Graphic Design students impress Dyson in the SNTech Creative Challenge

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The Achieve Project | Superpeople & Disability Rights UK

The Achieve Project is a collaboration between Superpeople, Disability Rights UK and AUB Human. It is a mutual aid and knowledge exchange project that aims to help disabled people and people with learning difficulties or mental health conditions, into employment.

The pilot project has been devised by Natalie Betts and Jake Atkins, Co-founders of the charity, Superpeople and Alice Stevens, AUB Human founder and Senior Lecturer in BA (Hons) Graphic Design. With the help of Disability Rights UK, fourteen participants were selected for the project from the South West Regional Assessment Centre (SWRAC), based here in Dorset. All of the participants were enrolled on an employability course and between age 18 and 25, each with additional needs relating to Asperger's syndrome, learning and processing difficulties, ADHD, Prada-Willi syndrome and epilepsy. BA (Hons) Graphic Design students from Level 5, were then tasked with using their creative skills to design a personal brand identity and self-promotion products for their participant over the period of three days. The aim of the project being to help the participants build confidence and find ways to introduce themselves to potential employers in order that they might gain work experience, an apprenticeship or employment. Whilst the intended benefit for the AUB students is that they had the opportunity to undertake a social change project, reflect on their own employability and develop skills in empathy, listening and analysis.

The range of assets designed by students was varied and included everything from logos and traditional introduction methods such as business cards and postcards to experimental 3D artefacts, comics, games, animated stings and augmented reality concepts. Students presented their designs to the participants who subsequently choose their favourite, which was then printed and supplied to them along with the digital assets. Natalie Betts reflected, ‘We were really impressed by the AUB students. They have thought carefully about the participants, paying attention to the information captured in the interviews and questionnaires. This enabled them to use their design skills to showcase the character, personality and ambitions of each participant they worked with. We love that the students considered the usability of the products, but at the same time, they have not been afraid to explore eye-catching and innovative design concepts, which our participants can use to grab the attention of employers and stand out from the crowd.’

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Annotated Environments & Anthropocentric Ecologies Activate Performing Arts

Accessible path to Sumbiocentricity | Maria Elina

BA (Hons) Graphic Design and Interior Architecture and Design students came together to collaborate with Activate Performing Arts. They believe that live performance has the power to fire the imagination, uplift and connect us. Based in Dorset for nearly 30 years as a charitable company and an Arts Council England Band 2 National Portfolio Organisation, they’ve brought live performance to unexpected places – town centres, village squares, beaches and hilltops – for everyone to enjoy.

AUB Human has collaborated with Activate in the past, and were delighted to get involved in the Inside Out Dorset festival where Activate will present Luke Jerram’s Gaia, a significant artwork measuring seven metres in diameter, and featuring detailed NASA photography of the Earth’s surface. The Gaia installation will be suspended among trees within the Tree Top Trail at Moors Valley Country Park in September 2021 and has been funded by Forestry England, Dorset Council and Arts Council England.

The Level 5 students were tasked with reflecting on the themes of the recent AUB Human symposium, Tech for Social & Sustainable Good, which covered areas of sustainability, ethics, accessibility and inclusivity as a catalyst for their discussions and start of the collaboration. In addition, students were also excited to hear from Activate about the festival and the work they do in breaking down barriers to reach the widest possible audiences. Furthermore, we were delighted to welcome the artist, Luke Jerram, to speak about his motivation for the Gaia installation and how the artwork aims to create a sense of the Overview Effect, thus provoking a deeper connection to the planet and sense of responsibility for the environment.

The Graphic Design students were required to design an ethical and annotated response to the forest context that enhances the experience for specific visitors and users as they visit Luke Jerram’s ‘Gaia’ installation. As part of the project, students also had the opportunity to undertake workshops with the AUB coder-in-residence, Ashley Brown, who had spoken at the symposium and was also involved in creating his own personal digital intervention that will feature as part of the Future Forest exhibition. Student work was broad ranging and covered ideas from augmented reality eco-poetry trails, to interactive concepts based on the Wood Wide Web that explore how trees communicate, to more practical ideas that address physical wayfinding and concepts that draw upon Greek Mythology and use storytelling and gamification to connect people to nature.

Interior Architecture and Design students explored themes of ecology, sustainability, and design within the Anthropocene, defining and developing an innovative temporary engagement experience as a single or network of interventions across the landscape of Moors Valley County Park.

To ground the work, the ideas for the interventions took inspiration from the site; natural systems (exploring scale/mediation) to propose explorative and imaginative structures. Varying in scale and scope, the outcomes embedded aesthetic and functional qualities, encapsulating grounded theoretical underpinnings of novel materiality and fabrication approaches, to be capable of withstanding climatic variabilities and cater for user access both physically/on site and/or remote/distanced. The propositions ranged

For more information about the Inside Out Dorset Festival please visit: www.activateperformingarts. org.uk/whats-on/inside-out-dorset/

Under Pressure | Sandra Hylén