Olga Konik
PhD Candidate, Doctoral School, Jan Matejko Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow
BIO
Olga Konik – a graduate of the Faculty of Industrial Forms of the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow and of Romance Studies at the Jagiellonian University. Artist, designer, curator, trash collector and mender. She is interested in repairing as a way for more sustainable consumption and building relationships with everyday objects. She is currently studying at a Doctoral School at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow.
She developed her practice combining design, research and art with Kuczka 2.0 projects for the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw (2019), Zielona Czytelnia for Provincial Public Library in Krakow in cooperation with Miastopracownia (2019), Spinning Triangles, Ignition of School of Design at the Savvy Contemporary gallery in Berlin (2019). She is an editor of Krótkie Formy – a column of the magazine formy.xyz. Co-founder of the Experimental Artistic Forms Collective (KAFE) operating at the intersection of theater and performance. With KAFE, she carried out projects such as: Kolonia, as part of the Dom Letnich Obyczajów festival, Galeria Miejska in Gdańsk (2016), performance KASPAR HAUSER Uff, Wrocław / Pauza, Kraków (2016), kameralnie: w poszukiwaniu tożsamości, Kultura w sieci (2020). As a speaker, she appeared at the conferences: 4 Design Days (2022), Young Agrafa (2022), ECO Congress (2022). She participated in group exhibitions: Zlin Design Week Exhibition (2021), Agrafa Beyond (2022) and individual: 100 Days to Black Friday (2022).
Abstract
Beyond 2D/3D – Searching for New Design Categories
Design, especially in the context of education, often operates in a binary division of 2d (graphic design) and 3d (product design). But in a changing world, are they still relevant and accurately reflect some dimension of reality? Do they force into uncomfortable categories, relegating ineligible projects to a grey area?
In my talk, I will address this question using the example of the student design competition and conference Agrafa 2022 under the theme Beyond. Organised by the Academy of Fine Arts in Katowice, Agrafa has so far been dedicated to graphic design. The 2022 edition opens up to design in the broadest sense. The organisers understand BEYOND as going off the beaten paths, interdisciplinary collaboration, community building and activist activities, as well as „the courage to push boundaries in combination with respect for people and the planet”. As part of a new competition formula called the International Student Design Competition, instead of categories, participants were invited to relate their project to three keywords: Social Design, Commercial Design and Beyond.
Using Agrafa 2022 as a signal of change I will look for more inclusive spaces and descriptions to provide visibility of design in its various forms.
Keywords: graphic design, product design, social design, student design competitions, beyond categories