Open Lectures

Monika Žaltauskaitė Grašienė-Žaltė Lecture: „Pixel generation: individual artistic(al) view in Digital Jaquard weaving and collaborations“ 

09.02.2022, 4–5.30 PM in auditorium A501 

Artist,  Assoc. Prof. VAA Kaunas Faculty Monika Žaltauskaitė Grašienė Žaltė will introduce Textile Department student works and  herself as an artist of the jacquard weaving technology in the context of contemporary art field: the technical one (knowledge how to do this) and the conceptual one (using possibilities providedby the technique to create the desired effect of the work). 

“Textiles have an incredible ability to be alive. What I mean by this is how it communicates a sense of substance, which is intimate to every human being. A fabric can hold both physical (heat, cold, protection) and rational (recall, memory) features. Each of us uses textile everyday in one way or another. Therefore, it is a common material that allows us to combine multiple experiences, collaborations and to understand the individual person.” 

The lectur is open to everyone. 

Monika Žaltauskaitė Grašienė-Žaltė is invited by the Textile Design Department of EKA.

Architects-critics Andres Sevtšuk and Lily Song from the USA will take part in the mid-term evaluation of the 5th year master’s projects. They create public discussion, giving feedback on the work and criticizing it.

The mid-term open evaluation of masters projects will take place in room A-501
Mon, December 20 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Tue, Dec. 21 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

We do ask you to carry your COVID vaccination certificate or proof of having had COVID and cover your nose and mouth with a mask. Academy students are subject to the usual in-house rules.

Andres Sevtšuk is an Associate Professor of Urban Science and Planning at MIT, where he also leads the City Form Lab. He was previously an Associate Professor of Urban Planning and Design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and has worked as an urban planner, designer and researcher in Estonia, France, Singapore, Indonesia and the USA.

Lily Song is an urban planner and scholar activist whose research, teaching and practice seek to accomplish infrastructure based mobilisations and experiments led by frontline communities and organisers in American cities and other decolonising contexts. She currently serves as Assistant Professor of Race and Social Justice in the Built Environment at Northeastern University.

The season of open lectures is supported by the Estonian Cultural Endowment.

EKA Interaction Design MA programme invites prospective Master’s students to join the online info session on Monday, January 24, 2022 at 17:00 (Tallinn time, GMT+2).

The info session will be hosted online over Zoom.

If you would like to attend, please register online through the form below. A link to attend will be e-mailed shortly before the event begins.

Registration is now closed.

Recording of the info session available here.

More information about the Interaction Design MA (IxD.ma) programme:

• https://www.ixd.ma
• https://www.artun.ee/ixd
• https://www.facebook.com/IxD.ma
• Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/977797089758108

Admissions period starts on the 1st of February 2022 and application deadline is 1st of March 2022.

https://artun.ee/admissions

At the last GD Lunch of this semester Graphic Design MA 1st year students will talk about their work and projects so far. GD Lunch is on Monday, 29 November at 4PM on Zoom. Please join us here: https://zoom.us/j/97416773771

Presentations by Carlo Canún (MX), Rita Davis (BR), Mark Foss (US), Michael Fowler (CA), Oliver Long (UK), Alexandra Margetic (AU), Gréta Þorkelsdóttir (IS), Patrick Zavadskis (EE), and Miriam Humm (DE).

Presentations will be in English. Everyone is welcome to join!

Within the framework of the Open Lectures Series of the Department of Architecture and Urban Design of EKA, architect David Sim will take the stage in the hall of EKA on 2nd December at 6 pm with lecture “Soft City”.

This fall, all the lectures in the series revolve around the issue of health in one way or another. We have already looked at whether architecture as a process can be therapeutic or in its own way improve the person in the room, as well as whether and how architects can contribute to the healing of the construction world or improve the environment around us.

On 2nd December, David Sim will give a lecture at EKA, in which he will look at the main issues of his book “Soft City” – now also available in Estonian – from the perspective of health. In the book, Sim addresses today’s biggest challenges – how to ensure and improve the quality of life of people in a growing city, in the context of the climate change and the digital society through creating a quality living environment. We’ll be talking about Scandinavian human-centered and human-dimensioned urban planning, which aims to support a local, functional and sustainable – healthy – living environment. Sims addresses in parallel both social, spatial and environmental issues, juxtaposing theory and ideals with real-world examples and solutions from existing environments around the world. Listeners and readers do not need to have prior knowledge of urban planning, but on the other hand, this book makes for an effective tool for professionals dealing with the design of the built environment at different levels. Both Thursday’s lecture and the book are particularly timely because of climate change issues, offering modern solutions to make the urban environment more resilient and at the same time serving the community and people: everyday urban lives in our climate can still offer pleasure, health and joy.

NB! The lecture is preceded by public book presentation at 5 pm at EKA cafe lobby.

David Sim worked for Ralph Erskine in Sweden for many years and moved on to Jan Gehl’s architecture office in Denmark, where he also worked as a partner for many years and where the book “Soft City” was born. David Sim believes that creating a good city is like organizing a great party; the author takes a simple, humane and apt approach to complex topics.

In order to minimize the risk of the virus spreading, we will broadcast the lecture on EKA TV and it can be viewed along with all previous lectures at www.avatudloengud.ee as well as the faculty’s Youtube channel. The lecture can also be attended in-person – we do ask you to carry your COVID vaccination certificate or proof of having had COVID and cover your nose and mouth with a mask. Academy students are subject to the usual in-house rules. NB! You can’t ask questions via EKA TV, so it’s worth coming to the hall to participate in the discussion! The lecture is free and in English.

