MUSAE. Future Foodscapes

MUSAE, a project addressed to define an innovative model for integrating artistic collaboration in European Digital Innovation Hubs through a Design Futures Art-driven (DFA) methodology, announces a two-day exhibition ‘Future Foodscapes’ which will take place on the 9-10th of April at the historic building of the University of Barcelona here to showcase artworks based on the future scenarios on the topic of ‘food as medicine’ developed by the artists in the MUSAE project.

Artworks emerged from the MUSAE project which is supported by Horizon Europe through S+T+ARTS and carried out by a network of universities, technology research centers and tech companies with the aim of defining an innovative Design Futures Art-driven (DFA) model to integrate artistic collaboration into European Digital Innovation Hubs (E-DIHs). The aim of MUSAE is to pilot a new collaboration model, which is called the MUSAE Factory model, based on art-driven innovation and design futures to guide tech-driven businesses in envisioning new solutions to improve the sustainability of the food value chain on different levels.

The exhibition will kick off on Tuesday the 09th of April @ 6 pm in the beautiful hall of the historic building of the University of Barcelona. Each artist will introduce their work, offering insights into their creative processes and inspirations. This will be followed by a cocktail party to encourage networking and discussion among participants.

On March 14th MUSAE launched the second open call for the selection of 11 teams, consisting of one artist and one SME, who will participate in an 10-month residency programme and create future-driven concepts and prototypes of TRL 5. At least 1 team (artist and SME) will be speciﬁcally selected from one of the Widening Countries.

The teams of applicants are expected to choose one of the twelve future scenarios, which were created in the First MUSAE S+T+ARTS Residency Programme. Future scenarios serve as a context of exploration for the teams in which they would like to work and develop concepts and prototypes. Future scenarios cover a wide range of topics in the area of “Food as Medicine”. All scenarios can be explored in more detail on the MUSAE website2 , as well as in the downloadable Scenario Booklet3. The teams of artists and SMEs are expected to apply with the proposal describing the opportunity of the scenario in the brief, which they would like to work on and develop during the Residency Programme by adopting the Design Futures Art-driven method.

The residence will last for 10 months in a hybrid mode, with scheduled travels to the different partners’ locations across Europe. In the ﬁrst phase the teams will work on Concept Generation, and in the second phase on Prototype Building. The teams will be supported by the expertise of the consortium in art and design (Politecnico di Milano, Gluon, University of Barcelona), nutrition (University College Dublin), and technologies in robotics, AI, wearables (Ab.Acus, PAL Robotics, University of Barcelona, University of Manchester, University of Belgrade). At the end of the Residency Programme, a public exhibition in Brussels, Belgium will be organized to exhibit developed prototypes to a large public. Each team can request a contribution of 80.000 €, which must include all related costs.