Rio Chen, IDSA is a designer and researcher who focuses on sociopolitical issues and contemporary popular culture in the field of design.
His latest work, Satellite Project, is an international design workshop based on randr research (founded in 2021 with Rahma Shahid) that aims to produce educational resources and a think-tank-based institute for design students and graduates to share their perspectives on the political influences on design language. In June of this year, Satellite Project will launch the first online exhibition resulting from a six-month workshop attended by artists from the United States, Pakistan, China, Italy, Taiwan, and Kashmir.
The exhibition “Satellite 2022,” curated by Rio Chen, focuses on “Security and Surveillance.” The world of the twenty-first century has a very different conception of what security entails, who provides it, and why ‘safety’ has become more complicated than it was intended to be. Trust is essential to security, but there is little of it left in the organized armed forces provided by states. In the economic politics of the world, the concepts of security, surveillance, and the right to self-determination have become deeply and perilously entangled. The need for safety has also expanded to virtual space, and the world barely comprehends what the combination of these two terms will mean.
Rio Chen’s work ‘Towers’ (pictured left) aims to bring attention to the antenna and cell towers that are often disguised as artificial trees or fake buildings in the construction of landscape planning. The architecture that exists in the city and our homes.
See the rest of the Satellite 2022 exhibition at satelliteproject.org
In the midst of uncertainty, it is essential for us as designers to recognize the authority and responsibilities we carry. Rio Chen holds a master’s degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a bachelor’s degree from Taiwan Tech in design. He is thrilled to present the online showcase of Satellite 2022: Security and Surveillance to the members of IDSA and share his expertise in industrial design research.
Get in contact with Rio via email at riochendesign [at] gmail [dot] com or visit him on Instagram and LinkedIn