The format for UnBox 2013 departs from the previous two years, making it more open, vibrant and experiential. The ample, unique & green spaces at this year’s venue, allow us to program multiple elements simultaneously, creating more of a festival and less of a conference. Multiple stages, several work rooms, bespoke lab spaces and open resource networks will house the nearly 100 different pieces of programming. All day bars and cafes will further add to the community atmosphere and inspire at least a few conversations. With more than half of the audience being active participants, UnBox 2013 will truly be a community-created festival.
Attendees and participants will be free to roam, choosing from varied options of engagement, in an environment that encourages and facilitates conversation. UnBox 2013 will span four days, affording people time to take in all the offerings in an intimate and leisurely manner, ensuring the experiences have greater resonance.
This is a little blurb about unBUILD
This is a little blurb about unPLAY
This is a little blurb about unTILL
This is a little blurb about unMAP
This is a little blurb about unVEIL
The UnBox Fellowships are a core component of the festival. Diverse offerings in inspiring contexts that bring together participants from different backgrounds, challenge participants while pushing the ‘action at the intersections’ in new directions.
The 2013 Fellowships are anchored by projects exploring: film and digital media for open-governance, augmenting agriculture with new technologies, gaming for social innovation, culture and heritage preservation and sustainable lifestyles.
Experimental, interdisciplinary performances are an intrinsic part of UnBox. In 2013 multiple artists and performers come together for several music and audio-visual performances that embody the crossover spirit of UnBox.
Peter Cat Recordings Co. is a New Delhi-based band that creates and records a variety of different music, ranging from Gypsy Jazz to Ballroom.
Gwyneth Wentink, one of the leading harpists of her generation, has been fascinated by Indian culture for many years. She travels around India regularly, and has introduced the country to the little known instrument. One of the major fruits of her travels to India is the unique ensemble she has formed here: Better Than Coffee. More recently, she teamed up InnerAct – an audiovisual performance with harp, electronica and visuals, based on the groundbreaking composition ‘Canto Ostinato’. InnerAct takes place on the fascinating intersection between music, visual art and technology, and provides a unique experience for all the senses. During the next 18 months, Ms. Wentink, electronica specialist Wouter Snoei and video artist Arnout Hulskamp will bring this arrangement to national and international stages.
The SoundCamp music lab at UnBox is created by Border Movement and supported by Goethe-Institut, and will assimilate and perform with the sounds of UnBox.
Saskia Rao-de Haas is a virtuoso cellist and composer from the Netherlands based in New Delhi. Saskia’s contribution to Hindustani classical music is through the Indian cello, an instrument fashioned out of the cello that enables it to be played in Indian classical concerts. Saskia is pursuing her doctoral studies in music and will be bringing all facets of her musical and academic worlds to UnBox. The nature of her performance at UnBox is being developed and built around a larger programme around instrument modifications and collaborations with other musicians. Saskia is also contributing a recording session to the development of the Games Lab fellowship videogame as an instrumentalist and inspiration for one of the levels.
“British Sarod Maestro’ (Time Out) and composer Soumik Datta is fast being recognized as “one of the the biggest new music talents in Britain” (Vogue). He has led groundbreaking new arts projects as a resident artist for the London based Alchemy Festival and the Rich Mix cultural foundation. The creator of the first electro acoustic Sarod, Soumik combines guitar riffs with Indian melody, electronica and drum n bass to create a hybrid sound distinctively his own. He is currently touring with the stellar Austrian drummer Bernhard Schimpelsberger on the project ‘Circle of Sound’.
Pitching together two underground stalwarts from the Indian electronica scene and having them explore their secret hobbies is a perfect excuse for a classic UnBox evening. A great sounding Vinyl is a thing of sheer beauty. PUMA celebrates the renaissance of Analog and the power of music that makes people come together in the true spirit of PUMA Social. Kohra and Vinayaka are both fascinated with analog sound, whether its through field recordings, vinyl, or analog synthesizers. This collaboration brings new ideas towards listenable, moody Indian electronica making lo-fi the natural flavor of tuning in to India.
A live audiovisual project helmed by electronic artists BLOT! and Nucleya, New Culture Mash-Up presents a unique approach to the composition of contradictions in the audiovisual space.
