hello I’m happy all brought your bodies
here today maybe you came by by King on
your bike or you were sitting in a bus
maybe you came by foot I don’t know
you’re sitting here and you’re able to
access the information that we’re giving
out based on your sensorial inputs based
on your own experience this is also how
you through your bodies see the world
from your point of view to me this is
fascinating which is why sometimes I do
judging by your reaction to these photos
we already know a very important thing
you all have a skill the skill to also
read bodies this is not something which
is new throughout history will have this
since ages and we’re easily
we’re easily seeing characteristics and
science immediately we can even read
abstracted symbol language which is
indicating certain actions for us to
take however I would like to argue that
we need to learn to read bodies and
understand bodies to much larger extent
than we’re doing at the moment why I
have two examples the first one is
related to facial recognition Google has
this arts and culture program with which
it wants to invite people to take more
better part of arts and culture
literally they’re opening up like very
zoomed in views on paintings they’re
opening up for like a Google Streetview
kind of tour that you can take through
museums all good so far as an in-app
service they also have this doppelganger
thing that came out in early like maybe
you saw it coming out in 2018 where you
could file a picture of yourself or of a
friend and you will get your art
doppelganger literally which is super
nice
the only thing is for some people of
color
this proved to be kind of restrictive
and options were very few and also
sometimes painfully stereotypical this
is partially due to sort of the biased
art history that Google has framed this
in but also may be due to biased coding
it’s also known that facial recognition
technology which is used of law
enforcement in the America in the United
States it’s also very inaccurate
especially when it comes to people of
color I would say that coders and
engineers out there have a lot of
knowledge gap to kind of bridge when it
comes to how they’re developing these
technologies my second example is
there was a startup company that wanted
to develop a wearable technology that
could indicate early stages of a heart
disease this technology was supposed to
with this you could treat the symptoms
and you would you wouldn’t have people
getting heart failure which is great and
amazing they were doing their tests
testing on male test subjects and you
can see you clearly in depression in a
very clear sudden pressure drop in this
graph here the thing is this applies to
men and old women for young women the
graph looks like this something that the
technology would not have been able to
pick up it would literally have been
blind to this kind of indication and the
symptoms would not have been treated
this could have had lethal consequences
for this particular technological
developments so again here we see that
research needs to have a better
understanding of what kind of bodies we
have which kind of sex they have and
maybe also how old they are but why am i
interested in this you already know that
I’m a designer a kind of cultural person
well I work as a designer that’s true
I teach design methodology at the Design
Academy here in Eindhoven and I also
work as the coordinator of the queer in
the collection at the fun Abba museum I
believe that we need to understand
bodies to much larger extent we
is why I would like to introduce a new
term to you that I have recently come
across the term corporate literacy is
divided into two parts
corpo which is the body the main mass of
a certain structure and literacy which
is our ability to read but also our
ability to write so with this term I
hope that we can get a bit more
understanding of not only our abilities
to understand bodies but also take a
step back and reflect on that reading
I’ll give you an example of how this
could how this could play out so I’m
here as an example that’s the first one
what do you think of when you see me
maybe am i ii am i twenty thirty forty
already yeah where does my what does my
north european or Germany perhaps maybe
Canadian what does my haircut lü about
me a lot of different things so I have a
body and these are maybe some of the
characteristics that you might use when
you’re trying to construct your image of
me but you also have bodies you also
choose to decorate your bodies with
certain elements that you want to put
forth that’s sort of a presentation of
you you do this for others in order to
communicate but you also do it to
communicate towards yourself right next
to that we also have things that we
haven’t chosen like where we come from
who we fall in love with how old we are
and what we’re able to do with our
bodies and minds but we also have a
certain way to act for what we believe
in and what we what we would like the
world to become like our position in the
world at the same time that world might
hinder us it might influence us in our
let me give you I want to give an
example of this kind of reading in a bit
more of a formal setting so what do you
see when
see this particular picture femininity
beauty seduction maybe richness I’m
choosing a fashion image because it has
a very high density of information in
fashion you often see that they want to
portray us in a very specific way so the
codes that we’re seeing here are very
specific and what do you see when you
read this body even though my
choreographer was doing an amazing job
guiding me sue in total over 400
different poses like this some of the
CREM questions
arised is my body which is performing
the same posture conveying the same
