Design Education Talks ep. 68 - Justus Theinert

After graduating as Industrial Designer Justus Theinert carried out a one year field inquiry on “Methodology and didactics in European design education”, visiting the leading design schools in Europe. Later he participated as Research Fellow in the project “Design quality of engineer-buildings” at the University Stuttgart, investigating the phenomenon of Gestalt-quality in engineer buildings. He then became an Assistant Professor at the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste Stuttgart where he was in charge of the development and establishment of the “Master of European Design” program and project manager within the design network “Four Motors for Europe” (Baden-Wurttemberg, Catalunya, Lombardy, Rhône-Alpes). At the same time he became Senior Designer and Partner in the studio “Prof. Wulf Schneider & Partner” with focus on the development of office furniture, interior and transportation design. In 1996 he founded the “Studio for innovation-management and product development.” After several projects for Mercedes-Benz, he was offered the position of Senior Designer at corporate design studio of DaimlerChrysler AG, where he was responsible for three dimensional aspects of corporate design such as POS furniture, accessories as well as brand strategy. In 2001 Theinert was appointed Full Professor for Industrial Design and Design Theory at Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences where he managed the faculty as Dean from 2007 to 2010. 2004 consultant for design promotion and design education development in Jordan in collaboration with Yarmouk University, Irbid and the German Research Foundation (DFG). International teaching and consultancy in design didactics in Europe, Egypt, Taiwan and at more than 30 Chinese universities. Various visiting professorships and publications on aesthetic education and design didactics. 2014 Justus Theinert was nominated DeTao Master at DeTao Masters Academy Shanghai.


https://www.linkedin.com/in/prof-justus-theinert-27577b50/

https://design.h-da.de/justus-theinert

Transcript

Lefteris Heretakis: 0:10

Hello, and welcome to design education talks by the new art school. Our guest today is Justus Theinert . Welcome, Justus!

Justus Theinert: 0:19

Hey, thanks for inviting me. I'm curious about this talk.

Lefteris Heretakis: 0:24

It's a real pleasure to have you here. So tell us about you and your fantastic work.

Unknown: 0:30

Well, it's just getting old. And it's not so easy to understand where to start. But actually, my interest in design education came from my studies. So when I studied industrial design at the academy, Art Academy in Stoker, I had the feeling that's, that's not all, there must be more than that. So I actually, I tried to get a scholarship, which I got finally, and so my, my idea was to travel Europe, and visit all the important design schools in Europe, and make a kind of short field inquiry of what design education is. And luckily, I was able to travel for one year and visit to many university just to mention here and ever since it was my Well, yeah, my main interest.

Lefteris Heretakis: 1:33

Okay, so but you studied, you studied what exactly?

Unknown: 1:39

I studied industrial design. And I worked as an industrial designer for quite a long time. So I try to experience every how to say every context, which you can imagine. So I had my own studio for five or six years, I worked with industry like Mercedes Benz for three years. So I tried actually all kinds of contexts. And it was amazing. So I did from investment goods, machinery, design, colour design, interior. And so that's one of the amazing facts of our profession that you actually can step into different fields whenever you feel the best, the longest period was actually furniture, furniture design.

Lefteris Heretakis: 2:32

What exactly in any particular piece of furniture?

Unknown: 2:35

Well, it was mainly office furniture, office seats and tables and systems. And that was, yeah, interesting and challenging. At the same time, it was furnitures, very close to interior design. So I did quite some interesting projects with that German railway, five star travelling train, which never came into realisation. So it was Yeah. But it was a nice project.

Lefteris Heretakis: 3:04

Fantastic. So tell us about how you got into teaching.

