One of our fieldtrips during our ECO DESIGN FORUM in Tel Aviv past October 2016 was to „ONYA City“. Heela and Yoav of the ONYA Collective – a gathering of architects, activists, community leaders, and volunteers – took the time and showed us around one of their impressive projects at the New Central Bus Station in South Tel Aviv.

Here are some impressions of our trip and a glimpse at who the ONYA Collective is and what they are doing in their own words:

The Onya Collective started in 2014 as part of the WorldWide Storefront contest, to reimagine alternative futures for large urban landscapes. We focused on the Central Bus Station in South Tel Aviv, an enormous concrete structure that has destroyed the surrounding neighborhoods and is a center for drug use, prostitution, and crime. We launched the Collective with a two-month-long festival on all seven floors of the bus station, showcasing artwork and creative urban agriculture such as hydroponics and a library with a green wall.

Since that time, we have continued to be active at the bus station with a community garden and space on Neve Shaanan street. We give tours of the bus station to highlight the unique challenges of this massive building, which today stands 60% abandoned, but also provides a home for the city’s marginalized populations.

We are working towards turning the “Rampa Garden” on Neve Shaanan St into a community resource available free of charge to the diverse communities of South Tel Aviv.

Today, the Onya Collective is made up of a core group of architects, activists, community leaders, and volunteers. Through our work at the bus station, cities from across Israel have turned to us to copy our approach to Neve Shaanan and do “placemaking” in their challenging neighborhoods. We utilize community organizing principals to design public spaces that serve the needs of all of the residents of the areas where we work.

iota is a social brand designing beautiful handmade objects for the interior while creating jobs for otherwise unemployed people worldwide. iota’s foundations are based on three fundamentals: the use of handmade elements to create new, unexpected designs; the usage of luxurious bespoke yarns and materials; and being a social business. Our collection gives stage to our unique textiles which we develop and design and is based on the technic of Crochet knitting. Our products vary from rugs in different sizes to poufs, stools and benches, pillows and swings, everything textile oriented, some with complimentary materials or structures. We design our products respectively to our vision so they can be crafted in the homes of otherwise unemployed women whom we train and groom. All our products are handmade by these women who create knitted elements in the comfort of their home and then send them over to our studio to be assembled into the final products. Our name has a meaning: ‚iota‘ stands for „a bit“ in Latin and as it is, little by little, from a single element to the final product, from the individual to the global, we aspire to make an impact on the lives of our clients, our employees and our community.

The vision behind ‚iota‘ is to establish a movement that allows different people from around the world to learn the technique of traditional hand-craftsmanship, to provide them employment and allow them to earn an honest living. This idea contains a social responsibility and a way to maintain traditional arts by extenuating the importance of knowledge and skills. It also portrays the belief that regardless of the infinite possibilities that technology offers, people still seek for a personal and unique hand print.

The main concept in our design is creating innovative products from a traditional starting point, and changing the perception of what can be done using hand techniques. As they are conceptually built up from pieces, our products have a tactile nature which calls to create playful contact and combinations between shapes, colors and textures. iota’s products fit into the “in-between” spaces of our lives, filling emotional and practical needs by creating beautiful objects which also carry a social cause. The search for products and materials is done by physical research. We learn old techniques combined with modern knowledge and come up with new strings in colors that are unique for us. All these create a new textile language that combines various materials into unlimited products. We make tradition contemporary.

iota was founded in 2014 by Shula Mozes, a social entrepreneur who had a dream to utilize the craft of knitting, which she loves, into a social opportunity. Knowing there are countless communities of women worldwide who are not able to work outside of the home, she felt that a design brand based on knitting could offer a solution for them and simultaneously be a platform for exciting and bespoke design. Shula reached out to Tal Zur, an Industrial designer with an inclination to crafts and an understanding in textiles, to be the creative mind behind the project. Tal fell in love with the idea, and together they set to build up their dream.

Today, iota first of all is a social-business, both ecologically and socially conscious, with a commitment to sustainability and community support. The majority of profits from iota’s product sales are invested in welfare and educational programs worldwide. We aim to work within communities with high rates of unemployment, and provide mentoring and training programs for women. We work with people with no prospect of employment, giving those opportunities as we invest in their training and mentorship. We give our employees the option of working from home and reward them with fair pay, while creating a sense of community and empowerment. Our production process is completely transparent, and we absolutely condemn child labor and sweat shop environment.

