Nomadic Design Emma Bowen Mobility and Territory, March 19, 2013
Nomad camp near Tan Tan, South Morocco. Harry Gruyaert, 1986 for Magnum Photos.
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Oxford Dictionary�s Definition of Nomad: nomad Syllabification: (no·mad) Pronunciation: /ˈnōˌmad/ noun a member of a people having no permanent abode, and who travel from place to place to find fresh pasture for their livestock. a person who does not stay long in the same place; a wanderer. Origin: late 16th century: from French nomade, via Latin from Greek nomas, nomad - 'roaming in search of pasture', from the base of nemein 'to pasture�
Nomadic Design (Fall 2013) Students� Definition of Nomad: nomad Syllabification: (no·mad) Pronunciation: /ˈnōˌmad/ noun a member of a community of adapters.
Nomadic Design – Introduction
Constant movement in space hones the senses differently. The unique sensibility is also the end product
of a life of constant and complete integration with the landscape: the nomadic tradition embraces a different
sensibility about the natural environment than that found in the Western sedentary tradition. The extent of human life is not to oppose and endeavor to control nature, but
rather to maintain a dialogue with the natural environment in order to find union with it; only by doing
so can the nomad survive. !
- Labelle Prussin, African Nomadic Architecture
Nomadic Design – Introduction
[Home]…is a world in which a person can create a material environment that embodies what he or she
considers significant. In this sense the home becomes the most powerful sign of the self of the inhabitant who
dwells within.
- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and Eugene Rochberg-Halton, The Meaning of Things: Domestic Symbols and the Self
Nomadic Design – Introduction
Gypsies, 1961, Wladyslaw Slesicki Nomadic Design – Introduction
Nomadic Design – Themes and Lessons
1. Cultivating a symbiotic relationship with the environment.
The extent of human life is not to oppose and endeavor to control nature, but rather to maintain a dialogue with the natural environment in order to find union with it; only by
doing so can the nomad survive. !
"!Labelle!Prussin,"African"Nomadic"Architecture"
Nomadic Design – Themes and Lessons
2. Creating rituals steeped in human interaction within and outside of the community.
Gypsy culture is created sometimes through conflict and usually through specific exchange. In contrast to the classical paradigms, Gypsy culture emerges from culture
contact, rather than being an isolate destroyed or undermined by contact. !
"!Judith!Okely, �Deterritorialised and Spatially Unbounded Cultures within Other Regimes��"
3. Creating a material culture of bricolage.
One skirt or a blouse was often made from several pieces of material colored and patterned in different ways….We must not forget, however, that the clothing of some
Romanies did not reflect so much the countries they passed through as rather poverty, which was their permanent traveling companion.
!
- Jana Horváthová, Devleskere Čhave: Svedectvom Starých Pohl�adníc
Nomadic Design – Themes and Lessons
Vincent Van Gogh, Detail of Gypsy
Camp, 1888. Oil on canvas. Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Martin Marencin for The New York Times,
April 2, 2010 Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Aaron Huey for National Geographic, http://
www.aaronhuey.com/#/national-geographic-magazine---pine-ridge/
PINERIDGE_1200p_114
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Scene from The Long, Long Trailer, 1953
Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Space is a fundamental category for any form of power.
- Anselm Franke (2003) �Territories� in Territories: Islands, Camps and other States of Utopia
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Quinn Norton, 2011 for Wired. Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other� Kevin Hagen, 2011
For New York Daily News.
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other� (or, On Nomadism and Capitalism)
Michel Foucault Edward Said Labelle Prussin
Nomadic Design – Nomadism as �Other�
Nomadic Design – Appropriation as Control or Flattery?
Nomadic Design – Subverting Control through Design
Tokyo Blues: Settlement (Park)
III, Nurri Kim Nomadic Design – Subverting Control through Design
Nomadic Design – As Our Present and Future
XS House, Tumbleweed Tiny
Houses
Nomadic Design – As Our Present and Future
�Tahrir�s Summer Canopy� in
Egypt Reports, Sharif Abdel Kouddous,
July 10, 2011
Nomadic Design – As Our Present and Future
"Now that our smartphones and tablets and pocketbooks have made us wireless and have set us free we are able to work everywhere and anytime we want; sitting down in a café, laying still in bed, walking in the fields, doing shopping, in flight and in waiting or at the kitchen table to search for some recipes at the same time. As a result we no longer need a desk or an office and are able to completely reinvent our existence and timetables….We are free to roam and wander... under this influence we will again become nomadic and are without knowing it going back to the beginning of mankind….The prognosis is that our species will in fact become super nomads with our world as their field of action….�
175 million people on the planet living in more or less voluntary exile; about 10 million more every year; professional nomadism increasingly commonplace; unprecedented circulation of goods and services; the formation of transnational political entities—
couldn�t this novel situation give rise to a new way of conceptualizing cultural identity?
For contemporary creators are already laying the foundations for a radicant art—radicant being a term designating an organism that grows its roots and adds new ones as it advances. To be radicant
means setting one�s roots in motion, staging them in heterogeneous contexts and formats, denying them the power to completely define one�s identity, translating ideas, transcoding
images, transplanting behaviors, exchanging rather than imposing.
- Nicolas Bourriaud, The Radicant
Nomadic Design – As Our Present and Future
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