Between body, object and place

This Doctoral School activity (DS), an inter-university collaboration between Hasselt University, LUCA School of Arts, and PXL-MAD School of Arts, aims to explore wearables as technologies that can shift perception, initiate unexpected encounters, and open alternative relations between humans, environments, and more-than-human actors. This connects to Haraway’s notion of sympoiesis, or “making-with,” in which bodies and environments are formed through relation. Wearables are therefore not representations of more-than-human actors from the outside, but relational devices that help participants become attentive to the materials and ecological conditions that already shape a place. 

Bringing together perspectives from participatory design, urban planning, performance studies, critical costume, art jewellery, and more-than-human theory, this DS activity is meant to investigate how wearables can mediate and shift participation, identity, and relationships within shared environments. Building on performance theory, we approach identity not as stable or inherited, but as fluid, procedural, and continuously performed through material acts of appearance.

This event will consist of a lecture by Dr Rachel Hann titled “When is costume? From showing-dressing to body-assemblages in contemporary costume performances”. Dr Rachel Hann is Associate Professor of Performance and Design at Northumbria University, Newcastle. She researches cultures of scenography, climate crisis, and transness.

Register here until November 02, 2026.