Unknown: 3:08

I was always interested in teaching ever since I left university, and actually I started teaching in the context of art, because friends of mine, found that very special kind of private art school. And once that was founded, it developed and so step by step became bigger, and we found a new campus. And then I was asked to step in there. And it was actually a, the idea of Applied Arts, but not in a historic way. But in a contemporary way. All the students had to do internships in industry, as artists, and they had to cope with the challenges how to act as an artist in industry. It was a very good school, it doesn't exist anymore. Because after that was cool 25 years ago. And it closed down about five years ago, because of political reasons. The problem was that, that Yogen, who was running the school, actually, he wanted to have officials, they have to say, certificate, certificate, yes. And then we had to change to a bachelor programme and auditing and things like that. And so that killed actually the schooling, but there was no, there was no other way because the system is like that. Germany is not a good, it's not a good environment for private schools. Not at all. Oh, because the higher education is free. You don't have to pay for your studies. So how would you survive as an art school? It's so almost impossible.

Lefteris Heretakis: 4:57

This is very interesting. So it was what changes were you forced to do. This is very interesting. What what changes were you forced to do?

Unknown: 5:07

Oh, it was it. Only former things like how many books are in the library? If it's not enough? You don't write the stem is just for the things. So the spirit of the institution didn't matter at all. It was just the formula.

Lefteris Heretakis: 5:24

Okay, but but just about the books or if you bought the LV ours or at the

Unknown: 5:29

end, this was the programme, it was the staff, it was kind of the teaching environment, it was almost everything. I think they actually they had the idea to kill private schools. So then, the Bologna process process in Germany had actually two focuses to reduce the study times two to three years for a bachelor. So in Germany, a Bachelor is always three years. That's the reason why, at our university, we still have a German diploma, which is a four year programme. We are the only one actually. And the other one was to get rid of private schools. That's what I believe. That's politics. Yes.

Lefteris Heretakis: 6:20

So what happened after that? So after

Unknown: 6:23

that, so actually, I was teaching and I was involved at that school only for five years. That was during my time at Mercedes Benz. And another important step was actually travelling to China. For many reasons, for many reasons, I was actually forced to travel to China, I didn't intend to do so. It was 1997. So I was assistant professor at the Stuttgart Academy. And my boss, intended to travel to China, with 20 students and ash would take care of 20 students in Beijing, which was not my favourite waste of time. So I said, No, I wouldn't do that. So my colleague, she wanted to do it, but she became pregnant. So I was, she didn't want to fly. Long Haul tonight, due to the radiation, so I was forced to travel to Beijing. And the funny thing happened when I opened, when I when I smelled the air Beijing, it was like walking down the stairs from the plane, there was no know how to say contemporary airport at that time. And when I smelled it, I felt at home the first time in my life. So it was a very, very interesting, no, it was a life changing moment. It was yes. So I don't know the reason why, but ever since I travelled to China, quite often, and China, we can talk about the Chinese spirit philosophy background. And the other fact was the China was developing in terms of design at that time, so late 1920s. So there were brilliant conferences. So I had all the colleagues from all over the world came to China and we had the conferences there. It was a the best school equity imagine, to talk to my colleagues there. Step by step, I got deeper into Chinese philosophy and Chinese thinking and Asian thinking. And I learned a lot for the or not only designed education, but for different kinds of thinking, which could be helpful to develop new ideas. And so that was my main interest then and ever since ever, when I had my sabbatical, which is in Germany every four years. So I spent that time in China. So normally, it was like three months a year in China. Another connection that to Andrew, because he has kind of the same experience with this Chinese background. So the beginning of my Chinese travels, they were very interesting, because there were no professors for design. They hadn't been educated at that time. They ended up in communication, that that design, it was artists and industrial design, it was whatever it was, functionally, landscape architects, so they had to put someone in the position. That was amazing to talk to those people who had very high expertise and competence in their field. 10 years later, it changed the first educated designers covert educated in China came into these positions. And that was a bit boring. And because they're too, there were too strong. I'd say developments in design education, the one the way it started, and we'll see, it was very much influenced by Japanese industrial design education. And others were influenced by German design education, there was actually not so much a British influence in the beginning. So, these are kind of competing Japanese way and, and the German wave as I am very critical to the German way, for two reasons, which we can talk about. It's the Bauhaus problem and the old problem. I was more interested, not exactly in the Japanese way, because that was very formal and very, pseudo statistical and scientifically, it was not an interesting approach. So the the experiment, which I tried to establish every time I travelled to Chinese universities is to find with colleagues a new way of teaching. So I refused actually, to present standard German education came. And that led to very curious situations effect. So I remember when I was holding top four master students at Tsinghua University in Beijing, very early if 22,000 or something like that. I criticise the Barcelona Chair of Mies van der Rohe. So I explained why this chair is very important design piece that does not fit any does not does, it doesn't match any criteria of good design, because it's too heavy and too large and things like that. So and so that made all the students at 300 Diversity curious. And so the bachelor students, they insisted to take part in this in this lecture, and of course, quite a quite a message. But it was fun.