We teach methods of re-appropriating traditional craft techniques, which requires teaching of skills. We believe the importance of skills does not lie only in the final product but rather in the process. The process of hand craftsmanship, which necessarily requires time and attention from the craftsman, creates an emotional connection between him and the final product he created. This connection creates emotional products. The products embody the craftsman’s unique finger print and thus making him an inseparable part of the final product. As opposed to a machine which creates anonymous products, our handmade products have a past, a background and a memory.

A skill, if utilized, can have rewarding qualities; rewarding to the product that is created as a one of a kind element; and rewarding to the craftsperson, whose skill makes him an expert, and therefore meaningful. This empowerment, deriving from owning a skill, is what we strive to preserve and enhance.

The photos from our visit are taken from Sabine Stein sabinestein.com

Facts

Name: ecosign / Akademie für Gestaltung
Schwerpunkt: Nachhaltiges Design
gegründet: 1994
Ort: Köln, Deutschland
Website: ecosign.de
Facebook: facebook.com/Ecosign
Twitter: twitter.com/ecosign_academy

Entstehungsgeschichte

Als Gründerin und Leiterin der Akademie berichtet Karin-Simone Fuhs im Gespräch über ihre Motivation, eine Ausbildungsstätte für Nachhaltiges Design zu gründen und gibt uns Einblick in die Entwicklung der ecosign seit der Gründung im Jahr 1994.

Wenn Karin-Simone Fuhs von ihrer Kindheit in Ägypten erzählt, geht es um gesellschaftliche und kulturelle Unterschiede, Emotionen und einprägsame Geschichten und Erfahrungen, die den Grundstein für spätere Entscheidungen gelegt haben. Zurück in Deutschland folgte ein Designstudium in Köln. Dabei hat Karin-Simone Fuhs schnell festgestellt, dass sie nicht nur schöne Dinge gestalten möchte, die sich gut verkaufen lassen: „Ich hab schon im Studium alle Dozenten verrückt gemacht und schnell gemerkt, dass es notwendig ist, einen anderen Weg zu gehen. Daraufhin habe ich mich umgeschaut, welche Hochschulen und Menschen sich mit dem Thema Nachhaltigkeit beschäftigen.“

Die Gesamthochschule in Wuppertal interessierte sie dank einiger spannender Dozenten, wie zum Beispiel Designtheoretiker Prof. Siegfried Maser, der später auch an der ecosign / Akademie für Gestaltung in Köln lehrte. Statt Köln zu verlassen, und das Studium in Wuppertal zu starten, hat sie jedoch früh erkannt, dass ihre konkreten Vorstellungen einer idealen Hochschule auch dort nicht zu finden wären.

„Ich wollte eine Schule, die das Thema komplett vereint und als Gesamtes lebt. Das bedeutet auch, dass man innerhalb der Akademie oder Hochschule eine eigene Kultur schafft. In Gesprächen ist mir klar geworden, dass man diese nachhaltige Form nicht künstlich implementieren kann in das System, das Hochschulen haben. Da wäre ich irgendwann auch nur zum Einzelkämpfer geworden. Und so habe ich mich entschieden – statt eine Hochschulkarriere anzustreben – es doch lieber selber zu machen und eine eigene Schule zu gründen.“
Das war Anfang der 90er Jahre. Mit Ökologie und Design konnten viele Banker und Unterstützer zu dieser Zeit wenig anfangen. Dennoch hat sie sich mit ihrem zukunftsweisenden Konzept durchsetzen können. „Mit sechs Dozenten habe ich angefangen, das Thema zu lehren. Mittlerweile haben wir fast 60 Dozent*innen und 250 Student*innen.“

Gesamtkonzept der Akademie

Karin-Simone Fuhs möchte ein stimmiges Gesamtkonzept von Lehre, Kommunikation, Struktur und Ausstattung. Der erste Eindruck, den wir bei unserem Besuch bekommen, passt zu ihren Erzählungen. Alles wirkt sehr familiär. Sie möchte einen Raum entstehen lassen, in dem man sich als Person individuell entfalten kann; jeder kann und soll mitreden, diskutieren und sich einbringen.

