Radical re-thinking and contrasts at Konstfack Degree Exhibition 2015

Radical re-thinking and contrasts characterize this year's Degree Exhibition. Konstfack's role as a public cultural institution is evident as 154 graduating students from 14 different programmes in seven subjects exhibit their work.

We have been exploring the concept of radical re-thinking at Konstfack over the course of the past year. This has taken place in lectures, publications and experimental approaches to education and research. How can re-thinking change, influence and contribute to social development — or to an individual discovery? Create new meaning? Disrupt the status quo and allow us to see ourselves in a new light?

At the Degree Exhibition 2015, the curators from Uglycute are challenging Konstfack's standard exhibition format by radically re-thinking the exhibition tradition. For the first time, student works from the university's various departments will be mixed. By selecting the placement of the works randomly, art, craft, design and visual communication are now exhibited side by side. Accordingly, different materials, approaches, aims and theories will engage one another, sometimes colliding and causing friction. This places greater demands on the viewer who is given a chance to reflect; to re-think.

Jonas Nobel and Fredrik Stenberg from Uglycute believe that contrast and difference function as powerful tools for visualising objects and actions.

“We hope that the diversity of expressions, styles and materials at Konstfack are interpreted more clearly through this mix, which also challenges hierarchies and provides a more equitable view of the different parts of the society in which Konstfack's students can use in their careers. This demonstrates the major influence Konstfack has on society,” they argue.

Konstfack's Vice-Chancellor, Maria Lantz, would also like to stress that the relationship between creativity and the commercial market is one aspect of our impact on society that we do not always mention, yet the design duo Joel remind us of this aspect in their identity branding for the Degree Exhibition 2015.

“Art, craft, design, visual communication and commerce are a coherent whole. Today, ‘creativity’ is a sought after quality that is important, but easily appropriated. Finding your own form of expression is often a matter of balancing your own expectations and desires with those of others. Consequently, artists often stand with one foot in the publicly funded cultural sphere and the other in the commercial market. In that way, we are represented in most sectors of society; we are in the kitchen drawer, on the silver screen, in the hotel lobby, in the art gallery, in the Metro — and on the barricades,” says Vice-Chancellor Maria Lantz.

Uglycute is a design and architecture firm founded in 1999 by artist Jonas Nobel, architect Fredrik Stenberg, artist Markus Degerman and interior designer Andreas Nobel. Uglycute expands the concept of design by cross-fertilising it with art and architecture.

The design duo Joel consists of Josefin Carlén and Elin Nilsson, both of whom graduated from Konstfack in 2012. Joel work with everything from print materials to installations and video. They have created the identity brand for the Degree Exhibition 2015 using the mascot Rosie to welcome and guide us on the journey.

The 154 graduating students represent the bachelor's and master's programmes in Graphic Design & Illustration, Industrial Design, Interior Architecture & Furniture Design, Ceramics & Glass, Fine Art, Textiles and Ädellab.

For catalogue, images and more info: www.konstfack2015.se