Lefteris Heretakis: 12:30

So you mentioned something very what is the standard job German where you mentioned

Unknown: 12:36

the history. So we have to over valuated schools in Germany, which is the Bauhaus and own School of Design. And that is, the reason for it is the Second World War and the reform the higher education reform in Germany. So let's start with the powerhouse. powerhouse in the beginning was art school with a strong emphasis on crafts. There was no industrial idea and the beginning in Lima. And so but this school had to survive the same way the private school had to say, where I was working in. So they changed their location from biometric to decimal. And that's how it was supported financially supported by Yonkers was that was the company building the aeroplanes at that time. So they had an interest to to force design into the industrial direction. That's not a problem in itself. But the problem actually appeared after the Second World War. So in Germany, all the schools had been closed, and you had to find new stuff stuff, which is not how to say this, the idea was to have new stuff, which was not involved into the Nazi regime. Right. So and the Bauhaus was closed during that time, it was not exactly close by the Nazis. That's another narrative, which I don't like. But anyway, after the Second World War, every school hired actually Bauhaus students. So we had all over Germany, we had a unified idea of how to teach design. And that was a problem because there have been many developments which from you can steal from other backgrounds, which were extremely important and actually led to the Bauhaus concept. But that was actually completely erased. There was nothing of that. And so everyone believed in Bauhaus and some of the teachers were good. There were students of the Bauhaus who were not good teachers. And maybe they didn't study, more than half a year in Bauhaus, so many things like that. So but finally, in 1971, the higher education reform in Germany took place in the 1970s, started 69. And so the oldest design schools had to deliver contemporary modern programme. And those schools which were called the backwoods through the time, they had to survive and by what did they do, they copied the home programme, because that was actually the most advanced programme at that time. So they were exactly like, so please let us survive. And so the school survived. And as the old school closed 1968, there were many students teachers available. So again, Germany was flooded by our singular concept of a design teaching. And that is the big problem. So Germany has these two historical impacts, that there was no real differentiation in design,

Lefteris Heretakis: 16:29

what does it mean difference between these two systems? What is what makes them different? So what is what is the arm system different different, or the old system

Unknown: 16:42

started with the idea to bring more scientific ideas into design education, which is not a problem in itself. But it was a very well, it was an experiment, it took many people. One was a perfect experiment. And when other schools copied the programme, there was no experiment anymore. They did the former steps, you know, in education, and they didn't search or try to find new ways in the system. So that was actually the problem at my university, it was very much like that. So and it took decades to get rid of that.

Lefteris Heretakis: 17:29

Okay. Okay. So, go on, you're saying,

Unknown: 17:37

to go back to, to Bauhaus, and also film school, there always have been other schools, and very good schools, the van invoca. And abandoned castle was a brilliant school, they fed. So we had different concepts of different schools. And all these concepts were forgotten. And that was a big problem in Germany. I think it's quite different in the UK, you'll find all kinds of

Lefteris Heretakis: 18:07

what what do we need to remember from from the from what schools do we need to remember what systems do we need to remember again?

