Tomás Maldonado: Design and Ecologies, Study day & Debate
On Tuesday 29 and Wednesday 30 April, a study day and a debate about Tomás Maldonado (1922-2018) will be held in Paris (Ensad and Italian Cultural Institut). This event coincides with the publication of two books by Tomás Maldonado (1922-2018), Vers une écologie critique. Environnement et idéologie (Les presses du réel, 2025) and Survivre ou habiter. Une écologie des milieux (T&P Work Unit, 2024). It is an opportunity to highlight the major figure of this designer and design thinker from the perspective of ecologies. In presence of French and international researchers, who aim to restore the historical significance and contemporary relevance of his thinking.
The project has received state funding managed by the French National Research Agency under the Investments for the Future programme, reference ANR-17-EURE-0008 (EUR ArTec), support from the École nationale supérieure des Arts décoratifs/PSL, the Italian Cultural Institute/Istituto Italiano di Cultura Parigi, the École nationale supérieure d'art et de design de Nancy and the Problemata platform.
Resolutely part of an industrialised world, contrary to vernacular nostalgia, Maldonado defends a demanding approach to the project, combining critical lucidity and pragmatic commitment. From the 1970s, he opened up reflection on the responsibility of design in a world in transition and outlined the contours of an ecology of environments. These writings are an essential contribution to design theory. They resonate with current emergencies, the outcomes of which engage the future of societies as a whole.
Reservation is recommended here.
Tomás Maldonado (1922-2018): A major artist of the concrete avant-garde in Argentina, professor and rector of the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Ulm, teacher at Princeton and at the Polytechnic School of Milan, director of the prestigious magazine Casabella, designer and theorist of design and media, Maldonado has followed a singular path, marked by a circulation between territories, disciplines and intellectual traditions. While in Italy and South America he is recognised as a committed intellectual, a promoter of industrial design and a specialist in urban planning and spaces, and in Germany he is one of the forerunners of the ecological debate, his work is still not widely known in the French-speaking world.
Programme
Tuesday 29 April, École nationale supérieure des Arts décoratifs de Paris, Amphi Rodin I 3-6pm
3pm Welcome I Emmanuel Tibloux, director of Ensad / Introduction I Catherine Geel and Emanuele Quinz, Design and Ecologies
3.45pm Tomás Maldonado and Viktor Papanek, Paradoxes and misunderstandings of sustainability I Pierfrancesco Califano,
16.15pm Tomás Maldonado and South America. Between Cuban rigidity and the announcement of the peripheries. I Ernesto Oroza
16.45pm From environmental design to an ecology of environments. Tomás Maldonado as a pioneer. I Victor Petit
17.15pm ‘The white side of our hope’. Environment, politics and design with Tomás Maldonado. I Raimonda Riccini
17.50pm Questions & Answers
18.30pm Cocktail
Wednesday 30 Avril I Institut culturel italien I 6-8pm
18pm Welcome |Antonio Calbi, director of IIC / Round table, with Catherine Geel, Emanuele Quinz, Raimonda Riccini, Pierfrancesco Califano and Antonella Tufano. / Cocktail