Als Leiterin der Akademie muss Karin-Simone Fuhs die Verantwortung tragen, aber wichtige Entscheidungen will sie lieber mit einem möglichst großen Konsens aller Beteiligten treffen. „Die ecosign ist so etwas, wie eine soziale Plastik“, zitiert sie eine ehemalige Dozentin. Für Karin-Simone Fuhs ist dies eine schöne und passende Beschreibung. Als Gründerin hat sie den ersten Stein in die Mitte gelegt. Mittlerweile beteiligen sich viele Menschen an der Entwicklung und Gestaltung der Schule.

Nachhaltigkeit im Studium

Das Thema Nachhaltigkeit ist heutzutage vielen Menschen ein Begriff. „Als ich die Schule 1994 gegründet habe, waren die ersten Studenten diejenigen, die etwas bewegen wollten. Danach wurde es schon anders. Die „New Economy“ kam. Das Bewusstsein für Nachhaltigkeit und ein Miteinander war zur Jahrtausendwende überhaupt nicht mehr vorhanden. Dann kam die Wirtschaftskrise. Seitdem hat sich viel verändert, auch in der Industrie und viele Unternehmen fangen an umzudenken. Wenn man beginnt, sich mit dem Thema Nachhaltigkeit zu beschäftigen, geht ein riesiges Themenfeld auf. Dabei wird bei dem konkreten Gedanken über eine bestimmte Sache eine Kette ausgelöst, die uns überfordert.“ Als Handlungsansatz empfiehlt die Direktorin daher, bewusster und verantwortungsvoller zu handeln, von Beginn an. „Es ist wichtig, Beispiele zu schaffen – wie der ‘Tag des guten Lebens‚ – die sichtbar werden lassen, dass es da etwas gibt, für das man sich einsetzen kann. Dabei hat Design eine Schlüsselfunktion inne. Man muss an der Substanz arbeiten und zugleich über den Tellerrand schauen.“

Unter gestalterischen, wissenschaftlichen und philosophischen Gesichtspunkten wird Design mit Nachhaltigkeit im Lehrkonzept der ecosign verknüpft. Dabei kann man als Student*in verschiedene Schwerpunkte setzten, wie beispielsweise Produktdesign, Grafikdesign, Illustration, Fotodesign, Filmdesign oder Designmanagement. Als private und unabhängige Akademie finanziert sich die ecosign ausschließlich durch Studiengebühren. Um das Studium dennoch möglichst vielen Interessent*innen zugänglich zu machen, bietet sie verschiedene Finanzierungsmodelle an (z.B. BAföG, KfW-Kredite, Stipendien). Das Studium endet nach acht Semestern entweder mit dem akademischen Abschluss „Bachelor of Fine Arts“ (B.F.A.), der in Kooperation mit der Alanus Hochschule für Kunst und Gesellschaft vergeben wird, oder aber mit dem nicht-staatlichen Diplom der ecosign / Akademie für Gestaltung.

„Mittlerweile bewerben sich immer mehr junge Menschen aufgrund des Profils der Schule. Dennoch ist die Mischung vielfältig; dabei gibt es natürlich auch Student*innen, die sich erst im Laufe des Studiums mitziehen lassen.“ Dennoch: „Das Bewusstsein wird stärker und auch der Wille, sich damit auseinanderzusetzen.“ Nachhaltiges Design sollte nach Karin-Simone Fuhs keine Theorie sein, sondern ganz selbstverständlich in der Praxis gelebt werden. Die ecosign / Akademie für Gestaltung bietet hierfür jede Menge Raum!

SOCIAL DESIGN – Perspektiven für nächste Generationen

Nicolas Beucker lehrt und forscht über öffentliche Räume und gesellschaftszentrierte Gestaltungsmethoden. In seinen Studien und Projekten thematisiert er, wie Stadträume und Stadtoberflächen als ‚urban interface’ gut lesbar, emotional ansprechend und zum Gebrauch einladend gestaltet werden können. Im Blog stellt er uns seine Interpretation von Social Urban Design vor.

