Nelly Ben Hayoun graduated from the Royal College of Art’s Design Interactions MA. The department, lead by Prof. Anthony Dunne explores alternative realities and possible futures that new technologies and science may hold.
From a textile design and fine art background, she has worked and done performances in Paris, Tokyo,Dublin and London.She is interested in how we can use design and science in our everyday lives to make them more thrilling, creative and passionate.
Her work is about collaboration with experts-scientists and amateurs; it aims to adapt science to our creative needs. Her method is to go ‘in situ’, to visit people’s place of research to find a common ground to develop new ways of engaging the public with their research.
Often science seems to be reserved for scientists – expert practitioners who alone have the privilege of experiencing the fringes of human knowledge and the extremes of nature. Her work aims to combat this (real or perceived) aspect of science, by enlisting willing scientists in experiences that mix the creativity with technology, science with fiction, factual with artistic, amateur with expert…
She thinks that design must be engaged and therefore she is particularly interested in questioning its set up. Her installations are built as a set to facilitate and encourage surreal interactions. Design should be embedded in a physical experience, something that lasts in your memory similarly to seeing a painting and remembering the tone of it.
Her work featured in ICON magazine, Glass, Core 77, Evening standard to New scientist, NHK TV, We Make Money Not Art…
Nelly Ben Hayoun is part of Disruptive Thinking which is exploring responses to our current turbulent social conditions, enabling us to visualize and understand what the future may hold.