Studio 1 with Bernd Hopfengärtner
The Next Big Thing: And Other Futures of Music and Visual Arts explores the evolving relationship between music and visual arts, focusing on how these forms have historically shaped one another and imagining their potential future trajectories. In this course, students examined how technological shifts, such as the transition from vinyl to digital, transformed both the consumption and visual presentation of music. The course also linked these changes to cultural and political movements, highlighting how music and visual art often reflected shared messages and aesthetics.
Students applied foresight techniques, including horizon scanning, future wheels, and the 3 horizons framework, to identify and interpret trends in the evolution of music and visual arts. They crafted future scenarios and developed design artifacts to communicate bold, innovative visions for the future of visual communication in the music industry.
The course encouraged students to explore future possibilities with an open mind, avoiding premature judgment. They used the foresight and scenario-building phases to create context and detail for their design work, focusing on producing visually compelling representations that resonate with contemporary relevance.