Design-Lösungen für die Praxis

Design ist eine optimistische Disziplin. Und damit ist Design eine der Schlüsseldisziplinen in Zeiten von Unsicherheit und Krisen. Mit designerischem Denken und Handeln lassen sich Gelegenheiten und Möglichkeiten fokussieren statt Hindernisse und Risiken. Design unterfüttert Hoffnungen und zeigt die Möglichkeiten besserer Zukünfte auf. Wer Design so versteht, hinterfragt die Ansprüche an eine bessere Welt und entwickelt eine Haltung für Mitverantwortung an deren Gestaltung. Vor dem Hintergrund einer nach ökologischer und sozialer Gerechtigkeit suchenden Gesellschaft verwundert es nicht, dass seit den letzten Jahren wieder vermehrt gesellschaftliche Anliegen in die Designdebatten einfließen.

Mit Veröffentlichungen unter den Überschriften „Design for Social Innovation“, „Social Design“, „Transformation Design“, „Kann Gestaltung Gesellschaft verändern?“ oder noch allgemeiner „Weltentwerfen“ werden Designer daran erinnert, sich mit ihren Kompetenzen aktiv für die Gestaltung eines gelingenden Gemeinwesens zu engagieren. Ihre Vorstellungskraft und die Fähigkeiten, diese Vorstellungen anderen so mitteilen zu können, dass sie darüber urteilen können wird dabei immer wichtiger. Designerinnen imaginieren das noch nicht Vorhandene und entwickeln Darstellungen, die es ermöglichen, über vorstellbare Zukünfte zu sprechen. Hiermit übernehmen sie eine Vermittlerfunktion zur Gesellschaft. Denn immer wenn es darum geht, die Welt zu gestalten, müssen mehr als nur Designer darüber befinden können, wie die Zukunft aussehen soll. Teilhabe in Designprozessen wird so zu einer neuen Kompetenz der Designprofessionen. Nicht nur muss Teilhabe von Designerinnen als wichtige Vokabel erlernt und verinnerlicht werden, Teilhabe muss vor allem gelebt werden. Dafür werden Designerinnen und Designer sich als Autoren zurücknehmen und auch schonmal partizipativ in co-kreativen Prozessen gestalten müssen. Je gesellschaftlicher ihre Aufgaben werden, desto häufiger werden Designer ihre Entwürfe in Aushandlungsprozessen auch mit den betroffenen Anspruchsgruppen und nicht nur mit Auftraggebern diskutieren. Dazu braucht es nicht nur Dialogbereitschaft und Empathie sondern die Bereitschaft, sich vertrauensvoll auf Augenhöhe zu begegnen. Nicht, dass Design seine Rolle als Impulsgeber für ästhetische Maßstäbe in Zukunft einbüßen wird. Es wird in vielen Gestaltungsfragen allerdings mit ästhetischen Mitteln ethischen Fragen begegnen.

Unsichtbares Design

Design für eine gemeinwesenorientierte Zukunft braucht also andere Voraussetzungen als das Design, das sich vor allem der Absatzwirtschaft verpflichtet fühlt. Dafür wurden und werden allerorts die Lehrpläne ergänzt. So auch an der Hochschule Niederrhein. Designstudierende in Krefeld haben schon seit über zehn Jahren Gelegenheit, sich mit Projekten zu beschäftigen, die das „Unsichtbare Design“ (Lucius Burckhardt) berücksichtigen. Sie lernen, sich mit Beziehungen zu beschäftigen, die durch das Design von Dingen entstehen und Produkte, Räume, Situationen oder Kommunikationsformen entsprechend zu gestalten. Das alles findet in Projekten des Social Design statt. Oft allerdings fehlten bisher methodische Grundlagen dafür, wie eine emphatische Annäherung an Entwurfskontexte und ein Verständnis für die unterschiedlichsten Anspruchsgruppen erlangt werden kann. Zudem stellt Social Design die Frage nach dem designerischen Lösungsweg erst während der vertiefenden Auseinandersetzung mit einer meist unscharfen und komplexen Aufgabe. Eine frühe Festlegung von Lösungswegen bestimmter Designprofessionen wie Produkt-, Grafik-, Automobil-, Messe, Editorial-, Web- oder XY-Design ist im Social Design eher kontraproduktiv.