Unknown: 18:15

So after the Second World War, there was a movement, which was called the vac coons Schuler that means actually a art base crafts boom. It's different to it's difficult to translate that exactly. But there were many schools actually involved to set up in you kind of design attitudes, thinking responsibility. So the first idea of ecological responsibility was actually in this context. But after the higher education reform, it was all cut off. Okay. And the old school had not enough time, the concept of the old school for my opinion has not the time to develop because from 1953 until 1968, it was 50 years of experiment. And then it was closed. And it didn't continue that's a pity I think the concept of the potentials are fantastic. But there was was no form further development.

Lefteris Heretakis: 19:35

Okay, wonderful. So to go back to your to your path your career so you taught after the first school closed, you went to the to the to the university?

Unknown: 19:49

Yes, some years later went to university. That's true. And I was lucky to get a position at the Darmstadt university because it is the only one you Germany combining the practice of design work with the students and design theory. So normally design theory you are either philosopher or whatever. So you don't have this combination in in Germany too often. So I was very lucky because it matched very well, my, my interests. And so it was 2000 when I started them. And yes, ever since I was there, I was trying to find money to publish the history of German design education. And I was lucky, like when I was at Darmstadt, 2007. For seven years, it was the 100th anniversary of design education. in Darmstadt, because in Africa, there was the artists residence, it was a huge deal. Artists residence, and they started educating designers in 1907. So in 100/100, anniversary is always a good moment to gain money. So I went to different institutions. And finally, I found enough money to publish a book, wonderful book, which, because it's, the money was enough. And I had a very, very good assistant employed for this book. He was now my colleague and my friend, in theory, and we had a lot of fun with investigating very deeply into German design education. So it's, it took two years, actually, two years and because many pictures, we realised at a certain point, we realised that we can actually we have access to the archives in Eastern Germany, we find the files, but we don't make sense of it. Because we were not socialised in, in Eastern Germany. So we had to find someone who can really read those texts. It's German language, but you know, it is completely different. There are some, like, say, some formal political layers, which you can just take off, you don't have to read them as I was taught. And so we needed support from the eastern German side, which luckily we got. And so the finally, we could finish the book. Yes, and ever since. Well, yes, actually, for me, the historic part which was before Bauhaus, I was a designer so and for me, design education started as Bauhaus, I learned a lot from my friend and colleague that this happened earlier. And ever since I am quite not so much in design education anymore, but more general aesthetic education, that is our main focus now.

Lefteris Heretakis: 23:06

So tell us about this book is available in English.

Unknown: 23:10

Oh, unfortunately, it's not No, no, no. So, so many people would like to see it being translated into English, but it never happens.

Lefteris Heretakis: 23:19

Yeah. So, tell us some things from from your conclusions or from your research from that research?

Unknown: 23:26

Well, the first conclusion is actually there was a big variety of different concepts, it was a constant progress of searching, finding new ways there was this economy, economy impact, like what does industry want, there was aesthetic impact, there was artistic impact, it was a continuous struggle actually. And it stopped ended this it stopped actually, with the higher education reform, there was no struggling anymore. And the worst situation was actually the Bologna process that killed definitely everything. So that is my my conclusion. So I would very much like to go back.

Lefteris Heretakis: 24:15

By struggle, you mean like effort of improving what?

Unknown: 24:19

Yeah, yeah, effort of improving and struggling for the right attitude, finding people who support this attitude. And so that's, that was before actually before the Bauhaus Foundation, peoples learn that copias founded the Bauhaus, which is not true. It was a very long process of trying to develop concepts from different interests, like industry like art. So that was a long process and calculus was involved in this process. Okay. In the last half year, I think, and he was quite smart to found the Bauhaus in the very moment were born Otto baffling who was actually in charge of this development of the teaching programme, he had to go to some how to say he was sick. So he was not in the hospital but a place for recreation. I don't know the word, but

Lefteris Heretakis: 25:25

centuries, yeah, something

Unknown: 25:27

like that. And in this very moment, Coke was founded the powerless,

Lefteris Heretakis: 25:32

but you had Froy bill in Germany, right? You have you had fibre, fibre, fibre fibre with a kindergarten system?