message how much does the scenography
and the context plane and how you read
this image and also it’s a male body
able to perform female beauty standards
I can understand if most of you maybe
aren’t interested in becoming a Volk
model is that because you haven’t
considered it a part of your ability to
act so by not reflecting on this we
might set the boundaries for ourselves
as well as for other people I think it
would be nice to have a place where we
could practice this which is why I would
like to tell you a bit more about an
institution that I work in so now we go
from my personal work as a designer into
how this can be applied into an
institute or into an institution the
phone app Museum here in Eindhoven has a
great collection of modern artworks but
instead of showing it from an art
historic context the museum has chosen
to see the visitor of the museum as a
user and therefore the way that we
select our
works to put on display is being based
on societal relevance in this way the
museum can become a kind of social power
plants where ideas can be exchanged and
where we can have debates about societal
topics the museum also wants to be able
to welcome all kinds of bodies into the
museum to have these kind of debates
people with non normative sexualities
people with different abilities the
young the old my role there is to be the
coordinator of the queer in the
collection program with which we’re
inviting the LGBTQ community in
eindhoven for a long term relationship
in order for them to be able to critique
how we display artworks but also to
critique other museum processes which
might be more institutional or might go
go around in the background this is done
through the queer book club we do it
through workshops and partly through a
tool that was launched in 2016 which is
called querying the collection so any
visitor or user that comes to the museum
is able to wear this set of garments
with queer information printed on top of
them or queer critiques of certain
artworks this is designed by myself and
by Alicia veneer who’s a sociologist and
this became a tool that visitors could
use when they were browse around the
collection and being then suddenly
informed about topics of power dynamics
axalta fication or other things that
might relate to this queer term one
example would be how it changed the
story around this particular painting
the story goes as follows
as we can see john brascia man and his
brother is swimming around in the under
left canal in central Brussels this is a
memory from him of course there is no
tension there’s no like homoerotic
tension there is no display of public
nudity this is just a memory of Bruce
Simmons right the chimney in the
background has no connotations to any
phallic shape whatsoever
and there is no tension between the
spectators and the bathers it’s also
highly unlikely that museums would be
places of display of pornography
nenenene
no no no it never happened that museums
would be places that Victorian men would
go to in order to see maybe ethnographic
pictures Roman nude sculptures Greek
vases with male naked figures painted on
them and be able to indulge in
homoerotic feelings in a socially
acceptable way could never have happened
right so by by printing this kind of
ironic critique of the museum story onto
a garment that people can become aware
of we can suddenly have a discussion
about what sexual orientation is based
on an artwork that initially didn’t have
it in it this is one way in which the
forum museum is engaging in this
corporate literate approach another
approach is the special guest program
where the museum is developing very
strong lines of knowledge production and
learning together with people with
different abilities in order to create a
multi-sensorial approach to art which is
not positioning the visual sensory input
as the main one which very often happens
inside white cubes the museum is able to
welcome not only people with ability
variations but this also becomes visible
to larger amount of visitors so by
coming to this museum at the moment you
get an understanding of how someone else
sees a particular artwork but to the
extent of that also how they might
reflect on society or what might
constitute society by developing this
kind of knowledge the museum is showing
this like how these different
characteristics that might make up a
person is very is highly relevant this
could be age gender sexuality level of
physical ability ethnicity and class but
this is already happening to some extent
like the discussions are taking place
and change is also ongoing as we’ve seen
today I would just like to imagine what
will happen if
our cultural institutions more education
maybe more businesses would open up for
a corporal it with methodologies perhaps
you would develop new patents new
medical tools new designs that would be
available for more diverse users maybe
engineers would be able to develop
technology that was more appropriate or
save lives even and clearly policies
around hiring or policies around like
what is constituted as knowledge within
a certain business would also change if
you would have this corporate literate
understanding so instead of seeing this
as ways to put people in boxes and
boundaries I would like to stress that
it’s important that we’re open for this
corporate literate acceptance and that
we can play with it this is a way to go
beyond characteristics I think that we
would be more open have a more open
understanding of what the body is and I
also think that you should try to apply
it in your businesses in your
institutions maybe also in your class
try to see what this body reading
approach could give you and I’m sure
that you and your bodies will be more
than amazing
thank you [Applause]
