Design Theory and Self-Management Socialism

CSEES

 

UNI GRAZ

 

visiting lecture

 

 

Location: Schubertstr. 51, HS 31.11

 

 

Date: Wednesday, 18 May, 2016 – 13:00 to 15:00

 

Speaker(s):  Feđa Vukić, (Armina Galijaš u. Hrvoje Paić)

 

 

Description:

 

Theoretic discourse on design had been developing in a significant quantity from nineteen-fifties to eighties throughout the formative years of the concept of self management which had been installed in 1952 within former Yugoslav federation. The idea of workers participation, as a vital element of industrial modernization, had been followed by a number of cultural strategies and practices, some of which were backed by ideology of ruling party.

 But some other developed in a spontaneous manner, from architects, artists and art historians, as was the case of debate on industrial design as a key factor in humanization of living and working environment.

 Lecture presents a panorama of theory insights into design within the social and political ambient of self-management socialism, over more than thirty years. Public debate on design was developing and semantic field of the concept of design was expanding within that period. The four cultural contexts are identified and presented as crucial: the critique of the concept of applied arts, context of architectural theory, context of public activism in the domain of housing and the context of art criticism.

 Development of terminology and theory on design was a reflection of social and economic framework in which a major shift had been the political decision on economic reform in 1963., when socialist party had introduced elements of free market economy within the context of state planned one. This was a major change in paradigm of self management socialism, and it is witnessed even within design theory as a reflection of new economic reality. Focus on some of the key issues in design discourse is treated as an element for reconstruction of cultural history of socialist Yugoslavia.

 

http://www.suedosteuropa.uni-graz.at/en/event/2016/design-theory-and-self-management-socialism