Introduction: Environmental Connection

AUB was delighted to be invited by Activate Performing Arts to contribute to the base camp activities at the Green Space Dark Skies event at Maiden Castle. The collaboration brought together AUB staff and secondyear students from BA (Hons) Graphic Design and BA (Hons) Interior Architecture and Design, in addressing the climate crisis.

The Interior Architecture and Design students were tasked with co-designing a site-specific and temporary engagement experience at Maiden Castle that conveyed the broader themes of the climate emergency, ecologies, interaction, and fabrication.

The Graphic Design students had the opportunity to respond to two briefs in relation to the project, with all students being posed the question: How could we help people build a deeper connection to the living world, enabling them to become future ambassadors of the environment and helping them live more sustainably?

Students were able to choose to either collaborate on a participatory staff research project with Dr Emilie Giles or respond to the question in a manner of their choosing. Both strands expected students to engage with the Green Space Dark Skies event, either to run a participatory creative technology workshop with community groups or to showcase an element of their project in the pop-up exhibition and work with Interior Architecture and Design students. Furthermore, students were also able to participate in the event itself and become Lumenators.

The following pages present not only the work from these projects and contribution to the Green Space Dark Skies event, but key contextual elements of the student learning journey; the 2022 AUB Human symposium, exhibition visit and key workshops. In addition, two articles that provide insight into a parallel staff research.