Unknown: 25:39

I guess, yes. Oh, there were many. We had the the Reform Movement reform movement was like fibre, and many other aspects which was a very German, Swiss, Austrian thing, reform movement. It was like the new concepts of teaching children, new attitudes towards children, so not understanding children as small grownups are adults, but realise that they have their interest by their own. And so that influence influence design equation very much. In fact, there was a project in Germany, which was the next step in Hello house for the workshop Hello, hello, how. So, the founder was a furniture manufacturer. His name was Schmidt which is a very German name. And he had the idea to create a new way of living, working and manufacturing attitudes. So he built a new factory. Not too far from Grayson, in helado. He built in the, in the woods, very much related to a British garden city concept. He built for the workers, he built houses to live in the greens. He had a brilliant educational programme. So that was actually maintained. One was it, it was 1907, something like that. So it was before Bauhaus, and he had all the the most advanced educators there. Also as legal, which you might know, the summer, summer Hill School founder of course, and as Neil came to help her out before he went to Summerhill because he was attracted by this educational, advanced educational movement. He realised then that some of those teachers then handed over to conservative so he decided to go to Great Britain and found the Sunday school but actually there was one important aspect of Hello So education was very much connected to the idea of how to design environment design your life, especially in hip hop dance, so dance education was a very very big thing at that time. And also the Bauhaus had a stage class of dance class which is all lost I don't know if there are any in Britain Germany I don't find any design schools with dancing

Lefteris Heretakis: 28:36

we have performed we have we have with our performing arts, yes, performing arts we have

Unknown: 28:39

we have performing arts but they are not related to design. There's only one school

Lefteris Heretakis: 28:44

even directly collected directly.

Unknown: 28:47

So it's part of a design programme. Wow. So this doesn't

Lefteris Heretakis: 28:52

exist, dance as part of the design programme. That's fantastic. Yes, I

Unknown: 28:57

do that from time to time. So I have very special invited guests design dance teachers which from another long story and also cooking so these are the basic things for aesthetic education.

Lefteris Heretakis: 29:17

So cooking and

Unknown: 29:19

dance, the cooking and then an unintentional drawings. So that three core aspects I deal with. So the unintentional drawing is a very good method opportunity to find new really new ideas. Because when you normally in design, industrial design in Germany, it's like you start a project, for example, design something to sit on or whatever. And you start with a research investigation. It's really your research what what does exist. And that is a big problem because it The very moment where you research the past, then you focus your brain to the past. So everything you find is existing its past. So we'll never be able to really have innovative ideas. So my ideas before researching, it's actually to start drawing without any intention. It's just like, cricket, cricket. So it's like nothing. But if you have 100 of these drawings, and you put them on the floor, then you see certain themes, topics, and you change your mind to more how to say it, it is not a logic of thinking, it is not a type of thinking, I'm listening the English word for it. So Association thinking like that, okay. And so your brain starts to find new things and in abstract drawings, but you can not make sense to. And so starting from this, you can develop really surprising and innovative developments. And this actually is also very much influenced and supported by Chinese Taoist philosophy. So then in Taoism, there is this term of movie, which means acting by not acting. And this is very much because in the very moment you have a intention, then you already know where to go to. So you don't discover anything. So you're and to get rid of your intention is a very important first step. And once you have with this creative associative development, you have gained an idea which can be very abstract, then it does make sense to to research because then you know where to research is one example maybe, because it's a bit abstract. So I did this. I did a project with my students in with a company Bosch Bosch is a cost supplier company. And it was the time when the instrument clusters that were changing from hands to LCD screens. So Bosch asked us to, can you do some design because we have to present to our clients something which is happening on the screen? And so I said, Yes, it's an interesting challenge. And I have many team of 12 students, something like that, and one student to see was extreme in her attitude, and in her how to say English, this is really where it's perfect. It's perfect. Now it's not because of my German. I didn't travel for three years, but that makes it a bit difficult. Now she was she had a brilliant start, actually. So she did this unintentional drawings. And she's so many things like jelly, fish, and whatever. And she said, deep sea, deep sea, that is the key word. Actually, she had to design instrument class as well. But that is an idea, an idea is very often not related to the task you'd have to fulfil. So the idea was deep CMC started researching in terms of deep sea. So what happens? What kind of animals live there? What kind of what happens there? And she actually spent weeks and weeks and weeks and it was kind of four or five weeks before presentation. And actually, I lost my confidence at that time as a teacher, and as I tried to convince it, just to something to present, so I didn't want her to fail. And she said, No, it's a deep sea. And then she designed a brilliant concept for organising information because it was actually the idea of the instrument cluster, and the information coming from the depth. Because imagine if you're, if you're running out of gas in the beginning is not so much a problem. So but then, you know, the more the problem is, the closer the information comes. And at the end, she had three patterns on her how to organise information in a three dimensional screen. It was brilliant, and that came out from the idea of deep sea. And if you start with so Searching on instrument clusters, you would never come to a deep sea of starting. So that is the idea. That is a very good example. Sometimes it's not so powerful. But what impressed me very much is that she had the certainty. She knew exactly if there was an inner certainty that she is on the right track. And that is, if you have a strong idea, then that happens. Yeah.