Sanskriti Foundation & UnBox will co-create a workshop experience that takes a group of 10-15 practitioners on a tour and investigation of the three museums in the Sanskriti complex. UnBox participants will brainstorm and co-create ideas based on specific challenges posed by the Foundation, with a focus on uncovering new experiential ideas for visitors, artists and stakeholders. The different ideas will be compiled as a book of directions for the Foundation. Established in 1978, Sanskriti Foundation cultivates an environment for the preservation and development of the artistic and cultural expressions of India, and the world at large. Sanskriti perceives its role as that of a catalyst, in revitalizing cultural sensitivity in contemporary times.
The pedestrian experience connects various elements of the Indian street: green cover, shading, lighting, safety, vibrant commerce, residential issues, waste management, and more progressively, an active street art culture, a progressive soundscape, and other younger attributes to urban life. An activated street, one filled with art, music and culture, becomes increasingly more economically stable, and safe for pedestrians. The Busride explores this aspect of Hauz Khas village, with cutaway examples of their own extensive project in Bandra, Mumbai. Both these find their roots in “pakhadis” or villages, and face similar issues. In the drawing of parallels, the workshop strives to produce a fun, stylish yet progressive way forward for issues faced by both these areas.
Led by Ms. Laila Tyabji, Dastkar has been working with crafts and craftspeople for over 3 decades. Dastkar recently won a Delhi tourism tender to turn the abandoned Kisan Haat (Farmer’s Market) near Mehrauli, New Delhi, into a more permanent Nature Bazaar. Nature Bazaar’s concept is “A vibrant, colourful, constantly changing space where craft & design meet food, herbal & eco-friendly products, and tradition sits side-by-side with contemporary style”. The challenge of Nature Bazaar is to create an intellectual, artistic and cultural hub that resonates with artisans’ needs to progress, and with customers’ needs for contemporary experiences. A society for crafts and craftspeople – Dastkar is a registered society that aims at improving the economic status of craftspeople, thereby promoting the survival of traditional crafts.
Heritage conservation organization INTACH provides a live historical site for design intervention to envision imaginative user-centered experiences. The Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) is India’s largest non-profit membership organization dedicated to conservation and preservation of India’s natural, cultural, living, tangible and intangible heritage.
UnBox is co-creating a workshop with INTACH to take participants on an informative journey through a live heritage site while seeking multiple perspectives that transform the urban experience of such ancient treasures.
While there has been an explosion in using new media to document everyday life, from family videos shared on YouTube to neighborhood blogs, both policymakers and designers have only just begun to explore the impact that these different outlets can have on wider consultation, regeneration or innovation efforts. BESPOKE was inspired, created and funded to bring together community journalism and design to find out whether journalism could be used as an Insight Tool and a platform for innovation in design and technology. For UnBox, Dr. Jon Rogers from Bespoke facilitates a HackJam beginning in January at the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad. The support of Mozilla and its Indian community of coders in this workshop connects the dots between hyperlocal content, insight journalism, new media, interactive newsprint technology and Indian community contexts.
Two kinds of design interventions can be employed to improve the human experience. The first, and most common, is through ‘events’: activities with a beginning, middle and end; within a specific context. The second, and far less explored, form is through transformations of the individual – constantly enhancing the way someone interacts with the world around them. The potential value in these various disciplines should be considered collectively as an emerging applied science: Experiential Research & Development. The goals of this experience are : 1. To argue the case for Experiential R&D using a combination of case studies, workshops and live experiments. 2. To provide participants with skills based upon our investigation that help improve them personally and professionally. 3. To test the validity of the ideas with an open discourse. A series of experimental, competitive workshops where the festival itself becomes the point of experiment, and the workshop, in turn, affects the experience of the festival will be conducted. PAN is a design and research studio that promotes the idea of Experiential Design and is collaborating with Gerry Hopkinson, co-founder of PR agency Unity, for the workshop. Gerry was one of the voices for UnBox 2012, and is an important advisor for the festival in 2013.
Indie Singapore beer brand ‘Jungle Beer’ will team up with mixologist Arijit Bose and participants to create special UnBox brews with a focus on cross-pollination and sensory experiments.
Aditya Challa is the brewer and entrepreneur behind multiple award winning, Singaporean craft beer brand – ‘Jungle Beer’. Aditya single-handedly brews, bottles and supplies Jungle Beer in Singapore, and is heavily invested in innovation in flavours and ingredients.
Puma, The Busride, BLOT! and Quicksand collaborate to give upcycling and repurposing a new meaning by extending it to festival decor, as UnBox interiors make their way to the new Puma zero-carbon footprint store in Bangalore. The Puma Social Club is a new concept housed in a one-of-a-kind Puma store and is possibly the first truly sustainable flagship experience for a brand. It’s agenda is to represent the most progressive ideas around art and culture, while also being a watering hole for the city’s enlightened youth.
