The What Design Can Do for Music breakout hosted by the Dutch Designers Association (BNO) on Day 1 was a variegated collection of presentations about the interrelations between music and design: how design can support music; how music can be the inspiration for design; and how the two can go together. The session was presented by Jeroen van Erp, founder and partner of design agency Fabrique and a known music fan.
By Philip de Josselin de Jong
Designer and musician Job Roggeveen, part of animation studio Job, Joris & Marieke, spoke about the buzz around Manfred the Yeti, main character in a clip for his own project ‘Happy Camper’. The clumsy Yeti from the animation collected in no time a real fan crowd.
Jeroen Disch presented backgrounds for the new, more edgy identity he made for the Amsterdam pop venue De Melkweg and Roey Tsemah presented the Whitestone platform, a hub for interactive and virtual reality experiences, that is the next step in music visualisation after the record sleeve and the video clip. The new website by Albert Buring and Paul Mulder, intended to set a new school in music, developed into a huge ‘steam punk’ music machine. Great to see and hear it for real.
The audience was also presented with a video of the making of the robots British designer Marcus Lyall devised for one of the shows of The Chemical Brothers. In his talk on the main stage on Day 2 Lyall showed the end result.
Old music, new technique
‘Wolfgang’ is an app that supports the experience of classical music, developed by Fabrique. Matthijs Klinkert talked about new ways to accompany old music with additional information to enhance the appreciation, but also about the resistance such a development encounters. Lidewij van Twillert is a design engineer working in the fields of product-, fashion-, and graphic design, the experiences of which she combines with her other life as dj, performing under the name of Ellis Vay.
Great fun is Jelle Mastenbroek’s installation ‘Splendour Lender’, that gives everyone who lends a euro a joyful moment. While in this installation everyone gets to hear the same music, Mastenbroek’s more recent work ‘Data Orchestra’ is more individual. This installation makes use of personal data of the listener to compile a unique piece.
Finally Dennis Flinterman (SILO) and Maarten van Boven (Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ) discussed the evolution of the identity of Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ, which evolved in time showing less building and more music.
Philip de Josselin de Jong is a self-employed graphic designer based in Haarlem
Top image: Lidewij van Twillert talks about combining designing with dj-ing / photos Leo Veger