London Design Biennale announces the first confirmed exhibitors for its 2023 edition, taking place at Somerset House from 1-25 June. The theme of this year’s Biennale, ‘The Global Game: Remapping Collaborations,’ goes beyond borders and territories to enact new forms of international cooperation and participation through the medium of design.

The fourth edition continues the Biennale’s mission to demonstrate how design can better the world we inhabit. Exhibitors will share perspectives and solutions to some of the global issues that face humanity today, exploring areas from the urban environment to traditional practices, environmental sustainability to the humanitarian response to conflict.

Victoria Broackes, Director, London Design Biennale, said:

“The previous Biennale took place towards the end of the global pandemic and once again the global context has drastically changed. Despite this, international design teams continue to demonstrate the possibilities of what can be achieved through design and design thinking. The Biennale is the place to see what is on people’s minds, across the world, right now. This year we will see exhibitors presenting design in all its forms – from ancient weaving traditions through futuristic urban planning, from AI systems to collaborative humanitarian efforts.”

The Nieuwe Instituut is experimenting with the Biennale’s format of national and territorial pavilions by asking participants to collaborate with the help of an online game. ‘The Global Game: Remapping Collaborations’ prompts and encourages participants to find new ways of partnering with each other.

Aric Chen, General Director, Nieuwe Instituut, said:

“The Global Game: Remapping Collaborations’ aims to create an alternative geopolitical landscape driven not by competition nor conflict, but rather cooperation. We all agree that global challenges require global collaboration. This is easier said than done, but in some small way, we hope real international exchanges will arise from this biennial in a way that also invites visitors to become part of the process.”

The first exhibitors to be announced are: Abu Dhabi, the humanoid Ai-Da Robot, Automorph Network, Care Pavilion, Chatham House, Chile, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dubai, India, Malta, the Swiss museum Mudac, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, South Korea, Spain and Peru, Taiwan, The Delegation of the European Union to the United Kingdom and Ukraine.

In the courtyard, Malta will adapt the form of the ‘village square’, demarcated with fabrics using traditional Phoenician-Maltese dyes, to highlight ancient approaches to the urban environment and the chance encounters that they encourage. On the River Terrace, India will invoke the sensory impact of a ‘chowk’ – an open market at the junction of streets – through the visual metaphor of a charpai, a traditional woven daybed found across India.

Designers from across Ukraine will come together to draw on its history of creative richness to demonstrate the vital role that collaboration plays in forging new means of connection and communication in a time of war. Poland will reinterpret the window as a symbol of cross-border collaborations, referencing the donations of windows from Poland to Ukraine to help those whose homes have been destroyed.

Abu Dhabi highlights the traditional Al-Sadu technique of weaving, practiced by Bedouin women in the UAE to create the tents and social spaces where families and visitors convene. This technique was recently added to the UNESCO List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding. Spain and Peru collaborate to demonstrate how historic design practices might offer alternative means of collaboration today, as symbolised through the ‘cajón’. This percussion instrument, part of the Afro-Peruvian tradition later brought to Spain, has become the ‘traditional’ instrument of flamenco music.

Responding to themes of societal disorientation, the Netherlands pavilion will be an ever-changing site-specific installation distributed throughout Somerset House to support moments of gathering, assembly and reflection among other participants. The European Union Delegation to the United Kingdom will present the New European Bauhaus initiative – a movement to facilitate and steer the transformation of our societies. Romania will emphasise humanity’s interconnection with nature and the need for regenerative practices to ensure the relationship continues to be sustainable into the future. Automorph Network brings together designers from France, Italy, Israel and the US to examine how the process of biomimicry learnt from nature can be copied in our own designs to drive innovation. Taiwan will showcase collaborations across industry, trade, natural resources and the economy.

South Korea will use Mixed Reality to bridge the gap between past and future, imagined within the surrounds of the traditional Korean garden. The world’s first ultra-realistic robot artist, Ai-Da, will prompt questions about how collaboration with AI technology might shape our future and its impact on creativity. Democratic Republic of the Congo reimagines the country’s national museum as a virtual world, exploring the country’s rich and varied communities and culture.

The Care Pavilion asks us to focus on the politics and ethics of care – be that ‘caring for’, ‘caring about’, ‘caring with’ – and how it can manifest itself in relation to humanity and beyond.

Portugal will bring attention to the issue of violence against women through their voices, to catalyse change. Mudac, (The Museum of Contemporary Design and Applied Arts in Lausanne, Switzerland) will speculate on a global management system for planetary issues by bringing together different types of intelligence around a control console.

The Future for Beginners is an irreverent and thoughtful exploration of the challenges of managing complexity in the face of the climate crisis and a more uncertain world through interactive game play, created by Chatham House, David Finnigan, Melanie Frances and Becky-Dee Trevenen in partnership with London Design Biennale.

New this year, the Eureka exhibition, running alongside London Design Biennale, will showcase design-led innovation from leading research centres. It will spotlight university research departments, demonstrating cross-disciplinary invention and creativity taking place now and changing the world of tomorrow. Exhibitors include Kingston University, Sheffield Hallam University, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow School of Art, The UK National Centre for Ageing (NICA), Canterbury Christ Church University, King’s College London.