HDSA 2016. If you are so smart why are you so poor
Date: 25 July - 5 August 2016
Location: De PUNT & Waag Society
Participants
Are you interested in cross-disciplinary collaboration and self-initiation? Are you a professional practitioner in the fields of design, art, and/or technology, in and outside of the Netherlands. Or are you an international undergraduate/graduate student and want to widen your horizon?
Sign up for the H&D Summer Academy 2016!
All workshops will be accessible for both the tech-savvy and newbie nerds. The workshops will be held English
Sign up before June 15th by sending a short motivation email (150 words max) to info@hackersanddesigners.nl and feel free to send along some work if you have (pdf not bigger than 2mb).
→ Apply early. Limited spots available.
Introduction
H&D believes designers and artists should be empowered with the tools of the digital realm including coding and hardware usage and construction. Conversely technologists should be more comfortable and effective in engaging in creative processes through familiarity with the vocabulary of designers and artists. All disciplines should become more comfortable in theoretical and social discourse, and thus be asking questions such as not only “can we” but “should we”.
During the summer of 2016 Hackers & Designers invites an international group of ambitious participants to learn by creating, researching, and discussing.
At work.
The program will center around the controversial topic of immaterial labor, and the effects digital economies have on our current techno-society, – an on-going discussion at stake in both design/art and developer practices. H&D engages this year’s summer academy participants to go into discussion and critically reflect on their (digital) activities that exist outside/alongside the traditional wage-based definition of labor. What does it mean for the future of our practices to contribute to creative commons and open source projects, to self-initiate, to organize communities, to promote and publish on social networks, to perpetually generate content, to evolve multiple identities as bloggers, vloggers, mojo contributors…?
Progam
The program will be divided in two blocks of each 5 days. Both program blocks fall under the thematic umbrella: ‘‘At work‘‘.
The first block ‘‘Soft work‘‘ has a focus on software construction along side looking at soft concepts including soft money, soft intelligence, soft power, soft or informal forms of organization of work etc. while taking place at De PUNT.
The second block: ‘‘Hard Work‘‘ focuses on Hardware construction along hard concepts like hard money, hard data, hard labor, etc., while taking place at the Fablab of Waag Society. The two blocks complement each other in terms of taught technical skills and in regards to the content.
Participants can apply for one of the two blocks or for the full program.
Block 1 Soft work
July 25th-July 30th 2016
Curated by H&D, taking place at De PUNT, Frans de Wollantstraat 84, Amsterdam
Mode of production: hands-on!
Topics: Crypto- & decentralized currencies, digitalization & mechanical turks!
Workshopping, wire framing, software development & prototyping, designing, discussion
(Lineup to be announced)
Block 2 Hard work
August 1st-5th 2016
Curated by Waag Society & Hackers & Designers,taking place at Waag Society’s Fablab, Nieuwmarkt 4 Amsterdam
Research question: Does smart technology make us dumb?
Workshopping: Make an animate machine (bezielde machine)
Modes of production: hands-on!
Hardware hacking, wiring, soldering, prototyping and discussing while making a smart machine Public program
(Lineup to be announced)
The workshops will be contextualized with a public film night and lecture program – the Hackers & Designers Summer Talks.
For the lecture night Hackers & Designers and Waag Society invites cross-disciplinary speakers to take the participants and the public into a deeper conversation around the topics investigated during the summer academy.
(Line-up coming soon)
DIY (Do it yourself)
The hands-on approach and the challenges that come with making as opposed to talking will stay central throughout the whole program. H&D believes that in order to develop a deeper understanding of the qualities and disadvantages of technology we need to look inside the black boxes of the technology that we heavily rely on in our daily physical and digital, and our private and professional lives. Therefore we urge the participants of the summer academy to open the box, look inside it, rummage through it or even make their own boxes.
DIT (Do it together)
Technologists will be engaged at the very beginning of the creative process. Similarly the designers and artists will be invited to experiment and engage with unfamiliar and deeper technological concepts with which they may not be immediately equipped. It is through Aanvraag e-culture: Hackers & Designers Summer Academy 2016 2 the collaborative approach where common vocabulary and understanding will arise, and be available in future endeavors beyond the Summer Academy.
Price
The full program inclusive welcome dinner, daily lunch, free access to the public programs, an arduino kit: €350,00 (excl. BTW)
Price for one program block: €200,00 (excl. BTW)
See also the documentation of last years Summer Academy: HDSA2015
In a more elaborate version: Book sprint Summer Academy 2015 print documentation