Launch of Ocean Imagineer: ArtScience Residency with Cesar Jung-Harada
Water Is living world. Water is the primal life force and the cornerstone of our future reality. However, our modern pace of life and ever-expanding cities are destroying them faster than ever.
Anthropogenic climate change will dramatically affect all life on earth, potentially wiping it out – it has already begun to quietly change the cultures, histories and identities of our common humanity. Can we escape the “Frankenstein monster” we’ve created?
French-Japanese designer, environmentalist, educator and entrepreneur Cesar Jung-Harada looks this monster in the face not with fear, but with promise. With an interdisciplinary practice spanning over 20 years, focused on harnessing the potential of the ocean, he draws on the synergy of nature, history and technology to construct experimental inventions that pave the way to sustainable development and designing the future. Jung-Harady Ocean imaginator The residency at the ArtScience Museum continues his personal belief in decolonized knowledge structures and a tangible, sustainable future. With a wealth of experience working with organizations such as the World Wildlife Fund for Nature, National Geographic, the United Nations and TED, Jung-Harad is rarely seen wearing a white coat in the lab. Instead, he sources climate solutions in living experience and with the spontaneous imagination he seeks everywhere and anywhere – from a garbage mountain to a floating hydrogen-powered solar power plant. Jung-Harada knows that the world will not be saved by conglomerates, but rather by communities where local tradition meets personal passion and practical conviction.
Jung-Harada disregards arbitrary boundaries between disciplines, believing that everyone, and especially future generations, are naturally equipped to be inventors. The climate crisis requires a solution that transcends the existing boundaries of science, engineering and design. In his educational work, Jung-Harada conveys a spirit of curiosity and entrepreneurship that survives experimentation and adapts to foster the interdependent relationship between man and nature.
“What if we adopted the thinking of both the artist and the scientist? We could be pioneers of technological and societal change with relentless creativity and rigor, asking tough questions and finding solutions.” (Emperor Jung-Harada, 2023)
By disrupting existing hierarchies of knowledge creation, empowering individuals with the courage, confidence, and ability to independently realize the vision of a sustainable planet Earth, Jung-Harada’s inventive process weaves play, collaboration, and vision in the spirit of what he calls “cooperation-opetition” – the clash of “cooperation.” and “competition”. It is a paradigm shift that could change the way we deal with the climate crisis, moving away from restless existentialism towards spontaneity and creativity. He lobbies for open source scientific and artistic research, encouraging everyone to work generously and collaborate.
“I believe that it is essential to abandon the boundaries that divide us and instead radically share, building a wealth of knowledge, experience and practical skills. The ocean controls the climate and is widely accessible to many people. We can have a big impact on our climate impact when we start caring and working together.” (Emperor Jung-Harada, 2023)
As the inaugural ArtScientist-In-Residence of the ArtScience Museum, Jung-Harad’s Ocean Imagineer residency brings to the museum, and more generally to Singapore, four of his ongoing projects: Indigenous Future Outrigger, Ocean Solar Hydrogen, Shape Shifting Sailing (Protei) and Ocean Train. Each of these projects reimagines existing technology, either by reviewing design principles that have gone unchallenged for generations, or by revisiting local traditions that once honored both humanity and the environment. Ocean Imagineer not only predicts the extension of our survival on Earth, but a living symbiosis between humans and the natural world.
Ocean imaginator: The ArtScience residency with Cesar Jung-Harada will run from April 2023, culminating in a presentation in the second half of 2024. For more information on this edition of the residency, including details of ongoing programmes, please visit Here.