‘My practice explores how technology participates in relational embodied systems - how bodies, sensors, and materials co-compose stories of attention and response.’
My practice explores how technology participates in relational embodied systems – how bodies, sensors, and materials co-compose stories of attention and response. The question of what counts as kin guides this exploration, asking how we might create with, rather than merely through, technological systems.
Mark Meeuwenoord (member of Polymorf) is a media artist and musician whose practice spans music and sound design, multisensory and installation design, and artistic research. His work integrates critical philosophical inquiry with hands-on, practical experimentation, exploring ways to facilitate a more-than-human condition. Mark’s artistic focus lies in engaging audiences through fully embodied, immersive experiences and developing multi-sensory strategies for storytelling and experience design.
He is a senior lecturer at Avans Communication and Multimedia Design in Breda and has been a research fellow in various programs, including the Sundance New Frontier Storylab, the MIT & IDFA DocLab Immersive Network Research & Development Program, The Sense of Smell (a collaboration between Polymorf, IFF, and Avans), and the Lectorate of Robotics & Sensoring Avans University of Applied Sciences. Mark currently serves as researcher in Robotics and Art at Avans focussing on Artificial Kinship – Care .
His work has received multiple awards, including the Award for Creative Technology at IDFA DocLab and the Sheffield DocFest Alternate Realities Audience Award, and has been presented internationally at festivals and exhibitions such as SXSW (US), PAMCUT (US), Holland Festival (NL), BFI (UK), STRP Festival (NL), Mozilla Fest (UK), Sheffield Doc/Fest (UK), FOST (US), Sundance (US), IDFA DocLab (NL), Nederlands Film Festival (NL), Fak’ugesi (ZA), Hong Kong Arts Centre (HK), FILE Fest (BR), and Future Forum (DXB).
Artificial Kinship
Artificial Kinship is an innovative artistic research project that explores the synergy between art, technology, and care. Building on experience with embodied artificial intelligence (AI) in robotic art, the project applies this knowledge to redefine the complex and dynamic interactions within the care sector.
Research Group: Situated Art, Design and Technology
The research group Situated Art, Design and Technology (SADT) focuses on the societal embedding and embodiment of knowledge production that art and design research enables. The conducted research contributes to a deeper understanding of technological developments and their impact on people, society, and the environment, and to the development of situated approaches in the creative sector and beyond. In doing so, it advances a wider acknowledgement of artistic and design research as a mode of knowledge production, one that is grounded in creativity and critical imagination as a way of generating insight into, and intervening in, societal transitions driven by technology.
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‘People are the product of their relationships with their environment. It’s important to understand how technological developments influence these relationships.’
Michel van Dartel 
‘‘Understanding how creativity and imagination emerge from interactions with our environment will lead to improved innovation processes, tools and technologies.’’
Alwin de Rooij
‘Beauty lies in connecting different parties and creating equal opportunities. I believe in the power of kinship, collectiveness and critical thinking. ’
Eva van den Boogaard
‘My practice is situated in between different actors, in this shape-shifting middle many things can happen.’
Tara Karpinski
‘Imagination is the key to a strong inclusive society. Artistic work and situated design can contribute to a better understanding of the other.’
Jenny van den Broeke
‘Investigating the potential of sensory augmentation to bridge the sensory gap between deaf and hearing.’
Michel Witter
‘Through an interplay of design and research, the apt questions and necessary tools can be discovered and applied to each research project.’
Antal Ruhl
‘Humans are atmospheric beings, particles, dust, in intimate cycles of exchange, actors with an incredible force.’
Annemarie Piscaer
‘Could experimental sensory translation of art works improve their accessibility for sensory diverse exhibition audiences?’
Eva Fotiadi
‘The tacit and embodied knowledge of practitioners about the complex reality of design can provide an important resource to innovate how we learn and teach’
Sarah Lugthart
‘How can the notion of the ‘script’ be used in a situated design practice? ’
Ollie Palmer
‘The ultimate goal is to provide people with the information, skills and tools that enable them to improve the quality of their daily lives.’
Simone van den Broek
‘For me, the iterative design-research process is an exciting journey towards designs that can transform human consciousness.’
Danielle Roberts
‘The essence of the situated, cinematic experience of dance lies in the mental interaction where the public becomes co-author.’
Noud Heerkens
‘Who benefits?’
Ivo Koolen
‘Getting comfortable with ambiguity enables designers to absorb feedback and use it to make better design choices.’
Gabri Heinrichs
‘I look at the ways in which citizens can play an active role in shaping their cities, and how new media and technology can contribute to this.’
Barbara Asselbergs
‘Power, control and chance play an important role in every creative process. I explore this complicated correlation.’
Michiel van Opstal
‘Attention during interaction is personal, not a given fact.’
Misha Croes