Design ecologies: sustaining ethno-cultural significance of products through urban ecologies of creative practice

Stuart Walker,Martyn Evans,Louise Mullagh,Yanzhong Wang

doi:10.1186/s41257-019-0025-7

Abstract

This paper presents an account of field research and its findings from an international knowledge exchange project entitled Design Ecologies: Sustaining ethno-cultural significance of products through urban ecologies of creative practice, jointly funded by the UK’s Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), Beijing. The contribution of this paper is to effectively communicate the processes, mechanisms and benefits of an academic knowledge exchange programme. In this case, six exchange visits were carried out, three to China by the British team and three to the UK by the Chinese team. These visits offered opportunities for both teams to gain insights into a variety of heritage sites and craft practices, as well as to the wider policy landscapes in each country. We found that the use of certain terms, like ‘creative industries’, to refer to traditional craft practices and other heritage related activities can be problematic as they tend to emphasise their instrumental rather than their intrinsic value. The Chinese team found the importance and significance of volunteers within the UK’s cultural heritage landscape to be very different from that of China, which does not have a history of volunteering. On the other hand, China supports its Intangible Cultural Heritage through adoption of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, hereafter referred to as the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) programme or UNESCO convention (UNESCO 2019b; Cominelli and Greffe 2012); in contrast, the UK has not ratified the UNESCO convention. The China team commented on the UK’s approach to heritage that keeps a sense of ‘living’ heritage, e.g. The English Lake District is a UNESCO World Heritage Centre in which people still live and work. In China, such areas are often depopulated to preserve the heritage and focus on tourism. The British team identified opportunities for design contributions in the visualisation of interrelated and interdependent “ecosystems” of design and production, as observed in Jingdezhen Ceramics Factory. Also, at Taoxichuan Creative Zone design was already being used effectively for the design of artefacts, points of sale, branding and packaging. There is much potential for this to be explored and developed further with different case studies in the UK and China. A shared understanding was developed from the knowledge exchange visits and visit reports created by each of the respective teams. These led to a set of conclusions, insights and themes. Finally, this project has already paved the way for a further Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) research project entitled Located Making, in collaboration with the Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology and Ningxia University.

Highlights

In recent decades, government policies and corporate directions have leaned towards international cooperation and economic globalisation in the West, especially the US and Europe, and in China (Baldwin, 2019, pps.3–4; World Bank, 2008)
From the visits to the UK and China, the research team identified themes that emerged from the interviews and observations made, the most pertinent of which are detailed below (Fig. 17 Design Ecologies Research Team, London July 2018)
Insights gleaned from the UK and Chinese teams have highlighted key differences in approaches to heritage in the UK and China that might be categorised as predominantly ‘bottom up’ in the UK and ‘top down’ in China

Summary

Introduction

Government policies and corporate directions have leaned towards international cooperation and economic globalisation in the West, especially the US and Europe, and in China (Baldwin, 2019, pps.3–4; World Bank, 2008). For the Chinese delegation, their first UK visit was to significant heritage sites of the British Industrial Revolution around Manchester and Liverpool, both of which experienced rapid urban development in the nineteenth century. Visits: Shougang Creative Industries Park, Beijing Enamel Factory Co.; 798 Creative Industries Zone In China, the UK team visited sites of making-practices and related cultural significance, including museums, art galleries, maker collectives, and government-sponsored heritage sites in Shanghai, Hangzhou and Jingdezhen, and in Beijing.

Results

Conclusion