top of page

HIC et NUNC III.
ZHdK, Interdisciplinary Module, Activation of a Asylum Seekers Camp, Zurich.

2017

HIC ET NUNC (Here and Now, in Latin) stands for a design attitude. With this motto, we invited design students to take concrete action, which can be realized in four weeks, to improve the life quality in a refugee camp in Zurich with a simple act. HIC ET NUNC III is the third workshop made in the Messehalle 9, Zurich.

The project, developed in collaboration with the BA design interdisciplinary program of the Zurich University of the Arts and AOZ (Asylum seekers Organization Zurich), represent a small action to face the first refugee emergency crisis in 2016. Didactically, students were asked to challenge their design skills and competencies to act "here and now" in an emergency condition.

To tackle the crisis, the City of Zurich hosted two hundred fifty refugees in a fair hall. Temporary rooms made of OBS wood were built inside the volume of the fair to guarantee privacy, yet, many small actions could have been taken to improve the quality of life and the integration process during the temporary accommodation in the camp.

HIC et NUNC III focused on activating the space in front of the cabins to create a semiprivate space. Furthermore, one cabin temporary empty has been transformed into a room with exclusive access for women, guaranteeing privacy otherwise precarious.

The workshop has been developed with the support of IKEA CH and DOKA.

Hic et Nunc (project in collaboration with Karin Seiler and Martin Bölsterli) in collaboration with:

- AOZ Zurich

- Zurich University of the Arts

and the generous support of: 

- IKEA CH

- DOKA


Awards:

- 2017 HOCHPARTERRE GOLDEN RABBIT, best of the year 2017 in category design.


Exhibitions: 

- 2020 SOCIAL DESIGN, Braunschweigischen Landesmuseum, Germany.

- 2019 SOCIAL DESIGN, MK&G, Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg, Germany.

- 2018 SOCIAL DESIGN, Museum für Gestaltung, Zurich, Switzerland.


Publications:

2017 M. Ernst, Doppelt Wirksam. Die Zürcher Hochschule der Künste liess Studierende und Asylsuchende clevere Lösungen erarbeiten. dafür erhält das Unterrischtsmodul ‹Hic et Nunc› den Hasen in Gold, in Hochparterre, N. 12, December 2017, pp. 34-39.

bottom of page