Lefteris Heretakis: 35:33

So how can we go back to a pre belong? Yeah, time? So how can we force the curriculum back there?

Unknown: 35:40

So if it's outside Germany, private schools would be a good wouldn't be a good abroad. In Germany. There's, it doesn't make sense. I talk to colleagues every now and then four or five of them would very much like to draw in for new kinds of design university. But no, it would not happen. I don't think so. But Bologna, the idea to unify education is a misunderstanding in itself. So education should not be unified. Because education is something which is very much based on a spirit of an institution, or the attitude of the teaching staff. And the interest of the of the students. And this can't be unified. It's almost impossible. I, I visited Andrew and implement the red house. Have you ever been

Lefteris Heretakis: 36:44

there? Yes, yes.

Unknown: 36:46

So that was a dream for me. This happens in Great Britain, when there is the right person to persuade people to follow this idea. And I think that Plymouth concept is very close to an ideal as I understand it, but also now it's it has changed, and told me that this was kind of Yeah, it's under a new administration now. And it's very formal and not this aesthetic freedom, which actually was the idea before. But at least it existed for, I don't know, 10 years or whatever. And that. Yeah. So let's hope that there will be other initiatives too. But I know that sorry. And I know that Andrew was struggling, so it was all negotiating with the ministry. And so it was kind of Yeah. It's good that he did it. But I think it's annoying. Always have to try to convince people.

Lefteris Heretakis: 38:01

So what after you finish the book? Did you start to embark on any other ambitious project?

Unknown: 38:08

Oh, yes. So I actually, I was a trained designer, I didn't know how to write books. It was my friend Kai, who was my my assistant at that time. And so but ever since I was very, I became interested in publishing, and trying to get deeper into aesthetic education terms. And so year after year, I have just, the latest one is actually on digitization and the problem of digitization, which is, yeah, it's very comprehensive, actually, from different sides and kind. And we wrote about the aesthetic experience in designing. So that is the main focus in the moment. So I'm not so much interested anymore in, in design practice. So I do it from time to time when, when I meet some special challenges. For example, if a few years ago, I was asked to run a project of it was under the idea that the UNESCO programme of education for sustainable development. So there's a worldwide programme of the UNESCO and there was a project in China, which friends of mine who are doing, they create playgrounds for children and nature experience parks and things like that. And they won. So they actually they were successful in getting this thing, the project, and then they realised that they, they can't manage it because they had no experience with it. And then they asked me if I could actually if I could run the project in China and the boss of the company of this playground company was one of the students of the private school I mentioned before. So his so he was one of the students them. And then we we developed this playground or a nature experience path and on a small island in the South of Beijing 300 kilometres south of Beijing, the island was for stood for pupil students only. So they had, they were able to explore nature. Directly. And for the tourists, there was a elevated path through the nature with a certain aesthetic had to say impact situations where the colour is changing, or you start hearing the nature, but they had to be very quickly to, to run through the island. And I just recently, that was with a Swiss landscape architect, and recently, I was kind of in a nostalgic mood, and I Googled China's view from top, and I realised that actually Ireland is looking different now. So it looks exactly the way like we designed it. But unfortunately, it is opened, will be opened, like in the next weeks, but I can't move to China, which is a pity. So that was something I thought that's a that's a funny challenge to run a project like that, China. So whenever it's kind of, there's more than just business in it, and I'm interested in doing it.

