Dana Tomečková
Can manual and machine labour have a mutual effect on each other? Can manual production be meaningfully transferred into a digital form? A link between the old and the new in the design, in terms of the tradition and the current technologies, is not new but some links can be rather surprising, e.g., a 3D print and basket making. Amit Zoran from Israel has combined these two worlds. He gradutaed from product design in Israel and later studied the specialisation media art and science at the MIT Media Lab in Cambidge, U.S.A. It was there that his project Hybrid basket making: a link between digital practice and current handicrafts came to being. He is designing 3D printed plastic constructions which require manual wickerwork with reed or jute. He has been studying possible synergies and balances between the digital and the manual processes, all based in the African culture. When studying it and collecting artefacts for his research he met a traditional basket maker, Thitaku Kushoya, in Botswana. Hybrid basket making is one of the interesting project which try to strengthen the understanding of manual work via a new, contemporary medium.