Gwangju Design Biennale 2005

A total of 1,038 works by businesses and designers from 32 countries around the world have been chosen for the main exhibitions and special exhibitions of the first Gwangju Design Biennale 2005.

The main exhibitions will showcase trend-setting designs of each country through the participation of leading businesses and designers from 32 countries including major players in the design world such as The United States, Japan, Italy, and France as well as a number of Asian countries which are rapidly establishing an important presence in design to include China, Hong Kong and India. Cutting-edge mobile phone producers such as Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, Nokia and Motorola, automakers such as Hyundai Motors, Toyota, and BMW will all introduce their latest design concepts currently in the process of development. In addition, design masterworks by Karim Rashid, a leading designer in New York, Arik Levy, dubbed “a poet of techno”, Tamon Hosoya from Japan, Syd Mead, a well- known designer for imaginative, future cities, and Professor Li Wei of Tsinghua University, a leading designer in China, will also be on display. Exhibited alongside these showpieces, works by le ading designers and businesses from Korea, Japan, China and India, increasingly important powerhouses in the design world, will also be introduced to explore visions of future life for the people of Asia.

In keeping with the objective ‘Cultural Design Biennale, creating a new way of life’, the selection of exhibition works has been carried out with the criteria of attempting to showcase the epitome of design concepts that seek to enrich human life and are setting new paradigms for the future of design.

The Gwangju Design Biennale 2005 will be held under the theme of “Light into Life” at the Kimdaejung Convention Center in the Sangmu District of Gwangju City and at the Gwangju City Hall for 17 days from October 18 to November 3.

The exhibition encompasses two main exhibitions; ‘Future Life’ and ‘Asian Design’, seven special exhibitions: ‘Design in Korea: Industry, Culture and History’, ‘Future City Gwangju: Prayer’, ‘Designer Hall of Fame’, ‘New Wave in Design’, ‘Korea Good Design Products Selection 2005’, and ‘Korean Industrial Design Exhibition 2005’, as well as international conference, seminars, workshops, and other diverse performances and academic events.

The Main Exhibition 1, “Future Life” will highlight cutting-edge design concepts in the form of actual products, prototypes, and images. In particular, several Japanese and German automakers plan to disclose high-tech concept cars that were not revealed even at the recent Seoul Motor Show 2005. Samsung, Motorola, Toshiba, and Nokia will demonstrate state-of-the-art IT products which will be defining future IT design trends.

In the Main Exhbition 2, “ Asian Design”, an array of earlier Asian design products that have not been properly valued by the world at large, despite their outstanding cultural and design characteristics, will be explored and reviewed. These exhibition pieces will later be housed at the Asia Culture Hall for the perusal of both scholars and the general public, and will utilized as research materials in order to establish linkage to contemporary and future design concepts.

Special Exhibition 4 “Designer Hall of Fame” will select a designer of remarkable achievement in the 20th Century design world and will display his/her works in the Hall of Fame booth inside the exhibition space as a means of paying tribute to the designer. Professor Penny Spark of Kingston University in U.K., Professor Kashiwagi Hiroshi of Musasino University in Japan, and the General Director of the Gwangju Biennale Lee, Soon-jong comprise the Selection Committee tasked with selecting the winning designer.

The Biennale Foundation, tapping its accumulated expertise from the Gwangju Biennales of the past ten years, is determined to help cultivate Gwangju as a world design city in name and fact by linking the cultural and artistic assets of Gwangju to the Gwangju Design Biennale 2005.

General Director Lee, Soon-Jong has stated that ‘In the 21st Century, the flow of the human way of thinking will thrive with an emphasis on spirit, integration, harmony and sharing. Setting a new value to design, however, has been overlooked.” He went on to disclose his determination by adding “Using the Gwangju Design Biennale as a building block, Gwangju will eventually evolve into an epicenter for world design through delving into the future values of design in order that it may establish a new set of values that can guide the 21st Century.”

The Gwangju Design Biennale 2005 will proceed with a total budget of 5 billion Korean won (2.8 billion won for exhibition) under the leadership of the General Director, Professor Lee, Soon-jong of Seoul National University, who is in charge of overall planning.

FUTURE LIFE main exhibition Gwangju Design Biennale 2005

This exhibition is planned to show several scenarios of future living, which has been created by projects of world leading designers and major enterprises. Every exhibit is presented as a part of everyday life scenes, and some of the exhibits include sketches and prototypes to show the process of design. Throughout these contents, the audiences are able to learn what the future would be like and understand the leading role of design by interactively experiencing the contents.

Participating designers and companies from 18 countries includes Syd Mead, Karim Rashid, Naoto Fukasawa, IDEO, Droog design, Mandrina duck, Muji, MIT media Labs, Sony, BMW and etc

www.design-biennale.org

Gwangju Design Biennale 2005, Korea

FUTURE LIFE
main exhibition Gwangju Design Biennale 2005
mit droog design, Mandrina Duck, Naoto Fukasawa, IDEO , Syd Mead, MIT Media Labs, Phunk Studio , Karim Rashid ...