Ab dem Frühjahr 2017 wird social design deshalb neu im Krefelder Design Curriculum verankert sein. Social Design wird zu einem wählbaren Vertiefungsfach. Systematisch können angehende Designerinnen und Designer nun Methoden zur Verdichtung von Empathie, Teilhabe, Partizipation und Co-Kreation erlernen. Es werden vorbildliche Projekte diskutiert und in ausgewählten Themenfeldern und Anwendungskontexten gewissenhaft Kriterien für eine bessere Welt verhandelt. Aus diesen heraus lassen sich dann Handlungsfelder und konkrete soziale Projekte definieren.

Aus dem Interesse interdisziplinärer Betrachtungsweisen heraus baute Nicolas Beucker 2009 das Kompetenzzentrum Social Design an der Hochschule Niederrhein auf. Mit Kommunen am Niederrhein erarbeitet SOUND verschiedene Ansätze für bürgernahe Stadtentwicklung. Beispielhaft dafür steht das StadtRaumFestival VIERTELPULS, das 2015 in Kooperation mit der Stadt Krefeld und der Urbanen Nachbarschaft Samtweberei durchgeführt wurde.

 

Aktuelle Artikel von Nicolas Beucker:

(2015) Transformation Design: A Piecemeal Situational Change. Transformation Design in Perspectives on a New Design Attitude. Wolfgang Jonas, Sarah Zerwas und Kristof von Anshelm, Birkhäuser: 33-42.

(2016) Design und die Sichtbarkeit möglicher Zukünfte. Social Design in Gestalten für die Transformation der Gesellschaft. Claudia Banz, transcript Verlag: 35-42.

Sustainable amazement

— a Philosophic Balancing Act

 

Plato and Aristotle once assured us that the origin of philosophy is amazement. The modern era is amazed that anything exists at all. In the recent past we have seen a new idea that is worth being amazed by: sustainability. I would like to go on a mental journey down the path of sustainability. This endeavour assumes a number of possible ways of thinking and there are three reasons that I will start this journey in search of something instead of having a clear goal in mind: Firstly, this interesting, diverse path seems to be more of a tail than an autobahn because it is interesting and varying. Secondly, after twelve years of working together with sustainable designers, this path has proven to be reliable. Thirdly, I hope that there may be a twist and turn on the path that will surprise even the most informed readers. So let’s go!

 

A Patch of Fog — The Middle Finger

Let’s cross the murky patch of fog that is ethics. At first glance, sustainability is a kind of ethical issue because you are supposed to do what you don’t want to. Which isn’t completely wrong. Sustainable behaviour implies that people recognise that principle responsibility comes before one’s personal interests and they say to themselves “You should!”. And that’s just the catch: People really like to say “You should!” to others, but not to themselves and they feel disconnected from external behaviour because they have the right attitude.

In sustainability communication, moral pleas do just the opposite of what they should: they make people go into a defensive mode. Which is no surprise. From the sociological perspective they have found that around 10% of the population is open to moral dictions, which is the same 10% that already leads a sustainable lifestyle. The other 90% reject the message or are indifferent, and this is the part of society whose behavioural changes would really make a difference. There’s a reason that the moral pointer finger and the “digitus impudicus”, the raised middle finger, are direct neighbours.

 

A Forest Path — Woodsman’s Latin

So let’s forget about morals and continue on our path, which now leads us to a forest. We are in Germany so of course this forest is orderly, the forests have been regulated here since the Early Modern Age. Back then, mining collapsed in many parts of the country as there wasn’t enough wood to support and secure the mining tunnels. In consequence, forest regulations were passed in order to manage wood as a scarce resource. It was Hans Carl von Carlowitz in 1713 who coined not only the principle of sustainable economics, but also the word “sustainability” in his work “Sylvicultura oeconomica” when he wrote that it was necessary to employ the greatest arts and sciences in order to manage a forest in such a way that its long-term use could be secured for the development of the country. Here we are dealing with genuine traditional thinking that incorporates the responsibility to maintain what you have so that future generations can benefit from it. The importance of this way of thinking developed around 15,000 years earlier when the Neolithic Demographic Transition began. The basic principle of this transition was that some of the harvest had to be kept as seeds for the following year in order to be able to harvest again. Strictly speaking that is saving resources for the future. A responsible economy would not think in quarters, but in generations.

