Department Blog
Department news, events, and snapshots of student life at SVA in New York City.
Zoom Info Sessions on December 11th!
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Zoom Info Sessions on December 11th! 〰️
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Announcing 6IXTH: MFA Products of Design Thesis Presentations are May 14th!
We invite you to attend the Masters Thesis showcase presentations of the 2019 graduating class of the MFA in Products of Design program on Tuesday, May 14th at the SVA Theatre from 11am - 5:30pm. Twenty graduating masters students will each present their year-long thesis work, comprised of research, artifacts, services, experiences, and platforms.
PAINT App Restores Agency to Women in the Doctor's Office
Paint is an app that allows patients to document and describe their symptoms in more than words. As part of her thesis, Hysterical, second-year student Rhea Bhandari designed Paint to help women advocate for themselves while navigating a healthcare system that often dismisses their symptoms, leaving them misdiagnosed and in avoidable pain.
SWIFT: An Arm-Free Crutch for Below-Knee Amputees
The idea for Swift came about while Smruti watched videos on the YouTube channel “AmputeeOT” by Christina Stephens, an occupational therapist and below-knee unilateral amputee. Smruti was especially struck by a video in which Stephens describes the annoyances of going to the bathroom or getting up for a glass of water in the middle of the night; Stephens mentions that she usually crawls on the floor to get to the bathroom or kitchen because putting on her prosthetic is so time-consuming.
HARK: An Over-the-Counter Rape Kit
Hark, a speculative project created by second year student Antya Waegemann, is proposed to be the first over-the-counter sexual assault forensic exam (or “rape kit”) available at any major pharmacy. Small and discreet, Hark is designed to be approachable and comforting for survivors of sexual assault.
PROSUMERISM: Crafting Alternate Consumption Experiences
In her thesis Prosumerism: Crafting Alternate Consumption Experiences, Sowmya Iyer explores whether products and services can ease the consumer’s guilt of excessive spending and materialism by providing them with options that best fit their values of sustainability. She also wanted to find out if these products/services could be adaptive to the consumer’s lifestyle and built for their convenience. As part of her research process, Sowmya spoke to researchers, innovators, educators, authors, and artists exploring ways to reduce the effects of modern consumerism on the environment.
Design & Politics: The 2018 Midterm Elections
“Design is intrinsic to politics,” argue faculty Jennifer Rittner, Marc Dones, and Andrew Schlessinger. “In fact, the entire Democratic experiment is a product of design.” In the Products of Design program, an opportunity to investigate the direct relationship between design and politics occurs biennially with the U.S. elections. This year, it was all about the Midterm Elections—when politicians compete for seats in the U.S. Legislative branch (Congress), as well as in State and Local political races.
A Day in the Life of Products of Design
It’s been an incredible couple of days here at Products of Design, and we thought we might share some of the highlights, including a Guest Lecture by Debbie Millman, The kick-off of this year’s MoMA Partnered Project, a field trip to New Lab, and guest lectures from Blue Ridge Labs! Partnered Project. Check out the photos, ’cause in addition to these special events, the students were soldering up their Arduino projects, hosting visitors in the gallery, working in group projects, and cooking meals in the kitchen. Enjoy!
Change Everything You Hate About Meetings with this ONE SINGLE WORD.
There are a ton of books out there on how to have more productive, more meaningful meetings, but the fact of the matter is, you’re not going to read these books. You haven’t yet, and you probably won’t. So the problem is that everyone agrees that meetings are completely broken, but nobody will take the time or the trouble to learn how to fix them. I have an alternative solution, and it’s made by changing one single word. No books, no seminars, no videos, no list of rules to post on the conference room wall. Just one word.
Orientation Futuring Workshop: Surveillance-Generated Paranoia and Isolation
Prompted by current headlines about developments in the Social, Technological, Environmental, Economic and Political sphere, the SVA Orientation Class of 2020 developed narrative visions of the resulting futures and designed “provotypes” (provocative prototypes) to explore how we might re-capture the pleasure of an intimate conversation that can provide a comforting and nourishing escape from surveillance, reconnecting us with a friend, family member, colleague or perhaps even ourselves. The workshop was led by alumni Steve Hamilton with Brandon Washington and Alexia Cohen.