Lefteris Heretakis: 42:00

So, how can we help students today with with employability or the transition of forming a student to be successfully employed?

Unknown: 42:11

I think so, number one is training them to gain ideas. So, as I mentioned before with a deep sleep, so, ideas are always needed every job if you have ideas, you are on the right side, the other is to to educate a critical attitude towards economics, which is extremely important, because we live that sort of problems which we face now. climate crisis and whatever is a economic problem, it is not a design problem. And what I big problem I see is that we are running into attitude of solution ism, as most of calls it. So we think that we can solve every problem. And designers are very good in that actually industrial designers so they create some kind of lamps which can be recycled and things like that. But that is not the problem. The problem is that people, it's the capitalist profit idea, which is a big problem, and it will cause more and more province and we will not be able to solve the climate crisis, we will not be able as long as we do not find another negative attitude in terms of economic business. So I think that is extremely important to educate students in the in economics, in ideas. And in well, it's something which is like kind of safe to say certain that they have confidence. So that is I think that that is central confidence in what you're able to do. And that you are not only someone who adds a little bit of beauty to daily life, but that this beauty is essential. Beauty is really essential. So it took be maybe sexy six or seven years to establish the word beauty at our university, because no one was talking about beauty that we're talking about function and responsibility and things like that. But no one talks about beauty and beauty is our core competence. And it is extremely important. Not only in a decorated way, but in a beauty as a perfect match of different layers of problem of a product of whatever. And so if this harmony occurs, so it's like with a cooking, if you reach the point that everything is surely interacting, each taste is interacting with another one and the temperature is perfect, and the one goes good with it, and so on, then you have this moment of beauty. And how could we live without beauty, it's almost impossible. And this, the idea of beauty was, indeed, very strong in the European city movement. And in the early Bauhaus, and it changed the design change to functionalism only due to where the money came from. And so on the aeroplane manufacturer Yonkers wanted the more technical approach. And so the beauty ever since it's kind of, I don't know, it's better in Great Britain. But in Germany, beauty is something which you don't talk about in design, education. And that another difference or that another problem, which came with the own school concept is that we lost our our relation to crafts in Germany, we don't have really arts and crafts. It's a very poor level. You don't find arts and crafts in the museum's we have special museums, like in Frankfurt, we have museums like that. But situation, like I face it from time to time in the UK, is that you have art exhibition, and there are crafts examples as well in the exhibition, which is a perfect thing. So I think that that would be something to bring into design education, definitely crafts should be part of design education. But the development is exactly opposite. It is bringing digital technology into schools, which is even bigger problem, because I don't know what is lacking in other places in Europe, because I'm not so informed now. But our school system in Germany is actually lacking any aesthetic quality. It's only technological. Emphasis is engineering. But there's no music, no crafts, no art. And what they teach students in school in art is ridiculous. So they draw actually from photos. So and then they come to university. And we realise Okay, so what shall we do if there has nothing, nothing to do? And so our idea now is that we, we established a private programme, but a semi private programme is run by the University in our department. But the students have to pay for it. And they from school, they get an intense intensive aesthetic art, education, like a foundation course with a very pre Foundation, because when they enter the university, they get an foundation, but that is necessary, because there's such a gap from school education to hire designer to Kashi, which has to be breached by some institutions.

Lefteris Heretakis: 49:04

Absolutely. So you've you've kind of answered the next question, but you know, I'll ask it anyway. Even if there was no limitation, you know, what would you do differently? What would you change? If there was you could do anything at all, including going people along? Yeah.