 

A Clearing — A Crucial Question

We come out of the forest onto a clearing with a cross in the middle. Now it’s time to ask what we think about religion. If sustainability is a moral issue, why can’t it be a religious one, too. Isn’t it the Creator God who compels us to preserve his creation? This is the caring principle that influenced religious thinking in the Erly Modern Era: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it […]” (Genesis 1:28) from the old testament can be translated in the modern era using the words “rule” and “subject”. But we would get closer to the Hebrew verbs if we also translated the responsibility and care that reverberate in this passage. The religious responsibility for creation would be a great idea if only the world were a bit more devout. But religious commandments have lost their normative power over society over the last few centuries and with the Reformation, they were finally banned to the private sphere. The crucial (sustainably asked) question could then be: Is sustainability more protestant or catholic? In honour of the anniversary of the Reformation we hear the same thing on a daily basis: A person’s beliefs alone make the person justifiable. Or put in a more modern way: The intention and inner attitude count. Martin Luther accused the Catholics of searching for salvation in external works such as the selling of indulgences. Sustainable development has revoked this basic assumption of the Reformation and has redeemed the selling of indulgences. For in sustainability the inner attitude is completely uninteresting, what counts is the corresponding behaviour. What good does it do if I don’t put my money where my mouth is?

There are innumerable examples of this. And the climate and finite resources don’t care why I am using them wisely, as long as I do it. Sustainable lifestyles are refreshingly superficial. It’s really enough to just refrain from doing some specific things, and if I do happen to do them, then I can go through a type of selling of indulgences with myself and compensate for it in another area of life.

 

A Balancing Act – The Art of Living

Now let’s go from the clearing to another path that leads us along a narrow ridge, on both sides there is an abyss. This is a very dangerous path where you have to be extremely careful not to lose control of your balance and not go too far off to one side. For Aristotle, moderation was one of the four cardinal virtues, the sophrosyne. Our effusive lifestyles neglect this virtue of antiquity in a risky way. And with that, all of this rambling has come to a head. Our planet’s natural resources are as finite as the most valuable thing that we have as individuals, namely our life. It is unquestioningly limited, just like the resources on our planet, but in a more specific way because everyone’s lifespan has its own individual limit. And how it ends is always an unknown.
This disturbing mix of the certainty of death and the uncertainty of when it will happen is the horizon of our human existence, “living to die”, whereby death is not just the last event in life, but life is rather planned around it. Heidegger calls that “the worry”, which not only represents being worried, but also caring for one’s own existence and that of our loved ones. Pension schemes, health and life insurance are the socio-economic realisation of this worrying.

 

A High Plateau – A Creative Mission

Even in early philosophy, mortality brought creative consequences. Epicurus postulated a lifestyle of simplicity, moderation and self restraint that was supposed to lead not to intense, but rather to long-lasting enjoyment. People don’t really read Epicurus anymore but his ideas live on in the diet and nutrition apostles of our time and the steady, unstoppable stream of guidebooks on the meaning of life and self-help books. For Montaigne, the limitations of lifespans implied the obligation to carefully structure one’s life. His most important conclusions were that we have to accept death and live everyday as if it were your last. He brought this idea to the point with his essay entitled “That to Philosophise Is to Learne How to Die” where he wrote that one of the greatest benefits is the contempt for death. “It is unclear where death awaits us – so we have to expect it everywhere! Considering death is considering freedom.”
Because our lifespan is a finite resource, we need to more carefully plan life because this brings meaning to it that hasn’t been a given since the enlightenment. This time is an exception: what is true on the subjective-biographical level holds true on the global level as well. The limitation of our planet’s resources is at the same time the contract to use them with moderation. Shortage leads to design. There is no path that leads away from this high plateau, there’s nowhere else to go. We as current world citizens are obliged to stay here, this is our place. This is a difficult responsibility, yes. But no other generation has had the insights into possible futures and mankind has never had a greater and more wonderful responsibility than we do today. Let us use this chance to do something great!

