Background
At the 5th International Conference on Art, Design and Social Sciences, this symposium seeks to bring together, contrast, and create knowledge based on the fusion of different disciplines of design and their emergence in relation to the urban form and the complex networks of physical interaction in the city, between individuals and with the spaces of the city. We call this interaction Urban FEEDback, a manifestation of how the city itself is the host and the vehicle for the production of multiple types of interdisciplinary collaborations. The FEEDback series is an architecture-centered, interdisciplinary exhibition that situates discourses of design control through projects of a diverse community of architects, musicians, fashion designers and artists, presenting their work in close proximity to distill individual disciplines, obfuscate them and elucidate on the effects that feedback – both in its instrumental and conceptual time dimensions – has on their work. It seeks to expand upon feedback in its many iterations as a residue of an action – like guitar feedback – and as litmus of an action’s effects – like a feedback loop.
FEEDback crystallizes the notion of the transdisciplinary project in architecture, generated by experimental strategies applied to systems in positive friction with the human body and beyond it, exploring its mediated environment. Through hybrid projects arising from contrasting different disciplines, the notion of architectural feedback becomes a new kind of conceptual inquiry into the very fabric of time. In doing so, FEEDback questions and explores the human identity understood as Techno-Sapiens.
Goal/Rationale
What makes the FEEDback series particularly significant is its exploration of reciprocity—the way our actions create responses that in turn reshape our understanding. Just as a guitarist creates a sound that reverberates through an amplifier and back into the instrument, creating unexpected harmonics, these creators have established feedback loops between different disciplines, between the human body and its environment, and between natural systems and technological innovation.
The research projects to be presented at the symposium invite us to reconsider our relationship with the built environment, with nature, with our own bodies, and with time itself. They challenge us to recognize that the boundaries we've constructed between disciplines may be precisely what limits our capacity to address our most pressing challenges. In a world where specialized knowledge has become increasingly siloed, this exhibition reminds us that the most generative ideas often emerge at the intersections. When systems come into friction—when architecture meets music, when digital fabrication meets biological inspiration, when the human body encounters new technological extensions—unexpected signals emerge.
Scope
The participants will be invited by the Symposium Chair, and the scope is interdisciplinary. Curated by Eric Goldemberg, this symposium builds on a series of transdisciplinary exhibitions over the last 8 years in Venice Biennale, Genova, Tokyo, Sendai, Perth, Brno, Miami, and Buenos Aires, where architecture, art, music, fashion design, industrial design and other creative disciplines are brought together through the exemplary work of some of the most notable designers and artists worldwide; including ZHA, OMA, Juergen H. Mayer, Asymptote (architecture); Iris van Herpen, Anouk Wipprecht, Behnaz Farahi (fashion design); Keziah Jones (music); Peter Donders (industrial design) and many others.
The core of the FEEDback series is a radical fusion of architecture, music, art, and technology, expressed through the presentation of printed media and video production; live events at the opening include a panel of presentations and a performance of 3D-printed instruments/sonic sculptures, created by Eric Goldemberg’s firm MONAD Studio in collaboration with musician-luthier Scott F. Hall. These works generate immersive experiences that invite audiences, regardless of their familiarity with the arts, into a space of shared creativity and exploration. A music performance is planned as part of the symposium activities.
FEEDback Genova – Urban Form as Catalyst for Transdisciplinary CreativityNOVEMBER 12, 2026 GENOA, ITALY