Unknown: 49:24

Yes, actually, I would. That's, that's a tree. I would get rid of any formal modules of teaching, because teaching is a it's a it's a process of how to say it is a process of continuous change. It is very much also Dallas that you have the continuous change. So modules sort of fixed like this is Design History doesn't make sense at all. And so that would be the first step. The next step is actually to find the right people to get involved in it. Because I, in my some of my friends are brilliant teachers, and they would not dare to teach, they wouldn't do it. Because they hate universities. They hate teaching. Anyway, but they are brilliant teachers, by her by their attitude, and to have kind of space or situation that those people can interact with students, which is not called teaching. But something comparable. So by actually, I would not. I would like to go before Bologna, that's right. Yes. But I would actually go back to the Black Mountain College. So that's where I would like to

Lefteris Heretakis: 51:09

restart it. They're just after about half them? Yes. Yes.

Unknown: 51:12

No, as well. It was yes. 1935 until the 60s. And the because then, we had read the musicians, we had the engineers, we had signed scientists. That was a perfect concept of an idea school. Yeah. But I that that was the time that the spirit was the right spirit. And people just went there. And it was enough to be at the cloud Black Mountain. Yes, so that's in a historic view. It's the ideal design school, maybe the Plymouth School of artists a bit like that, especially the red house, that sort of children's education is brilliant.

Lefteris Heretakis: 52:06

So how can our viewers and listeners find you?

Unknown: 52:10

Oh, as I said, I am very critical about digitization. So I don't have any, any website, I don't have anything, I'm not in social media, and so on. So it's a bit different, a difficult to find me. So the best is an email. I'm very good in emailing. Okay. I would very appreciate to have people in the same spirit and attitude that we can maybe set up a network on aesthetic education, that would be

Lefteris Heretakis: 52:44

great. So would you like me to share the email?

Unknown: 52:47

Yes, you can share the email, and I'm very much ever since. So when I met Andrew the last time I invited him for anniversary of craft Association in German because of this problem. I mentioned that crafts are so underrepresented and gave a good contribution to this discussion. And so ever since I was I was thinking at least LinkedIn should be something. Maybe I get more involved in

Lefteris Heretakis: 53:23

it, that's a very good idea.

Unknown: 53:25

Okay, so yeah.

Lefteris Heretakis: 53:27

So what advice would you like to leave us with?

Unknown: 53:34

How to say, the English word distance, don't don't lose your your current insurer. So, even if everything is like bologna is a big stupidity, there will be other times there will be a time with is to pit attitude will not be the dominant one. So there are very that they are in fact developments, which I appreciate very much the new European Bauhaus. Have you heard about that? Yes, of course. So that is one thing that I said, Oh, wow. They're talking about beauty. They're talking about aesthetics. And my university now it's a technical university is involved in a eu t plus programme. It's eight European universities, and these eight universities. And in the long term, they want to merge to one university. And so dumbstruck university would only be one campus of this big university. And within this process of merging eight universities, there is one field where I'm involved in is called aesthetical. It's bringing aesthetic education into engineering education. And we are working on this So every university has kind of a group working on it. And it's very formal. It is very weak in the moment, but still it is. It's a good beginning. Yes.

Lefteris Heretakis: 55:17

Sounds very positive

Unknown: 55:19

out of that.

Lefteris Heretakis: 55:21

Well, thank you ever so much for an amazing conversation. And looking forward to connecting with you again. There's also design Education Forum. Yeah. That's gonna be happening in November. So again, I'd like to invite you to that and we can.

Unknown: 55:46

So that forum will be in presence, or will it be forum

Lefteris Heretakis: 55:50

is right now, but right now, it's virtual again, but we'll have more information by July I think, you know, regardless of anything is going to happen.

Unknown: 56:00

Okay, but I'll take part.

Lefteris Heretakis: 56:03

Thank you so much.

Unknown: 56:05

Thank you for you. And thank you for the great talks you establish, and good success. Thanks.