Urbane art meets sustainable development

The developmental NGO one world network NRW (in German: Eine Welt Netz NRW) has launched the urban art campaign “Weltbaustellen NRW” (in English: global construction site NRW) to help shape and discuss the Agenda 2030 and its Sustainable Development Goals. International murals are setting the example of change that must start with us.

Visible Changes

The Agenda 2030 and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which were resolved by the United Nations on 25 September 2015, have set the course for a future in which we can no longer live beyond the possibilities of our planet. It includes the responsibilities of all nation-states to sustainably combat poverty and to promote education and gender equality. Furthermore, it includes enforcing fair international trade and minimising the negative impacts of consumption on humans, animals and the environment. The Agenda became effective as of 1 January 2016 and Germany must develop and evolve!

If we really want to reach the goals of global sustainable development, we have to make changes in all life aspects. Policy, economy and society must change in order to sustainably address urgent issues such as poverty, the need to seek refuge and the lack of equality. Which is why the one world network NRW launched the “Weltbaustellen NRW” campaign in December 2015.

Together with artists from the Global South and Global North, we will be designing murals in 2016 and 2017 that will be painted in a total of 16 cities in NRW. The artists’ murals will deal with aspects of the Sustainable Development Goals, making them visible to the public. At the same time, they will be changing the cityscape, giving impetus for change.

The murals that have been realised so far this year are unique and fascinating. Some of them illustrate an issue in a drastic manner, such as the mural in Bochum that deals with plastic and consumption. Others, such as the mural in Bedburg illustrating the issue of renewable energy, have chosen a more subtle motif in a fusion of humans and the future. Some murals show elements of a utopia and a world in danger, as does the mural on the “Hexenhaus”, or witch’s house, in Dinslaken. Each mural is an expression of what personally concerns the respective local artist(s) regarding the topic of sustainability.

In Minden, the artists involved called on other international artists to send in their own sketches and ideas about the Sustainable Development Goals – and 21 artists followed their call. The mural turned out to be a collage of all of these ideas and concepts, framed by an intergenerational dialogue.

The picture of impact

We have initiated a lot of dialogue with these murals, primarily about what is actually being done with the respective wall. People walk past and ask themselves: What is going on, what is this all about? Neighbours are curious and want to talk to the artists. For us it’s about dialogue regarding the mural, but also it’s important to include people’s curiosity in discussions about how we want to live in the future.

The design of the murals is accompanied by many events which include everything ranging from podium discussions on sustainability, artistic and cultural activities, to film workshops or pub quizzes on the Agenda 2030. In order to organise these great programmes, we count on many partners and volunteers in the respective cities.

At the psychiatric hospital in Düsseldorf, for example, we had a graffiti-jam with 20 artists who worked on a construction site fence. During a workshop, the patients had the opportunity to work with an artists to create their own motif that they actually got to spray on the fence during the jam. Direct participation is especially interesting because the dialogue between the artists and the local people help the process to become more complete.

Which is why a part of our campaign involves a specific programme for schools in which students work on the Agenda 2030 issues using urban art. Students and artists co-produced murals in many schools in NRW.

Stop complaining!

We use comprehensive events to bring people together with the different “Weltbaustellen”. At the kick-off event in April 2016 in Cologne, the art director of the campaign, Klaus Klinger of Farbfieber e.V., summed it up really well: Over the course of the campaign we hope as many people as possible will join us in our cause and also participate in the process themselves!

And so far, it’s been working: At our event “Stop complaining! Let’s eat fair!” at the Eigelstein Gate in Cologne, we got such great feedback that we will be hosting other community events and activities such as organic fair trade dinners. The idea of coming together in a mix of political statement, urban art and dinner to discuss what food actually means to us consistently carries on the ideas of the campaign.

What we have planned for NRW

This year we have installed “Weltbaustellen” in Bedburg, Bochum, Dinslaken, Düsseldorf, Cologne, Minden, Mühlheim and Remscheid. The murals make people want to come back and take in their size, time and again, to find they keep discovering new details they hadn’t seen the first time. The murals are here to stay – and at least as many murals will be added to the list in 2017. We have already planned projects in Bielefeld, Dortmund, Hagen, Herne, Essen and Münster.

