Decolonising Design
Designers, theorists, artists, researchers, filmmakers and others share their vision of the designed world in this magazine. Het Nieuwe Instituut invites contributors to reflect on decolonisation and racial justice from a design perspective.
The Decolonising Design magazine is constantly evolving. Over time, the number of perspectives, insights and imaginations will grow. The most current contribution is always highlighted on this homepage, after a list of recent and upcoming reflections. Previous essays, videos and audio works can be found on the appropriate pages of the magazine after publication. An explanation of the context and development of the magazine can be found as Background.
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The first contribution is Tabita Rezaire's essay Womb Ecology _ Decolonial Birth
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The second contribution is the essay Kas di Shon by Miguel Peres dos Santos, which will be published soon.
Womb Ecology _ Decolonial Birth
In her contribution Womb Ecology _ Decolonial Birth, artist, priest, healer and tech expert Tabita Rezaire examines birth as the art of creation par excellence, as a universal primal technology. The essay is a thought exercise through which Rezaire recaptures the acts of giving birth and being born from the patriarchal, colonial and greedy "civilization" that has caused birth, with all its important implications, to be neglected globally. It offers social, cultural, political, environmental and spiritual alternatives.
In her contemplation of birth, Rezaire manoeuvres through different scales of time and space: from genetic transferability and the coexistence of human bodies with their bacterial ecosystems, she moves to family ties and the possibility of escaping hereditary trauma, ultimately reflecting on the geopolitical implications of birthing and the spiritual practice of motherhood. We are all born and all birth each other, but stubborn, violent logic limits the potential of birth. Therefore, she concludes, conscious handling of birth is a prerequisite for enabling a thriving next generation: this realisation and the evolution beyond greed and oppression is the decolonial project.