21.01.15
Pecha Kucha Global Night – Vol 11 was back on Friday 20th February 2015. This special annual global event was developed by the organisers in Tokyo to connect some of the 800 PKN cities around the world.
PKN Global had the incredibly timely theme ‘Design in Your City‘; and as Dundee has recently been awarded the title of UNESCO City of Design, there was a healthy dose of design mixed with the usual great hotchpotch of stuff!
A big thanks to Sofia Sita for the great global Illustration!
We also showcased some designs in the Bonar Hall reception space and had the regular ‘spread the word’ feature, giving anyone the chance to grab the mic and shout out the events and opportunities they had coming up.
Sam Gonçalves is a documentary filmmaker whose work focuses on finding captivating real-life stories hidden in mundane and ordinary contexts. He recently filmed ‘Coletivo’, a short documentary on the extreme wealth gap found in São Paulo, Brazil and how some of the most deprived communities in the city have engaged with the issue. @SidlingBears. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Damon Herd is an artist and comics self-publisher. He his currently studying for a PhD in Autobiographical comics at Duncan of Jordanstone. He likes to push the comic book form to see how far it can go and still be recognised as comics. To this end he runs DeeCAP, which hosts comics performance events in Dundee. @tickingboy. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Holly Scanlan is a Dundee born Hairstylist and author of popular lifestyle blog GGBOBSHERHAIR. 2013 saw her win a place on the prestigious Wella Generation Now Team and gain credibility within the hairdressing industry. Since she has showcased her skills at high end events including London Fashion Week. Holly documents her life and experiences through her weekly WordPress blog. @hollyscanlan. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Ian Abbott currently resides on the edge of a lagoon in Montrose & embarking on adventures with artists, writers & choreographers. WLTM people who want to: play, make minds swoon, are hungry & want to effect change. Falling in love with the geography of mountains. @TheGeometrician. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Paola McClure is an artist living and working in Dundee where she has a studio at WASPS Meadow Mill. She creates soft sculpture figures that owe as much to cartoon kitschery as they do to more primitive themes. For the last five years she has been chair of the community festival Dundee WestFest The festival’s annual concert, Big Sunday on Magdalen green and has grown from small beginnings to one of the largest open air events held in the city and for many marks the start of the summer calendar. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Rod Mountain has his ‘day job’ in healthcare, working as an ENT head and neck surgeon and educator at Ninewells Hospital. He recently stumbled into an exciting new world of ‘DESIGN’ and is on a journey learning the language, philosophy, length and breadth of ‘design thinking’. He aspires to use the Dundee design agenda to educate and introduce Bio-Dundee and the Healthcare sector to the the significant benefits of closer interdisciplinary thinking and working between his healthcare world and the arts, technologies, IT, humanities, trades and more! Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Dominic Littler is one of the Co-founders of “A Fox Wot I Drew”, grammatically challenged games studio based in Dundee. The team won Design in Action’s award for Commercial potential at Dare to Be Digital 2014, and are currently working on their debut title “Baum”, which is to be released for iPhone and iPad later this year on the App Store. Dom is the Creative director of the company, as well as one of the team’s artists. His mission at “A Fox Wot I Drew” is to create beautiful, exciting and engaging games, and bring them to an ever growing audience. @Dom_littler @afoxwotidrew. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Generator is an art collective based in Dundee. Founded in 1996 their aim is to generate eclectic culture and opportunities for artists in Dundee. Generator run a project and exhibition space under the banner Generator Projects located in Mid Wynd Industrial Estate that allows them to put on art shows and develop experimental, critical and contemporary relevant art work. @GENERATORproj Video from Pecha Kucha Night Vol 11.
Stacey Hunter is a design curator, producer and co-editor of The New Metropolitan a web-magazine about urban citizenship, she is also the co-owner of Edinburgh cycling accessories design business Woodguards. Her work connects design thinking and practice to the everyday life of cities and she was awarded a PhD in Architecture from the University of Edinburgh in 2014. Favourite clients and project partners include: Panel, Scotland Can Make It! Graphical House, The University of Edinburgh, Creative Edinburgh and LeithLate. Stacey is a founding member of a tech company called Nautilus Beam which won £30k Design In Action funding in January 2015. @StaceyHunterEDI @new_met @woodguards. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Sarah Drummond is the co-founder and director of CycleHack, a company on the mission to reduce barriers to cycling by bringing people together to prototype solutions. Starting with Glasgow, in one year the movement has grown to 40 signed up cities and spawned a viral hack called Penny in Your Pants, reaching over 3.2 million cyclists. In her spare time, she runs Snook, an award winning Service Design agency working globally to create great experiences and in her sleep she runs Dearest Scotland, a letter writing campaign that India have copied. @rufflemuffin @cycle_hack @wearesnook @dearestscotland. Video from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
Jenny Sealey co-directed the London 2012 Paralympics Opening Ceremony alongside Bradley Hemmings (GDIF). She has been Artistic Director and CEO of Graeae since 1997 and has pioneered a new theatrical language, coining the term “Aesthetics of Access”; the creative integration of sign language and audio description within performance. In 2009, Jenny was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s Honours and became the Artistic Advisor for the Unlimited 2012 Festival. For captions, please click the ‘CC’ button at the bottom of the video and select English. Video taken from Pecha Kucha Night Dundee Vol 11.
If you’ve not been to Pecha Kucha Night Dundee before, then all we can say is come along and try it out. PKN is part of a massive global network, which you can find out more about here. You get to hear from around 12 diverse individuals who speak about whatever they like, and it’s a speedy format – presenters have 20 images and 20 secs per image – so just under 7 mins, which means you hear a lot of interesting, though-provoking, often inspiring stuff.
Pecha Kucha Nights* were originally started back in 2003 in Tokyo, as an event for creatives to meet, network, and talk about their work in public. Since then Pecha Kucha, meaning ‘chit chat’ in Japanese, has spread internationally running in over 800 cities across the world. The much loved and respected format is relaxed, simple and enjoyable, with something for everyone – presenters have 6 minutes 40 seconds to show and talk through their 20 images, each for just 20 seconds – this keeps things fast and fun!
Pecha Kucha was devised and shared by Klein Dytham architecture. The PKN Dundee event is organised and hosted by Creative Dundee.