Curators: Sille Pihlak and Johan Tali.

The season of open lectures is supported by the Estonian Cultural Endowment.

On Monday, November 29, at 4 pm, Dr. Kadri Ukrainski, Professor of Research and Innovation Policy and Head of the Faculty of Economics at the University of Tartu, will give a public lecture on “Basic Concepts of Innovation: Theory and Practice” in the hall of EKA (A-101).

Innovation is a word that runs through all walks of life today, ambitiously encompassing the readiness to innovate, the creation of new values ​​and the management of these processes. In the Academy of Arts, too, innovation is something we encounter on a daily basis, but can we also make sense of its various aspects and the conscious orientation of its possibilities?

Kadri Ukrainski is an Estonian economist and professor of research and innovation policy at the University of Tartu. With her research on innovation policy, she has supported the development of research policy both in Estonia and in international organisations.

The lecture is open to anyone on presentation of a valid Covid digital certificate.
It is mandatory to wear a mask in the EKA building.
The lecture will be in Estonian.

The lecture is organised by the Estonian Association of Architects.

EKA Urban Studies programme invites prospective Master’s students to join the online info session on Thursday, December 9, 2021 at 16:00 (GMT+2).

This online info session will be a good opportunity to hear more about the curriculum, and to meet and ask questions directly from people behind Urban Studies programme. The info session will be hosted online over Zoom.

If you would like to attend, please register online through the form below. A link to attend will be e-mailed shortly before the event begins.

Registration is closed.

Recording of the session HERE.

More information about Urban Studies MSc programme:

• https://www.artun.ee/urban-studies
• https://www.facebook.com/urbantallinn

Next admissions period starts on the 1st of February 2022 and application deadline is 1st of March 2022.

https://artun.ee/admissions

More information:

Maarja Pabut
maarja.pabut@artun.ee

As part of the Open Lectures series of the Department of Architecture and Urban Design of EKA, writer and researcher Philip Maughan will take the stage in the hall of EKA on November 25th, 6 pm with a lecture titled “Black Almanac: Processing, Cooking and Expanding Earth”.

This fall, all the OLS lectures revolve around the issue of healing in one way or another. We’ve explored whether architecture as a process can be therapeutic and in what way inhabiting space could be restorative – and whether and how architects could contribute to the healing of the construction world. 

On November 25th, we take a look at something directly and closely related to health – the food system – and ask how it could be healed. In order to feed ourselves we cook the land, the atmosphere, the oceans, and other animals, and the earth in turn is cooking us. Named for the tradition of farmer’s almanacs that stretches back to the dawn of agriculture, and for the potential of the earth’s most fertile, dark synthetic soil, this open lecture will introduce Black Almanac: a catalog of steps to produce a viable food system by 2050. It asks when and why food culture became so reactionary, and how might we “cook” with flavors, landscapes, genes, machines and buildings in order to expand a sustainable, nutritious, and desirable feast for a growing population at planetary scale. Black Almanac is a growing index of urgent questions around food, with tough and surprising lessons for the present, and new hope for the future.

Philip Maughan is a writer and researcher based between London and Berlin. He was a member of The Terraforming cohort at the Strelka Institute for Media, Architecture and Design in 2020 and is currently working on a book about food and climate change under the title Black Almanac.

https://philipmaughan.net/ 

In order to minimize the risk of the virus spreading, we will broadcast the lecture on EKA TV and it can be viewed along with all previous lectures at www.avatudloengud.ee as well as the faculty’s Youtube channel. The lecture can also be attended in-person – we do ask you to carry your COVID vaccination certificate or proof of having had COVID and cover your nose and mouth with a mask. Academy students are subject to the usual in-house rules. NB! You can’t ask questions via EKA TV, so it’s worth coming to the hall to participate in the discussion! The lecture is free and in English.

Curators: Sille Pihlak and Johan Tali.

The season of open lectures is supported by the Estonian Cultural Endowment.

Department of Graphic Design’s GD Lunch series is back and the first presentation will be by graphic designer Maria Muuk on Monday, 1 November at 16:00 on Zoom. Please join us here. Zoom ID: 940 6079 6104

Maria is going to talk about the graphic design process of the exhibition “Art is Design is Art” (Kumu Art Museum, 07.05.–03.10.2021), which showcased Estonian late Soviet unique design objects and poster design. It’s an interesting case study of a commissioned exhibition identity with a lot of designer’s input, as well as a glimpse into the rabbit hole of the recent yet forgotten history and craftsmanship of manual graphic designing tools, which the 1980s Soviet poster artists and their printers mastered in inspiring socialist unison.

On Tuesday, 26 October at 17:30 Charlotte Rohde will give a lecture at EKA hall.

Typedesigner and artist Charlotte Rohde will talk about her latest project “HOT MESS 2021”, which she will contextualise within her practice. In her work “HOT MESS 2021”, Rohde explores the idea of 2021 womanhood through niche internet culture, thinking about Naomi Osaka and Britney Spears, who dared to become human under the public eye. Machine-produced and hand-treated, “HOT MESS 2021” performs a self-fetishisation to reclaim its body and emotionality from the public gaze.

Charlotte Rohde is a (type-)designer and artist researching letters as an extension of the body and dealing with hyper-femininity, pop culture and (self-)control. Her work manifests somewhere between contemporary art, niche internet culture and type design as a tool of écriture féminine.