Blu-Mathilde Bonan
About
Blu Bonan is an interdisciplinary designer with a background in Anthropology. Her work is guided by an anthropological perspective, grounded on ethnographic research, and driven by a community-centred approach.
Education
- MA/MSc Global Innovation Design - Royal College of Art and Imperial College London (2021-2023)
- Graduate Diploma Fashion & Textiles - Royal College of Art (2021)
- Bsc Anthropology - University College London (UCL) (2016-2020)
Relevant experience
- Designer & Researcher, UCL Multimedia Anthropology Lab (2020-2021)
Statement
Where I am in 2022
I am deeply passionate about integrating research and human understanding into the design process. My experience at RCA over the past two years has given me the tools to explore the intricate relationship between culture, society, and design. I have come to comprehend the profound impact they exert on one another, empowering me to develop meaningful solutions that address real-world challenges with purpose and empathy.
RCA Showcase
In the RCA2023 show, I am giving you a sneak peek of two pieces I worked on during my time at the RCA: LimiSphere: Meals with a Purpose is a comprehensive system designed to prevent loneliness among men about to retire by promoting awareness and involvement in community projects; Re-Told a storytelling tool that helps younger generations document their families’ oral stories, whilst preserving their cultural heritage and recording dying dialects and languages.
LimiSphere: Meals with A Purpose
LimiSphere: Meals with A Purpose
Addressing the crucial public health concern of loneliness, LimiSphere focuses on a lesser-studied demographic: men on the cusp of retirement. By stressing the preventive advantages of community participation and fostering a sense of purpose, LimiSphere proactively nurtures these pivotal aspects outside the professional sphere, preparing men for a fulfilling life post-retirement.
By stimulating interest in community participation, encouraging self-reflection, and endorsing self-initiated actions, LimiSphere ultimately lays the foundation for a proactive, fulfilling, and enriching retirement journey.
Re-Told
Re-Told
Re-told is a storytelling tool that helps younger generations document their families’ oral stories, whilst preserving their cultural heritage and recording dying dialects and languages.
Through ethnography and fieldwork research with two descendants of Orang Pulau, Singapore's indigenous islanders, Wan and Asnida, we learned the importance of documenting stories about cultural traditions that are slowly disappearing. Oral storytelling, despite its integral role in indigenous cultures, was found to be overlooked as a communication method in today’s increasingly visual world. Together we co-designed a multisensorial workshop to understand the younger generations’ relationship with their cultural heritage. The results demonstrated a disconnection between young people and their roots, including lacking knowledge of the dialects and languages spoken by older family members.
As an intervention, we created a digital tool that would turn everyday families’ stories into an audiobook. Capturing all of the recorded stories in their original languages, along with the written translation, Re-told then delivers a keepsake book that can be passed on for generations. By having a digitised family archive of cultural anecdotes, the audio data crowdsourced by the Re-told community can also be contributed to conservation initiatives such as Indigenous AI to slow down the threat of disappearing languages.