Interview 15 January 2005 |
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Garikoitz Iruretagoiena won the 2003/2004 Signes Award and was granted a six months scholarship at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea. An industrial designer who trained at the L�Ecole de Design of Nantes Atlantique in France, Gari won thanks to a product/signage project that aided Alzheimer sufferers in accessing toilet facilities in special care centres. On the jury was Gillian Crampton Smith, academic director of Interaction Design institute Ivrea, the designers Gert Dunmbar and Tom Roope from Tomato among others.
�I did not know IDII,� says Gari, �and for the first month I was not very conscious of what interaction design exactly is.� Since his arrival in September, Gari has had to grapple with two new languages,(Italian and English), technology and a different methodology of working. But he has also worked a fellow student Hayat Benchenaa on an innovative project called Sfera and learnt a great deal about electronics. �I don�t know if in the future I will work with electronics, but a new horizon has opened up for me. I realize now I have many more possibilities, and I can for example talk to the engineering department of a company. It has added a new layer of knowledge.� For the near future, Gari will work as a project advisor in the Arrasate University of Mondragon in the Basque country. Gari plans to continue to pursue his research as well as set up a company with fellow Nantes students to work with companies of the Basque area.
(Interview by Sara Manuelli)
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