Lecture / Discussion
Friedrich von Borries:
IS DESIGN POLITICAL?

Tue, 09/27/2016
Goethe-Institut Los Angeles

Design becomes political when we see more in it than the shaping of our environment’s surfaces. Friedrich von Borries, architect and Professor of Design Theory and Curatorial Practice at the Hochschule für Bildende Kunst Hamburg, talks about his concept of design as an emancipatory praxis that intervenes in the world in order to change and improve it. He is in conversation with Kimberli Meyer, Director of the University Art Museum at Cal State Long Beach.
 
Is Design Political? is presented as part of the global lecture series Kritikmaschine, organized by the Goethe-Institut and Kursbuch, one of Germany’s leading intellectual magazines.


Friedrich von Borries, architect and professor of Design Theory at the Hochschule für bildende Künste (HFBK) in Hamburg, Germany, operates at the intersection of urban planning, architecture, design, and art. His work focuses on the relationship between design practice and socio-political developments. "As scientists we try to comprehend the world. As designers we try to change it. We engage with the big questions of our time―global economic inequality, environmental destruction and climate change, technologies of surveillance, and security policies―by drawing on the tools of both, research and design.

Kimberli Meyer is the director of the University Art Museum at Cal State Long Beach. Until recently she led the MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Los Angeles, where she oversaw the expansion of the MAK Center properties as well as numerous programs, exhibitions, and publications.  Meyer holds a BArch from the University of Illinois at Chicago and an MFA from Cal Arts.