Shanna Soh

Design Researcher and Lecturer
Netherlands (residence)
research interests: Design research, design education, academic research, design, fashion, textiles, interdisciplinary, Dutch design, transcultural design, transnational design, national identity, pluriverse, decolonising knowledge, Decolonizing methodologies
affiliation: Royal Academy of Art, The Hague - Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten (KABK) | Amsterdam Fashion Institute (AMFI)
en

Shanna Soh lectures at the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague (KABK) and at the AMFI, Faculty of Digital Media and Creative Industries, Amsterdam University of Applied Science. BDB & BKE qualifications attained. Alongside her teaching roles in design education, she is also a design researcher with a MA in Design Cultures from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU Amsterdam). Current research interests: Decolonising design; design & pluriverse; bottom-up approaches to design & social innovation; design & generative AI; design & community engagement; design in the context of placemaking & national identity; design education and artistic research.

 

Latest publication: Soh, Shanna (2023) Replica Relay Race. In: Gardner, L. & Mohajer va Pesaran, D. (eds.), Radical fashion exercises: A workbook of modes and methods. Valiz.
 

She considers her work environment as a (virtual) playground, in which participants are actively engaged to have fun while co-creating experiments which question and reflect on past, present and future issues, especially those that tend to be deeply embedded within the design ecosystem.

 

In addition, she is the co-founder of Schone Vormen, a design collective which explores the boundaries of research, art and design, and often deliberately traverses these borders.

research

research expositions

  • Schone Vormen: Night/Shift (last edited: 2022) author(s): Shanna Soh, Cyril Tjahja This exposition is in progress and its share status is: visible to all.
    NIGHT/SHIFT captures a glimpse to the lives of a group of Bangkok city dwellers within the confines of a bus at night. It is about those who work the night shift in an urban setting: the people who work on the bus, including ourselves, and perhaps most of the passengers too. We started filming everyday, exactly as the day shifts into the night.
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  • Making Histories: Pluriverse Perspectives on Fashion & Textile Design Studies, Contributions from Year Two students (AY 2021/22) (2023) author(s): Shanna Soh, Bessel Bijtelaar, Sophia Bogstedt, Elke Cloin, Julia Groven, Wassim Hodayebi, Peter Wertmann, Asira Wiegers, Ziah Siyu Zhang, Leva Drobenkaitė, Azul Espirito Santo, Lotte Roelandse, Neele Verhees, Emma Verrijt published in: Research Catalogue
    Co-created with Year 2 students from the department of Fashion & Textile of the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague (KABK) as part of the end of year assignment for the subject of Fashion & Textile History, this exposition combines academic and practice-based research as a contribution to existing discourse on Fashion and Textile design studies. This exhibition showcases a spectrum of research from constructivistic perspectives. Contributions range from those which highlighted the politics of identity in the design canon of fashion and textiles; to attempts to resurrect lost crafts; to addressing the importance of designers being able to move beyond the role of being a maker operating on figuratively isolated islands, towards that which operates more as a hub of human connections in socially-engaged and socially-responsible ways. In order to preserve the ephemeral nature of students' explorations in art & design education setting and in the spirit of Arturo Escobar's vision on the Pluriverse, students are given the freedom to propose their topic of choice and to deepen their knowledge as independently as possible. Guidance was given only when sought. In line with retaining the integrity of students' works, no interventions were made to student' contributions in this exhibition. Author / Curator Shanna Soh ; Co-creators Ieva Drobenkaitė, Azul Espirito Santo, Lotte Roelandse, Neele Verhees, Emma Verrijt, Bessel Bijtelaar, Sophia Bogstedt, Elke Cloin, Julia Groven, Wassim el Hodayebi, Patryk Ochmanski, Timour Bonin, Peter Wertmann, Asira Zai, Ziah Siyu Zhang
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  • Making Histories: Pluriverse Perspectives on Fashion & Textile Design Studies. Contributions from Year One students (AY 2021/22) (2023) author(s): Shanna Soh, Simon Veldkamp, Marijn Brinksma, Renée Buitendijk, Laura Garnier, Kim Gemmink, Carina Georgescu, June Gibbs, Jungyun Jang, Emma Lobina, Riet Pedro, Bas Pol, Hiromu Takeshita, Marie Eve Vedrines, Nora Vervat, Noah Warmer, Zhenyi Zhou published in: Research Catalogue
    This exhibition is co-created by Year One students (2021/22) from the department of Fashion and Textile in The Royal Academy of Art, The Hague (KABK) after attending a series of lectures examining the historical study of Fashion & Textile design from constructivistic perspectives. This exhibition showcases a spectrum of practice-based research, ranging from imagined narratives from the past; to observations on the global cultural impact of (digital) fashion and music; to attempts in addressing gaps of knowledge and imbalances in the eco-system of fashion & textile in the past, present & future. In order to preserve the ephemeral nature of students' explorations in art & design education setting and in the spirit of Arturo Escobar's vision on the Pluriverse, students are given the freedom to propose their topic of choice and to deepen their knowledge as independently as possible. Guidance was given only when sought. In line with retaining the integrity of students' works, no interventions were made to student' contributions in this exhibition. Author / Curator Shanna Soh; Co-creators Riet Pedro, Emma Lobina, Carina Georgescu, Jungyun Jang, Noah Warmer, Renee Buitendlijk, Simon Veldkamp, Hiromu Takeshita, Zhenyi Zhou, Laura Garnier, Marie-Eve Verdrines, Bas Pol, Marijn Brinksma, Kim Gemmink, June Gibbs.
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