PRADA FRAMES

Materials in Flux
The multidisciplinary symposium conceived by Formafantasma returns

PreviousNext

Prada presents the 2023 Prada Frames symposium, exploring the complex interaction between design and the environment. The event is curated by Formafantasma, a research and design studio based in Milan and Rotterdam renowned for its close attention to the social and political implications of design and its critical use of materials.

This year, Prada Frames is being held in Hong Kong and Milan. The theme is ‘Materials in Flux’, and examines the concept of waste as matter in transformation. Departing from the work of British anthropologist Tim Ingold, materials are interconnected and endlessly changing living entities. The symposium will investigate the dynamics that govern waste infrastructures and their value systems, aiming to unpack the complex relationship between matter and ecosystems.

The symposium will take place on March 21 and 22, 2023 at M+ in Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, Asia’s first global museum of contemporary visual culture, dedicated to collecting, exhibiting and interpreting visual art, design and architecture, moving image and Hong Kong visual culture of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The M+ building, designed by Herzog & de Meuron, is a new addition to the global arts and cultural landscape. The two-day programme, curated by M+, will present an opening lecture by architect Jacques Herzog about the M+ building on March 21, followed by two sessions on March 22 that will respond to ‘Materials in Flux’, bringing together local and international speakers, including Ute Meta Bauer, LAAB Architects, Lisa Reihana, Charles Lim and Formafantasma.

The Italian event, curated by Formafantasma, will then be held in Milan on April 17, 18 and 19, within the framework of the Salone del Mobile, and will include contributions from Tim Ingold, Elizabeth Povinelli, Beatriz Colomina, Mark Wigley, Sophie Chao, Veena Sahajwalla and Hans Ulrich Obrist.

Prada Frames brings together scholars and professionals from various fields, including designers, architects, curators, scientists, anthropologists, activists and legal and economic experts, employing a transdisciplinary methodology and a shared environmentally attentive approach. The resulting collective reflection combines innovative lines of thought to analyse, contextualise and define a new reality.

The inaugural symposium, held in 2022 at the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense in Milan, investigated the topic of the forest ecosystem and the forces governing today's timber industry, as well as offering a broader reflection on the role of design and science as agents of change.