Yet in the moment of an ending the beginning demands to be faced.

The situation in Greece is obviously of concern to the people of the nation in numerous ways – economically, culturally, existentially and so on. But it is equally a felt concern for many other people globally as the plight of the nation is understood as symptomatic of far wider problems at the end of modernity. These are problems such as the complete loss of credibility of evolutionary and emancipatory narratives including ‘development’, ‘progress’, and ‘sustainability’. What the recent history of Greece exposes is that while the powerful and the privileged will continually strive to retain their power and privileges, they are fundamentally failing to deal with the issues that are deciding the fate of humanity (and much else): planetary destruction, a climate heading toward, perhaps already in, chaos and an ever growing volume of displaced people worldwide; increasing the spread and growth of asymmetrical warfare as a feature of late-modern life.

The intent of ‘hothouse’ 3 is to bring together a dynamic collection of people from Greece and around the world in order to confront these issues in a structured way; this conversation will be grounded in the identification and elaboration of local agendas.

The event cannot simply be an interesting discussion or a search for a savior. Rather its ambition has to liberate thinking that is able to begin reversing those principles linked to a Eurocentric model of making the world that is now embedded in globalism and in so doing think and initiate specific projects from which beginnings and directions can grow.

For the above to occur, the ‘hothouse’ will be an intensive four-day event. The first day of the event will require briefings and dialogue; the focus of the second day will be on project ideas, evaluation and selection; and, the remaining two days will focus on project development and presentations.

This HotHouse is an Urmadic University project – this university is an institution without a place in formation. Each year it moves (year one was in Brisbane, year two in Paris). However, HotHouse 3 is different: rather than talking about problems to be faced it is being situated in a problem.

EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST

The Hothouse is taking place June 27-30, 2013

At Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece-School of Architecture

Expressions of interest in participation in the event are invited from:

1. Disenfranchised Greek intellectuals/designers of all ages disenchanted by the current local status quo interested in new thinking and critical practices (limited to 20 places)
2. Members of the Urmadic University Network (limited to 20 places

Place numbers are open to revision (based on the volume of expressions received/selection process.)

To express interest please supply:

• Name
• Age
• Gender
• Contact details
• Employment status
• If employed: Institution/Employer/Position

Plus Statement of Interest in the event and what you believe you could contribute (word limit 300 words)

Email to: e.kalantidou@griffith.edu.au By April 29^th

Selection will be based on the creation of a diverse group and the nature of the statement presented. Selection will be made by members of the Urmadic University. Those selected will be notified by: May 10^th

Additional considerations

• There will be an attendance fee this year of €75 for professionals and €50 for students – it will cover the cost of refreshments (including lunch). This is due to the financial situation in Greece and the absence of funding. No profit will be made from this fee.

• Travel by your own arrangements
• Accommodation  – a list of budget and standard priced hotels will be supplied

A pre-event briefing, travel information and payment arrangements will be provided to the selected participants.

Red Group: Urmadic Kitchen from ]]> http://www.theodessey.org/?feed=rss2&p=683 0 http://www.theodessey.org/?p=678 http://www.theodessey.org/?p=678#comments Tue, 02 Oct 2012 17:31:55 +0000 bec http://www.theodessey.org/?p=678

Yellow Group from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

dTOUR from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

ParisHothouse2012 Black team from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

Blue Group Final Presentation: Port hedland from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

Port Hedland – Presentation from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

Blue Group final presentation: Detroit from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

Blue Group final presentation: Kerala from the oDESsey on Vimeo.

Based on the continuation and advancement of the project of institutional change in design education introduced at the Brisbane HotHouse 2011 an international invitation was sent out for the Paris HotHouse 2012. The event was intended, not only to gather kindred spirits, but to establish an ongoing and unstoppable process of affirmative change.

The Paris HotHouse was hosted, 10^th – 13^th July 2012, by the American University of Paris with the support of Pi Studio, Goldsmiths, University of London and the Queensland College of Art, Griffith University.

WHY

The HotHouse’s have been established in the recognition that for there to be a future, institutional education, with a focus on design education, must change. In order for this to be achieved it is necessary to find like minded people who can work towards meaningful institutional change with the support of a change community.

The gathering was based around the following conversational framings:

• the remaking of education
• the remaking of design as a praxis beyond its professions and their restrictions of it as practice
• the mobilization of design remade against the nihilism that negates  our future and life itself
• the building of a global change community of focused thinkers, activists and leaders
• confronting the price of taking action

As with the Brisbane HotHouse, Paris was structured to create an intense conversation to guide the formation of a global change community with the intention of establishing the Urmadic University.

