By Cassandra Pizzey /asdf 07-07-2011

The entire building on the Prinsessegracht in The Hague - where the Royal Academy of Arts (KABK) is situated - has been taken over by some 300 graduate students for a week to showcase their work.

Various disciplines each have their own area and vary from fine art to textiles and fashion, interactive media and design to type and graphic design.  

Upstairs, the Interior Design and Furniture Design students have occupied a number of vast class rooms to display their work. Amongst them Renate Nederpel’s Foster Family; an array of ‘leftover’ china , brought together to form a collection of orphans. Nederpel combines the china with knitted fabric which forms a second skin and aims to preserve the history that lies within these old discarded objects.

A more colourful take on furniture design is presented by Rutger de Regt, whose Happy Misfits are made using balloons, polystyrene balls and adjustable straps. Taking his inspiration from body builders, De Regt seeks ways of manipulating materials to create new shapes and forms, allowing the objects to adapt to the human body and surrounding architecture.

Surprisingly, over at Graphic Design there was hardly a poster nor illustration to be seen (aside from the theses that is). Rather, the KABK graduates are proving graphic design is much more than printed matter and packaging design, or as graduate Jing Foon Yu explains: “For me graphic design is communicating what you or the client wants to say and choosing the medium which is best suited to achieve your goal.”

Augmented reality (Laura Elprama) stands side-by-side with typographic fashion (Rob Mientjes) and old crocheting techniques (Joan An Beaudoin), yet each is labelled Graphic Design.

In addition to the three-dimensional interpretations, Pavla Nesverova’s beautiful installation named Form Follows Music creates a visual language for expressing the feeling of organ music. The interactive computer animation seems to capture the essence of the music in a form that subtly changes shape, size and even colour.

Back to Jing Foon Yu who is tackling a growing social problem within the Dutch culture in a witty and fun way with her project named Nooit Meer Alleen Eten (Never Eat Alone Again). She explains: “During my research into the project I found that children and adults who often eat on their own are at risk of developing insufficient social skills.” Yu’s idea was to create a medium that would get these people socialising again: “I thought of a social networking website or using a webcam and laptop, but the DVD seemed the best option.” The idea is that people can choose a dining partner from a selection on the DVD, and have a conversation while having their dinner. “You can even cook the same meals as your virtual partner, and lay the table with identical linnen!”

For a complete overview of the graduates click here

Click on the images to enlarge

Main image: Joan An Beaudoin
Other images: 1. Renate Nederpel 2. Rutger de Regt 3. Rob Mientjes 4.-5. Jing Foon Yu 6. Pavla Nesverova

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