Type of site | Conference |
---|---|
Available in | English, multilingual subtitles, transcript |
Founded | 1995 |
Headquarters | , |
Area served | Africa |
Owner | Interactive Africa |
Founder(s) | Ravi Naidoo |
URL | designindaba |
Registration | Optional |
Launched | 1995 | (first conference)
Current status | Active |
Design Indaba is a trademark and brand founded and run by Interactive Africa [1] in 1995 with a focus on design and under the slogan "A better world through creativity". [2] Consisting of an online publication and a series of events and creative projects, it is most widely known for its annual festival held in South Africa, in particular the flagship three-day conference hosted in Cape Town. The Design Indaba Conference is also broadcast live to various cities, most recently including Johannesburg, Durban, Nairobi, Windhoek, Kampala and Lausanne. [3] It has also been referred to as the "Conference on Creativity". [4]
Design Indaba was founded with the inaugural conference in 1995, which hosted 11 speakers over two days. [5] It has since grown to host over 30 speakers from all over the globe [6] and has been named by many to be one of the best creative conferences in the world. [7] [8] [9] In its list of top "52 Places to Go in 2014", [10] The New York Times touted Design Indaba as "the annual visual arts spectacular" and part of the city's creative renaissance.
The Design Indaba Conference is just one part of a weeklong creative festival, known now as the Design Indaba Festival. [11] In its entirety the Design Indaba Festival comprises the conference, a film festival, [12] a series of exhibitions including the annual Emerging Creatives programme [13] , and various music events and other performances. [14] The main event takes place in Cape Town, most recently at the Artscape Theatre Centre, and various cities in Africa and Europe also host a simulcast of the conference and peripheral exhibitions and events. [15]
The Design Indaba Conference has been held in Cape Town since 1995, biannually until 2001, and annually since then. Speakers at the conference represent a broad spectrum of design and the creative industries, with a focus on international thought leadership and innovative problem solving, [16] in keeping with the company ethos of "A better world through creativity". Alongside professionals from traditional design disciplines such as architecture, product design, graphic and communication design, fashion, furniture design, design thinking and design education, the programme of recent years has included chefs, musicians, visual artists, filmmakers and founders of creative businesses on the list of Design Indaba speakers. [17] Together the three-day Cape Town conference and simulcast host 4,500 people. [18]
Largely funded by the Design Indaba Trust [19] and independent sponsorships, Design Indaba Do Tank [20] consists of projects and initiatives designed for the greater good. These include the Your Street Challenge, [21] the 10x10 Low-Cost Housing Project, [22] Another Light Up, [23] Sonop [24] and Arch For Arch monument in honour of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. [25]
Thomas Alexander Heatherwick, is an English designer and the founder of London-based design practice Heatherwick Studio. He works with a team of more than 200 architects, designers and artisans from a studio and workshop in King's Cross, London.
Christoph Niemann is an illustrator, graphic designer, and children's book author.
Noma Bar is a graphic designer, illustrator and artist, based in London. Bar's work has been described as "deceptively simple", featuring flat colours, minimal detail and negative space to create images that often carry double meanings that are not immediately apparent. Bar himself outlines his approach as avoiding unnecessary detail or decoration that might detract from an image's message, instead aiming for 'maximum communication with minimal elements.'
NewMusicSA is a non-profit arts advocacy organisation that promotes the creation, performance, and enjoyment of South African new music. Founded in 1999 and operating formally since 2003, NewMusicSA is the South African section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM).
The Eurobest Festival of Creativity is an annual event which celebrates and rewards "creative excellence" in creative communications, advertising and related fields in Europe.
Andrew Matthew Shoben, FRBS FRSA is an English artist, academic and broadcaster. He is Professor of Public Art and Computation at Goldsmiths, University of London as well as a Fellow of the Royal British Society of Sculptors and a Fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts. He is considered one of the world's leading practitioners of public art, especially in relation to digital and other interactive technologies.
Nelly Ben Hayoun is a French designer, artist and filmmaker. Born in Valence, Drôme, France, she now resides in London, United Kingdom. She serves on the Advisory Council of METI and is the designer of experiences at the SETI Institute. She is also an exhibitor and keynote speaker who has worked with museums and design centres across the world.
A South African comic is a book or periodical published in South Africa that contains sequential art stories.
The Loeries is a non-profit company administering awards for the brand communications industry, in Africa and the Middle East.
Craig Edward Dykers is an American architect and founding partner of the architecture firm, Snøhetta.
Nuqat is a nonprofit organisation based in Kuwait that focuses on cultural development in the region. Diverse participants from all over the world join Nuqat throughout the year to discuss design, entrepreneurship, architecture, fine arts, technology, culture and every aspect of life that creativity permeates.
Wiki Indaba is the regional conference for African Wikimedians both within the continent and in the diaspora. Topics of presentation and dialogue include Wikimedia projects such as Wikipedia, other wikis, open-source software, free knowledge, free content and how these projects affect the African continent.
Ravi Naidoo is the founder of Interactive Africa and Design Indaba, an annual three day design conference hosted in Cape Town, South Africa, as well as a suite of events such as Design Commons and antenna. Naidoo is also a co-founder of the Cape Innovation and Tech Initiative (CiTi) and Rain, Africa's first 5G network.
Design Commons is a deconstructed conference founded by the CEO of Interactive Africa, Ravi Naidoo in collaboration with World Design Weeks founder Kari Korkman. The event was established in 2017 and acts as a travelling discussion platform on the future of cities.
The Arch for Arch is an architectural structure and monument located in Cape Town, South Africa, created to commemorate the life and work of Desmond Tutu. Commissioned by Design Indaba and sponsored by Liberty, its name is a play on Tutu's widely used nickname, "The Arch". A smaller version of the monument is located in Johannesburg, South Africa at Constitution Hill.
Titi Ogufere is a Nigerian interior designer, critical design thinker and publisher at Essential Media Group. She is the Creative Director at Essential Interiors Consultancy, a pioneer interior designing company in Nigeria. The award-winning practice was set up in 2002 and has since established an international identity with a wide variety of projects that are context-specific, innovative, experimental, critical and theoretical.
African design encompasses many forms of expression and refers to the forms of design from the continent of Africa and the African diaspora including urban design, architectural design, interior design, product design, art, and fashion design. Africa's many diverse countries are sources of vibrant design with African design influences visible in historical and contemporary art and culture around the world. The study of African design is still limited, particularly from the viewpoint of Africans, and the opportunity to expand its current definition by exploring African visual representations and introducing contemporary design applications remains immense.
Inimfon "Ini" Joshua Archibong is an industrial designer, creative director, artist and musician who is active in product design, furniture design, environmental design, architecture, watch design, and fashion.
The World Around is a global design conference and media organisation that publishes video presentations and short documentary films under the slogan "Architecture's Now, Near, and Next" covering contemporary ideas and projects in architecture and design. The organisation is a 501c3 registered public charity in the United States, and seeks to "make the best new ideas in architecture accessible to all." The platform has a particular focus on climate change and social justice issues, and hosts the Young Climate Prize, a mentoring scheme for climate change-focused designers between the ages of 13 and 25.