The intention of the Urmadic University is for it to be an ‘educational institution without a place’ able to structure and facilitate the exchange of knowledge, projects and research programs all aimed at creating a futured future.

WHO

The HotHouse was led by led by Associate Professor Oliver Feltham and Professor Tony Fry with six team leaders: Associate Professor Oliver Feltham (American University of Paris), Mr Duncan Fairfax (Pi Studio, Goldsmiths, University of London), Ms Anne-Marie Willis (Editor, Design Philosophy Paper) Dr Oliver Vodeb (QCA, Griffith University), Professor Tony Fry (QCA, Griffith University) and Ms Bec Barnett (Pi Studio, Goldsmiths, University of London).

PROCESS

HotHouse Two began with the introduction of three projects currently underway, facilitated by the Urmadic University. This was done to provide an example of the kind of project the Urmadic University facilitates as well as give participants the opportunity to become involved in the projects.

The projects presented were –

Kerala Ethnocidal Action: Anti-globalization counter cultural creation – with Tony Fry

Key elements of traditional culture of Southern India and the values they carry are being rapidly destroyed as a modernizing economy and culture arrive. This culture in many respects cannot be saved. The Urmadic University arrives to forge cultural partnerships able to start a process of generating new practices of cultural sustainment out of selected enduring ‘old’ values.
Kerala IMAGES and HAND OUT
(Images are: 1. one of the three families
2. 1000 year old book of instruction on the Samavarda Festival written on palm leaves.
3. a reproduction of a Jacquard loom.
4.the proto-computer of a Jacquard loom currently in use in Kerala.)

Transformation City: The Detroit roadshow – going nowhere/going somewhere – Kiersten Nash

Detroit has become a symbolic focus of the life, death and possible rebirth of a city of modernity – its lessons are global. As a place with an expelled and wasted labour force, and an industrial base that’s been made redundant, it’s mostly seen as an exhausted city. Yet something is on the move. Is there a story to take on the road? The presentation of this project will explore this issue in the context of the Urmadic University.
Detroit VIDEO and PRESENTATION NOTES, MORE COMING SOON

Port Hedland: Launching the urmadic overplan – with Eleni Kalantidou & Bec Barnett

Port Hedland, Australia is set to become one of the world’s biggest ports. In this project it becomes a case study of one of the major cultural issues Australia, and other parts of the world, will face in this century; rapid urban growth against the backdrop of an unsustainable culture, in this case mining. This project will present, via situational analysis, design fictions and a process of ‘designing in time’, an approach to city creation and re-creation based on new modes of habitation.
Port Hedland VIDEO and HAND OUT

Following this the participants were broken up into five groups to work on a rigorous examination of educational institutional transformation via thinking, talking, reflecting, planning and acting. This examination was structured around five strategic and convergent points of entry.

The five groups were:

• Red Group: Information and Radical Communication asks: what can ‘now’ be deemed radical and, thereafter, whether informational content itself can actually be made radical.
• Green Group: Political Action invites the very nature of politics and action to be named and examined prior to the designation and undertaking of a ‘political act’.
• Black Group: Transformative Education Content asks questions of what is to be transformed: how is education to be understood, and does content imply institutional context.
• Blue Group: New Practices asks of design: do such practices assume a failure of the old, what are they, how are they created, what do they aim to do?
• Yellow Group: Change Communities, here discussion goes to what actually is community, what is to change and how can a community be constituted on the basis of acting toward change.

As with the first HotHouse the objective was for participants to leave with a selection of projects, design actions, new practices and political strategies, informed by their own context, to form the basis of new collaborations – all of this to assist in the creation of a new kind of educational institution.

DOCUMENTATION
Below is documentation that was given to participants in the lead up to or during the hothouse as well as the outputs from the HotHouse.

Paris Hothouse Invitation

I ♥ Sustainability by Cameron Tonkinwise 

HH Group Reader - HotHouse Handout

Outputs of each group (presentation text, diagrams, video, etc) are hear available here:

Red Group, Information and Radical Communication: VIDEO, URMADIC KITCHEN PRESENTATION and TEXT

Green Group, Political Action:  KIT FOR CONVIVIALITY: LEARNING WITH DETROIT

Black Group, Transformative Education Content: URMADIC UNIVERSITY; THE SECRETARIAT and TRANSCRIPT

Blue Group, New Practices: ENVISIONING THE URMADIC UNIVERSITY – KERALA, DETROIT, PORT HEDLAND and UU CONTEXT

Yellow Group, Change Communities: PRESENTATION

THE URMADIC UNIVERSITY PROPOSAL – Document by Tony Fry