Leon Doering

Felicitas Ohnesorge, Anne Groß, Florian Giele, Leon Doering

Patrick Bösch

Winter semester 2015/16

Faculty:
Art and Design

Degree programme:
Product Design (Bachelor of Arts (B.A.))

Semester project

"Time Witnesses"

Cognitive sciences found out, that humans are able to externalise memories. They can project and load sensory impressions and save these moments forever. So can a unique taste lets us suddenly remember a long ago forgotten experience of our childhood or music hits us with a flashback of a beautiful summer years ago. Externalised Memories are associated with actions and objects that appeal to the senses in a unique, significant way. By experiencing these sensory stimuli the memory is externalized. Through reliving these sensory input it is possible to bring back “forgotten” memories years later. In this project we did research on how this knowledge is relevant for the design of products. Is it possible to deliberately save memories so that they are only readable by the owner of the memory? What does it mean for the design of objects that are capable of doing so?

The objects called “Time Witnesses” examine three ways of how to load moments into objects and by this preserve them for the future. All three share the same dialectic of remembrance recording and release but when they do they need to be made of different applications and decisions. They are not only the witnesses of a moment, but also of a design approach which in addition to the human cognition opens a new way of thinking.