Taking this spirit of sustainability and up-cycling forward, UnBox has proposed a format including:
-A parallel mapping of the Puma store and UnBox festival plans and artist networks
-Design and curation of aspects of the new Puma Social Club, including a large ‘play’ area, using a modular system made with repurposed materials.
-An assemblage of UnBox decor made relevant for an entirely new context carried out by The Busride
A curated team of writers explore UnBox as a fertile ground for progressive design thinking and writing It is imperative that UnBox nurtures and creates repositories of local knowledge and commentary to understand the nuances of the bridges between tradition, culture, modernization and design, while inspiring a truly ‘Indian’ way of design. At UnBox 2013, Prof. Teal Triggs, an expert in design writing from the Royal College of Art, UK, will create avenues to share her experiences, and facilitate the exploration of progressive ideas and techniques in design writing and documentation. A curated set of 6-8 participants, selected in advance of the festival, will be part of a focused workshop mentored by Prof. Triggs that immerses them in all aspects of the festival, with a view to create written pieces on aspects of the festival. Daily workshop and review sessions with Prof. Triggs will refine the outcomes with a view to finding their way into the UnBox Zine to start with, but into mainstream national and international publications as an end.
AA field site might be chosen to prototype these ideas. This workshop, remotely co-created by CGAP (an initiative of World Bank) builds a case for engaging with human-centered research and innovation for revitalizing microfinance. These streams can facilitate a rich, shared understanding of stakeholders, and deliver distinct, relevant opportunities for financial products, services and experiences of the future. CGAP and Quicksand will facilitate a workshop to uncover and detail new service delivery experiences using the scenario of a new financial product and a local partner. Participants will engage with mentors in contextual enquiry followed by ideation and workshop sessions. CGAP is an independent policy and research center dedicated to advancing financial access for the world’s poor. It is supported by over 30 development agencies and private foundations who share a common mission to alleviate poverty.
In 2013, workshops form a core part of UnBox allowing participants to engage deeply with an international group of exemplary practitioners and studios in a true ‘Hand On, Minds On’ fashion, ranging from skill-building around cognition to creating products using technology tools, with craftspeople.
An explosion of gastronomical delights, Food Lab is the umbrella title for all things food and beverage at this year’s festival. New and different preparations and ingredients explore pairings that promise to be as serendipitous as they are delicious. These culinary efforts culminate in a festival-ending feast to close this year’s UnBox on a high, and tasty, note.
Sanskriti Foundation & UnBox will co-create a workshop experience that takes a group of 10-15 practitioners on a tour and investigation of the three museums in the Sanskriti complex. UnBox participants will brainstorm and co-create ideas based on specific challenges posed by the Foundation, with a focus on uncovering new experiential ideas for visitors, artists and stakeholders. The different ideas will be compiled as a book of directions for the Foundation. Established in 1978, Sanskriti Foundation cultivates an environment for the preservation and development of the artistic and cultural expressions of India, and the world at large. Sanskriti perceives its role as that of a catalyst, in revitalizing cultural sensitivity in contemporary times.
The pedestrian experience connects various elements of the Indian street: green cover, shading, lighting, safety, vibrant commerce, residential issues, waste management, and more progressively, an active street art culture, a progressive soundscape, and other younger attributes to urban life. An activated street, one filled with art, music and culture, becomes increasingly more economically stable, and safe for pedestrians. The Busride explores this aspect of Hauz Khas village, with cutaway examples of their own extensive project in Bandra, Mumbai. Both these find their roots in “pakhadis” or villages, and face similar issues. In the drawing of parallels, the workshop strives to produce a fun, stylish yet progressive way forward for issues faced by both these areas.
Led by Ms. Laila Tyabji, Dastkar has been working with crafts and craftspeople for over 3 decades. Dastkar recently won a Delhi tourism tender to turn the abandoned Kisan Haat (Farmer’s Market) near Mehrauli, New Delhi, into a more permanent Nature Bazaar. Nature Bazaar’s concept is “A vibrant, colourful, constantly changing space where craft & design meet food, herbal & eco-friendly products, and tradition sits side-by-side with contemporary style”. The challenge of Nature Bazaar is to create an intellectual, artistic and cultural hub that resonates with artisans’ needs to progress, and with customers’ needs for contemporary experiences. A society for crafts and craftspeople – Dastkar is a registered society that aims at improving the economic status of craftspeople, thereby promoting the survival of traditional crafts.