LINES OF FLIGHT – an EARTH research symposium

The arts and creative disciplines offer essential ways of knowing and doing in the context of climate emergency. The research symposium Lines of Flight will query the lines of inquiry needed today within research and related practices aimed at ecological and societal impact.

• Where are fault lines or gaps in our knowledges?
• How are we drawing other knowledges into our disciplines, how are we aligning with or redirecting others?
• What relevant knowledges, assemblages, movements and pathways are emerging?

These are some of the questions for research that we will explore, aligned with UAL 2026 Earth Week theme ‘Fault Lines’. The symposium will gather researchers from across colleges and disciplines at UAL (spanning the arts, humanities, design, fashion, spatial and creative fields) engaging with ecological issues. Together, we will share examples, experiences and ideas about doing and developing such research.

The symposium will comprise lively and varied formats. A keynotes session will take place in an interactive and dialogic way including the audience. Multiple sessions will showcase the work of UAL researchers, who will engage with one another and the audience around common themes. The symposium will conclude with a strategic panel of UAL research leaders discussing what it takes to secure and sustain research projects and collaboration.

Preliminary list of contributors (more to be announced):

Keynote: Dr Sria Chatterjee (Head of Research Initiatives at Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art and Director of Climate & Colonialism, Yale University),

• Jess Mountfield (LCC / Wimbledon College of Arts, Associate Lecturer in Animation / Lecturer in Development of the Storytelling Diploma),
• Dr Arnab Banerjee (Lecturer in Marketing Consumer Behaviour),
• Dr Mila Burcikova (LCF, Reader in Fashion Systems, Centre for Sustainable Fashion),
• Gabriela Daniels (LCF, Programme Director Science),
• Krista Evans (CSM, Doctoral Student), Dr Suraksha Gupta (LCF, Professor of Marketing),
• Lucy Jane MacAllister Dukes (CSM, Doctoral Student, Living Systems Lab),
• Hester Mauduit (LCF, Doctoral Student),
• Dr Pat Naldi (CSM, Lecturer, MA Fine Art),
• Dr Alison Prendiville (LCC, Professor of Service Design),
• Karen Tang (CSM, Doctoral Student / UAL Foundation Senior Lecturer),
• Lu Wang (LCF, Doctoral Student),
• Dr Andy Weir (Chelsea College of Art, Senior Lecturer Fine Art),
• Dr Zoi Zoupanou (LCF, Specialist Technician in Psychology),
• and more.

The research symposium “Lines of Flight” is organized by EARTH (Ecological Arts Research Transdisciplinary Hive) and EARTH is co-convened by Dr Caterina Albano and Dr Catalina Mejía Moreno (CSM – Central Saint Martins), Dr Lana Locke and Dr Niki Wallace (CCW - Camberwell, Chelsea and Wimbledon Colleges of Art), Dr Francesco Mazzarella and Prof Dilys Williams (LCF – London College of Fashion), Prof Ramia Mazé and Dr Yiğit Soncul (LCC – London College of Communications).

The symposium is part of Fault Lines: UAL's Earth Week programme and is open to the public. During the day there will be refreshments. Interested researchers, UAL staff, students, alumni and the public are invited to learn, meet and mingle.

You are invited and welcome to join us in person at the Doctoral School in UAL, High Holborn. We will also have a number of spaces to join the symposium online.

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