material experimentation for exhibitions has led to research collaboration, in this case with the Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program (RRAP) for the Great Barrier Reef. RRAP is the world’s largest effort to protect an ecosystem from climate change. With a team of 360+ scientists the program is a collaboration between science, design, and engineering for a nonhuman client – the corals. |
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Nicola Bidwell: Hope in the Unmaking: Insights from the Kalahari about the temporalities of prediction |
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Human Computer Interaction researcher and sustainability advocate Nicola Bidwell discusses emerging work and thoughts from a many year collaboration with Ju|’hoansi people in the Nyae Nyae conservancy in North-East Namibia.June 2023, Z9 The Terrace, QUT Kelvin Grove |
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| Nic Bidwell has researched at the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and social informatics with a focus on the Global Souths for 20 years. This encompasses working with First Nations people in far north Australia, Namiba and Mexico and rural inhabitants of South Africa, Mozambique, Kenya, Ireland, Uganda, Indonesia, Argentina and India. She initiated the first panel on Indigenous Led Digital Enterprise at OZchi’08 and co-founded the African HCI Conference (AfriCHI) in 2016. Her ethnographically informed design work with rural collaborators set the stage for South Africa’s first community owned ISP and her analyses of relations between spectrum regulation and community networks (CNs) and community radio have informed policy debate. Nic is Chair of SIGCHI’s Sustainability Committee, Digital Ethics Lead at Melbourne University, University Fellow at Charles Darwin University and an Adjunct Professor at International University of Management in Namibia, where she maintains her rural home.
In this talk I introduce new insights that emerge in collaborating with Ju|’hoansi people in the Nyae Nyae conservancy in North-East Namibia. I reflect on people’s practices of making and unmaking in relation to a low-cost system comprising solar-charging and communal phones, which we made together and installed in 40 villages in 2019. I connect my reflections on making and unmaking with ongoing analyses in a parallel project that explores how Ju|’hoansi knowledge practices can drive the creation and use of AI tools. Our conversations, observations, games and stories, since 2020, situated discussions of probability in everyday reasoning about social, ecological, and other phenomena. They drew our attention to how we inhabit and embody time in lived experience and imagination and to relations between hope, probability and risk. Thus, my talk considers how temporal phenomena are integrated in making and unmaking and how the temporal sensitivities of Indigenous groups may help in designing to better support the knowledges that can sustain our worlds. * With research and reflection from: Charlie Nqeisji, Leon Tsamkxao, |Kun Kunta, Martin Ujakpa, Helen Arnold, Alan Blackwell and Candi Miller |
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