Article by Jean Monnet University
On the 03, 04 and 05 of April, the CIMAD Arts & Crafts and Design conference was held in Saint-Étienne (Jean Monnet University) and Lyon (SEPR).
The MOSAIC project partners managed to bring together 15 speakers from all over the world, and just as many professionals, to discuss the future of arts and crafts. We had the pleasure to welcome researchers from Armenia, Cyprus, France, Italy, Latvia, Morocco, Netherlands, Portugal and Poland which all shared their research regarding the future of crafts teaching in a conference format.
The subject of the conferences were:
- Vernacular Design : A dialogue between Tradition and Contemporary values in Design – Presented by Christopher Karaguezian
- De-centering fashion narratives : A provisional framework for mapping sustainability knowledge in textile crafts through the lens of meta for theory – Presented by Ruxandra Lupu
- Textile 360 : Thé craft of re-use as an alternative to the challenge of textile waste – Presented by Virginie Belle
- Creation in art factories – Presented by Hélene Lathoud and Pauline Kuntz
- What cross-disciplinary teaching methods are conducive to the development of the craft ? – Presented by Benjamin Astier and Patrick Bourgne
- A new school model for a new era – Presented by Maria Gabriela Rodriguez and Maria Chiara Pavesi
- A cartography of craftmaking skills : Perceived educational gaps as the basis for developing tailored educational programmes for the Hephaestus project – Presented by Francesca Leonardi
- Teaching pupils to participate in the textile design and technology Olympiads – Presented by Māra Urdziņa-Deruma
- Traditional crafts in Fez : An art, an heritage and a lever for development – Presented by Mohamed Lazhar
- Stuck in the middle : How framing creative craft helps enhance the field – Presented by Marleen Hofland-Mol
- Tradition and innovation in artisanal urban rest furniture through digital creation – A creative and sustainable solution in practice – Presented by Gabriela Jobim
- Craftsmanship well designed, a case study of service design process in creation of arts schools in Poland – Presented by Lubomira Trojan
We also experimented with another format, with round tables whose aim was to bring together researchers and non-researchers such as students, practitioners, craftspeolple and even chambers of commerce and cultural institutions.
On those round tables, we discussed:
- The use of artificial intelligence
- The innovations in the arts and crafts
- New consumer practices
- The handful of possibilities that we have in the future of teaching arts & c rafts for tomorrow
It has been really fruitful for the Jean Monnet University to be able to exchange research methodologies as we are always wanting to improve and learn from each other in order to make the best research possible for MOSAIC.
We were also lucky enough to have representatives from two other European Projects on Arts & Crafts: Hephaestus and Charter. It is always nice to see how we are building the future with complementary approaches.
If you missed out, don’t worry ! We made sure to record and videotape all conferences and round tables; you will soon be able to virtually attend the event on our Mosaic Observatory of Arts & Crafts ! Stay updated !
You could also come and visit us next year, where we will have the second edition of the CIMAD conference.