We appreciate each and every person who wants to get involved in the projects or who is simply interested in the Sustainable Development Goals and what the future on our planet should look like. Those of you who would like to stay informed about our projects can either follow us on Facebook or check out our website to see what we are currently working on.

Making it Happen – The Campaign Sponsors

Along with all of the volunteers that are help us out with our work, we would like to mention our supporters, for they have helped make this project possible:
The patron of the “Weltbaustellen NRW” campaign is Franz-Josef Lersch-Mense, Minister for Government Affairs, Europa and the Media in NRW and is Head of the State Chancellery of North Rhine-Westphalia. The campaign is funded by the Foundation for Environment and Development of NRW, Engagement Global on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and Misereor. Campaign sponsors are Lemonaid and the natural electricity provider Naturstrom out of Düsseldorf.

The One World Network NRW

The one world network NRW is the campaign coordinator of “Weltbaustellen”. The one world network NRW association is the umbrella organisation of many developmental organisations and individuals in NRW. The one world network NRW is an independent and self-organised association that has been supporting civil society’s one world engagement in North Rhine-Westphalia since 1991. Together with its members, the one world network NRW advocates for fair international trade and global environmental protection, for open-minded policies and cultural diversity, and for human rights and peaceful conflict resolution.

Happy beginnings

Even back as a graduate student I realised: I want more out of life. I want to do more than “just” work in advertising. I realised that people can use their creative and communicative skills to really do something good and important. And that is why I decided to go into advertising values. It’s meaningful – and fun! So I do freelance work for agencies that accept mainly socially oriented or sustainable projects as well as for non-profit organisations and associations. Since I have become the self-appointed Minister for Happiness, I have been bringing together all of these aspects in my project “Ministry for Happiness and Well-being” and work on creative ways to help our gross national happiness (GNH) grow.

Main Focus

There’s more to it than what meets the eye

Since I began focusing on topics such as happiness and well-being and have got to know the extensive world of social design, I am convinced that designers can do more than just produce pretty, colourful things. We can help make this world a better place by using our skills to make complex issues visually accessible to the public, to present them in an understandable and creative manner and help contribute possible solutions.

You can reach a great deal of people with good, clear design projects and creative ideas. There are many opportunities to draw public attention to important issues and problems that deserve to be attended to or need to be solved.

The path to gross national happiness – a group effort

I have been running the multi-media communications campaign “Ministry for Happiness and Well-being” for a few years now and I work Europe-wide as a freelance Minister for Happiness, working with people to come up with diverse, creative ways to increase the gross national happiness in their respective country.

With inspiring events and lively activities such as interventions in public spaces, street art, workshops in schools and companies, I call on people to ask themselves what it means to them to lead a good life – and to become actively involved in creating a good life.

Time and again I am fascinated by how much positive feedback we get from the public, be it in social networks, through email or people that talk to me personally at events and workshops. I give people down-to-earth ideas and material that they can use in everyday life and that they can use in their own activities. Fun, creative input help people realise that happiness is something that everyone can discover for themselves each and every day and that happiness can grow and be shared with others. And since this is a multi-media campaign, I have all the artistic freedom I want and need. Sometimes I film interviews, sometimes I set up an online contest, give a workshop that combines methods of design thinking with happiness or I offer an inspiring film night with time for a discussion afterwards. Whatever the media used, the goal is constant: Empowering people. Bringing people together and creating shared spaces and experiences and getting people to step outside of their comfort zone.

Happiness means change

I always work intuitively. I have buried my business plan deep in my bottom desk drawer. I don’t want to define a target group, I want to be in constant contact and exchange ideas with the project’s fans and friends and expand my network. I work on exciting cooperative projects and enjoy the fact that my job is part of a happiness project, if you will. As is life.

Happiness is movement – in the sense of change. Everything is in transition, it seems that things around us are changing faster and faster all the time and our job is to accept these changes and make the best out of them. That is the art of life: Taking advantage of the opportunities change can offer.

And if my work can contribute to the positive outcomes of these changes, then that makes me very happy.