here today maybe you came by by King on
your bike or you were sitting in a bus
maybe you came by foot I don’t know
you’re sitting here and you’re able to
access the information that we’re giving
out based on your sensorial inputs based
on your own experience this is also how
you through your bodies see the world
from your point of view to me this is
fascinating which is why sometimes I do
judging by your reaction to these photos
we already know a very important thing
you all have a skill the skill to also
read bodies this is not something which
is new throughout history will have this
since ages and we’re easily
we’re easily seeing characteristics and
science immediately we can even read
abstracted symbol language which is
indicating certain actions for us to
take however I would like to argue that
we need to learn to read bodies and
understand bodies to much larger extent
than we’re doing at the moment why I
have two examples the first one is
related to facial recognition Google has
this arts and culture program with which
it wants to invite people to take more
better part of arts and culture
literally they’re opening up like very
zoomed in views on paintings they’re
opening up for like a Google Streetview
kind of tour that you can take through
museums all good so far as an in-app
service they also have this doppelganger
thing that came out in early like maybe
you saw it coming out in 2018 where you
could file a picture of yourself or of a
friend and you will get your art
doppelganger literally which is super
nice
the only thing is for some people of
color
this proved to be kind of restrictive
and options were very few and also
sometimes painfully stereotypical this
is partially due to sort of the biased
art history that Google has framed this
in but also may be due to biased coding
it’s also known that facial recognition
technology which is used of law
enforcement in the America in the United
States it’s also very inaccurate
especially when it comes to people of
color I would say that coders and
engineers out there have a lot of
knowledge gap to kind of bridge when it
comes to how they’re developing these
technologies my second example is
there was a startup company that wanted
to develop a wearable technology that
could indicate early stages of a heart
disease this technology was supposed to
with this you could treat the symptoms
and you would you wouldn’t have people
getting heart failure which is great and
amazing they were doing their tests
testing on male test subjects and you
can see you clearly in depression in a
very clear sudden pressure drop in this
graph here the thing is this applies to
men and old women for young women the
graph looks like this something that the
technology would not have been able to
pick up it would literally have been
blind to this kind of indication and the
symptoms would not have been treated
this could have had lethal consequences
for this particular technological
developments so again here we see that
research needs to have a better
understanding of what kind of bodies we
have which kind of sex they have and
maybe also how old they are but why am i
interested in this you already know that
I’m a designer a kind of cultural person
well I work as a designer that’s true
I teach design methodology at the Design
Academy here in Eindhoven and I also
work as the coordinator of the queer in
the collection at the fun Abba museum I
believe that we need to understand
bodies to much larger extent we
is why I would like to introduce a new
term to you that I have recently come
across the term corporate literacy is
divided into two parts
corpo which is the body the main mass of
a certain structure and literacy which
is our ability to read but also our
ability to write so with this term I
hope that we can get a bit more
understanding of not only our abilities
to understand bodies but also take a
step back and reflect on that reading
I’ll give you an example of how this
could how this could play out so I’m
here as an example that’s the first one
what do you think of when you see me
maybe am i ii am i twenty thirty forty
already yeah where does my what does my
north european or Germany perhaps maybe
Canadian what does my haircut lü about
me a lot of different things so I have a
body and these are maybe some of the
characteristics that you might use when
you’re trying to construct your image of
me but you also have bodies you also
choose to decorate your bodies with
certain elements that you want to put
forth that’s sort of a presentation of
you you do this for others in order to
communicate but you also do it to
communicate towards yourself right next
to that we also have things that we
haven’t chosen like where we come from
who we fall in love with how old we are
and what we’re able to do with our
bodies and minds but we also have a
certain way to act for what we believe
in and what we what we would like the
world to become like our position in the
world at the same time that world might
hinder us it might influence us in our
let me give you I want to give an
example of this kind of reading in a bit
more of a formal setting so what do you
see when
see this particular picture femininity
beauty seduction maybe richness I’m
choosing a fashion image because it has
a very high density of information in
fashion you often see that they want to
portray us in a very specific way so the
codes that we’re seeing here are very
specific and what do you see when you
read this body even though my
choreographer was doing an amazing job
guiding me sue in total over 400
different poses like this some of the
CREM questions
arised is my body which is performing
the same posture conveying the same
message how much does the scenography
and the context plane and how you read
