Circular Cultures Design School 2025 | Strand B – Immateriality

Virtual Affection—Designing social games-experiences and digital filters for social media

Dates

21-01 —25-01-2025

Prices

Free admission / Open call for applications

Location

Athens

Time & Date

Day

Time

Venue

Day

Tuesday - Friday

Time

17:00 - 21:00

Venue

Galaxy Studio (2 Galaxia Str.)

Day

Saturday

Time

12:00 - 16:00

Venue

Galaxy Studio (2 Galaxia Str.)

Information

Dates

January 21-25, 2025

Application submission

Registration until December 15, 2024

Addressed to

Web design studios, game development studios, marketing agencies, and UI/UX companies

Language

The program is conducted in English

Participation terms

- Application submission online
- Strand selection (each participant may join one strand/key topic)
- Past experience (Portfolio)
- Availability for attending Circular Cultures Design School 2025 in its entirety

Although participation in the program takes place on an individual basis, a participant may represent their company, organization, or group.

More details can be found in the Terms & Conditions
For any clarification, please contact digital@onassis.org

How can design for digital environments help create collective empathy and redefine people’s relationship with themselves and play?

Strand B—Immateriality

Virtual Affection

This strand explores how to use social design to build virtual communities and platforms that foster care, freedom, and self-expression within communities. Participants will delve into immateriality through social games and experiences, examining how they can create collective empathy. They will also dive into the technology of digital/social media filters and how they shape virtual identity and transform the public space.

Lecturers: Keiken
Speaker: Costas Kazantzis

Morphogenic Worldbuilding: A Learning Project
by Keiken

This program offers insights into Keiken’s collective worldbuilding practice, drawing from their years of experience as an interdisciplinary artist collective. At its heart is “Morphogenic Angels,” a project that explores themes of immateriality, hybrid beings, and advanced technologies in a speculative future world. Participants will be guided through its storytelling, characters, lore, and structures, gaining a deeper understanding of how to build compelling speculative worlds.

Grounded in concepts that have shaped Keiken’s practice, such as String Theory and Bubble Theory, the project combines interactive, conversational, and embodied participation to explore how new worlds can emerge through collaboration.

Keiken will share recent research and methodologies from their latest R&D project, conducted with the deaf and blind community in Japan. This research investigates how worldbuilding can foster belonging and help envision a more conscientious and inclusive society.

Designed for artists, designers, and creative thinkers, this program introduces dialectical creativity, connecting opposing ideas to spark innovation. Participants will leave equipped with actionable tools to accelerate ideas, explore speculative futures, and engage in collective processes that transcend materiality, addressing the complexities of belonging in an interconnected and hybrid world.

Introducing digital platforms as community-building spaces through inclusive approaches to play, worldbuilding, and design
by Costas Kazantzis

Costas’ talk challenges conventional gaming mechanics, purpose-driven UX design, and the allure of instant gratification. Instead, it emphasizes research-driven, community-led initiatives that foster meaningful, sustained engagement. Key projects include 3D scanning technologies, digital filters, animation technologies, augmented reality experiences, and volumetric capture, aiming to create interactive 3D worlds and enhance immersion and authenticity. The session redefines gaming as a tool for social engagement and community building, promoting inclusive and participatory environments.