The 5th Istanbul Design Biennial’s Book “Empathy Revisited: Designs for More Than One” Published

Book – Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one. Image courtesy of İKSV.

Istanbul Design Biennial
https://tasarimbienali.iksv.org/en

Organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV), sponsored by VitrA and supported by the Republic of Turkey Ministry of Culture and Tourism and ‘higher contributing corporation’ Borsa Istanbul, the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial’s book Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one is published.

Can design elicit new forms of sociability between humans and other species? What role does design play in building a resilience alternative to the global industrial model now in crisis? How can each of us create pathways for a more sustainable tomorrow? The 5th Istanbul Design Biennial’s curators, Mariana Pestana, Sumitra Upham, Billie Muraben and participants are looking for the answers to these questions in the book titled Empathy revisited: Designs for more than one. The publication also contains detailed information about the biennial works from the programmes Library of Land and Sea, Critical Cooking Show, New Civic Rituals, Empathy Sessions and satellite projects spanning across the city.

Developed alongside an urgent climate crisis and a global state of social deprivation brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic and published in collaboration with Onomatopee, this book brings together ideas and projects that seek to define a new role for design based on empathy. As a mediator of emotions and feelings, design is presented here as a practice that takes care as its main purpose. Designers adopt sensitive, diplomatic, sometimes therapeutic functions, with the aim of connecting us with one another but also with the world around us, with other species, with soil, water and even the universe. In this book, the reader will find new ideas, utopian propositions but also practical solutions for reinterpreting and reconnecting with the world around them. Taking food as a key medium of encounter, both between people and also with the more than human world, the designers featured in this book consciously operate in a multi-scalar realm – from the invisible microbial life that lives in our gut to the vast landscapes transformed by agricultural practices. Designs for more than one are those that take into consideration not just their immediate user or client but the many constituents inevitably impacted by any new object or action.

You may find more information and purchase the book through magaza.iksv.org or onomatopee.net

Book title: Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one
Prepared for publication by: Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV)
Editors: Mariana Pestana, Sumitra Upham, Billie Muraben
Co-publisher: Onomatopee
Pages: 408
ISBN: 978-94-93148-59-8
Price: € 24

The biennial book, Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one, will be launched at the space of the co-publisher Onomatopee in Eindhoven, on Monday, 18 October, along with a lecture and talk on the suggestion for a design based on empathy with the participation of curators and designers involved in the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial.

Moderator: Deniz Ova
Speakers: Mariana Pestana, Maria João Macedo (Macedo Cannatà), Martina Muzi, Studio Ossidiana

18 October 2021, 16.00-18.00
@Onomatopee Exhibition Space, Bookshop and Office
Lucas Gasselstraat 2a, 5613 LB Eindhoven, The Netherlands