this image and also it’s a male body
able to perform female beauty standards
I can understand if most of you maybe
aren’t interested in becoming a Volk
model is that because you haven’t
considered it a part of your ability to
act so by not reflecting on this we
might set the boundaries for ourselves
as well as for other people I think it
would be nice to have a place where we
could practice this which is why I would
like to tell you a bit more about an
institution that I work in so now we go
from my personal work as a designer into
how this can be applied into an
institute or into an institution the
phone app Museum here in Eindhoven has a
great collection of modern artworks but
instead of showing it from an art
historic context the museum has chosen
to see the visitor of the museum as a
user and therefore the way that we
select our
works to put on display is being based
on societal relevance in this way the
museum can become a kind of social power
plants where ideas can be exchanged and
where we can have debates about societal
topics the museum also wants to be able
to welcome all kinds of bodies into the
museum to have these kind of debates
people with non normative sexualities
people with different abilities the
young the old my role there is to be the
coordinator of the queer in the
collection program with which we’re
inviting the LGBTQ community in
eindhoven for a long term relationship
in order for them to be able to critique
how we display artworks but also to
critique other museum processes which
might be more institutional or might go
go around in the background this is done
through the queer book club we do it
through workshops and partly through a
tool that was launched in 2016 which is
called querying the collection so any
visitor or user that comes to the museum
is able to wear this set of garments
with queer information printed on top of
them or queer critiques of certain
artworks this is designed by myself and
by Alicia veneer who’s a sociologist and
this became a tool that visitors could
use when they were browse around the
collection and being then suddenly
informed about topics of power dynamics
axalta fication or other things that
might relate to this queer term one
example would be how it changed the
story around this particular painting
the story goes as follows
as we can see john brascia man and his
brother is swimming around in the under
left canal in central Brussels this is a
memory from him of course there is no
tension there’s no like homoerotic
tension there is no display of public
nudity this is just a memory of Bruce
Simmons right the chimney in the
background has no connotations to any
phallic shape whatsoever
and there is no tension between the
spectators and the bathers it’s also
highly unlikely that museums would be
places of display of pornography
nenenene
no no no it never happened that museums
would be places that Victorian men would
go to in order to see maybe ethnographic
pictures Roman nude sculptures Greek
vases with male naked figures painted on
them and be able to indulge in
homoerotic feelings in a socially
acceptable way could never have happened
right so by by printing this kind of
ironic critique of the museum story onto
a garment that people can become aware
of we can suddenly have a discussion
about what sexual orientation is based
on an artwork that initially didn’t have
it in it this is one way in which the
forum museum is engaging in this
corporate literate approach another
approach is the special guest program
where the museum is developing very
strong lines of knowledge production and
learning together with people with
different abilities in order to create a
multi-sensorial approach to art which is
not positioning the visual sensory input
as the main one which very often happens
inside white cubes the museum is able to
welcome not only people with ability
variations but this also becomes visible
to larger amount of visitors so by
coming to this museum at the moment you
get an understanding of how someone else
sees a particular artwork but to the
extent of that also how they might
reflect on society or what might
constitute society by developing this
kind of knowledge the museum is showing
this like how these different
characteristics that might make up a
person is very is highly relevant this
could be age gender sexuality level of
physical ability ethnicity and class but
this is already happening to some extent
like the discussions are taking place
and change is also ongoing as we’ve seen
today I would just like to imagine what
will happen if
our cultural institutions more education
maybe more businesses would open up for
a corporal it with methodologies perhaps
you would develop new patents new
medical tools new designs that would be
available for more diverse users maybe
engineers would be able to develop
technology that was more appropriate or
save lives even and clearly policies
around hiring or policies around like
what is constituted as knowledge within
a certain business would also change if
you would have this corporate literate
understanding so instead of seeing this
as ways to put people in boxes and
boundaries I would like to stress that
it’s important that we’re open for this
corporate literate acceptance and that
we can play with it this is a way to go
beyond characteristics I think that we
would be more open have a more open
understanding of what the body is and I
also think that you should try to apply
it in your businesses in your
institutions maybe also in your class
try to see what this body reading
approach could give you and I’m sure
that you and your bodies will be more
than amazing
thank you [Applause]
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