Program

HyperWerk is the name of the Institute for Postindustrial Design at the  HGK FHNW in Basel, Switzerland. In a radically experimental and interdisciplinary setup, about one hundred collaborators–students, staff, and researchers–are designing significant moments in the transition from industrial society towards a postindustrial reality yet to be discovered. This is done through strategic projects within the context of yearly topics and through the systematic organization of task-oriented forms of international networking, exchange, and support.

HyperWerk understands the present postindustrial transformation as the central task of today's design. Against the background of an aesthetics of sustainability, the many social, educational, economic, and technological aspects are considered in the effort to cautiously design this imminent transformation. The concepts of the neoanalog, the establishing of the network acar2, and the organisation of the campus2.0 exhibition are prototypical examples of strategic real-world HyperWerk projects. We need bright students–apply for our B.A. study program in Postindustrial Design! Entrance examination interviews can be arranged during the entire festival with the Director of HyperWerk, Prof. Mischa Schaub. Please send him an email: mischa.schaub@fhnw.ch.

And do not forget to have a look at hyperwerk.ch and fhnw.ch/hgk/ihw. HyperWerk Institute for Postindustrial Design HGK FHNW Basel, Switzerland.

“Senones dans les Vosges & acar2”

In 2002, the Institute for Postindustrial Design HyperWerk HGK FHNW was looking for a seminar venue in France that would be suitable for a project-oriented form of instruction. A brief search led to the Senones Abbey, a building that had been vacant since 1996 after having been used as a textile mill since the French Revolution. The 8,000m2 monastery is located in a small town that is as charming as its situation at the time was desperate, since the collapse of the local textile industry had left extremely high unemployment in its wake.  

Postindustrial Design
HyperWerk deals with the transition from Industrial Society to a postindustrial reality. There are social, economic and technological aspects as well as educational policymaking considerations involved in the effort to cautiously shape this transformation. The framework circumstances in place in Senones confronted our planned undertaking with a prototypical challenge, a situation similar to what can be encountered in hundreds of hard-pressed towns throughout Europe at the end of the Industrial Age.  

A Project Takes Shape
In the fall of 2002,HyperWerk developed a general project outline that included seven modules, and presented it to the Town Council as a proposal for a way in which Senones could, in the medium term, recover from its state of shock and generate momentum on its own in order to develop into a research platform.  

City Lab and Lab City
An initial test run took place during the winter semester 2003–04, when five university departments from Basel, Muttenz, Aargau and Karlsruhe launched a project designed to investigate Senones’ problems and potential with respect to urban planning, architecture and interior design, and to come up with a course of action. What emerged from this collaborative effort was an association named salm2, which was granted a 20-year lease on the abbey for a token rental. 75% of the costs of the renovation work involved in turning the former monks’ cells into a seminar hotel were covered by French government subsidies; IKEA and the Hotel Les Trois Rois in Basel sponsored the interior furnishings. A government feasibility study ultimately recommended investing 16.8 million euros in the project. We’re pleased about that, of course, but we don’t put as much stock in big promises as we do in unremitting work to develop our project. For instance, the fact that 10 jobs have already been created in Senones in conjunction with acar2 is what we consider an initial success.  

Framework Activities and Modules
salm2, as lessee of the Senones Abbey, has assumed responsibility for dealings with government agencies, and has also taken over the job of coordinating the framework activities being carried out by the project’s semi-autonomous modules. Particularly active at present are the theater group, scène2, the youth association D’Jeuns2 and the acar2 module that has developed the “neoanalog” theme and operates a constantly growing lab/workshop in Senones.    

„The D’Jeuns2 Association“  
In January2007in the context of these salm2 framework activities, street worker Philippe Meyer setup an association to empower unemployed young people, which, among other approaches, involves the use of new technologies. One of this group’s initiatives is to develop a fashion label focused on wearable computing as a youth-run enterprise. And it took only a few weeks to organize a workshop bringing together interested youngsters and experts in the field. Since this workshop, four individuals have been working intensively on product development. This research is proceeding parallel to the set-up of the free Internet café. D’Jeuns2is also currently working on renovating a youth center and setting up a travel and sports program, whereby most of these activities are being financed by the young people who have been offered project-oriented jobs by the city to carry out these plans. D’Jeuns2’s participation in Ars Electronica is meant to show how unemployed young people, who lack financial means and relevant training and who live in peripheral areas that have been written off by the economic powers that be, actually can pull off a successful business start-up in the context of new technologies.    

“Expressive framework”  
A team of HyperWerk students was responsible for the general exhibition design and for the construction of various major installations. The main idea was to demonstrate a neoanalog approach to the digital without using keyboards or screens.    

“digitality sans display”
The challenge was to design a transportable, adaptable, sustainable low-cost system for creating a neoanalog information space. The exhibition offers a creative mix of vector graphics, extensive use of an ultracheap Chinese laser-cutter, and recycled cardboard materials.

“Clotheslines display”  
For the major installation of the campus2.0 the two corner buildings flanking the gateway from the Main Square to the Danube are connected by clotheslines. Together with 250 boxer shorts and some robotics these lines form a very large and cheap, spectacular matrix display. Its public-laundry-messages with their lovely Italian touch give their neoanalog regards to privacy.

“Board without keys”  
The input station for the clotheslines display consists of a six meters long narrow table with a conveyor belt system on which the public can compose messages out of laser-cut wooden letters. As this input takes place publicly, a kind of social control against racist or sexist messages is expected to work discreetly.