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CoCreate Programme

CoCreate is the inter-school teaching programme offered by the FHNW Basel Academy of Art and Design. It aims to promote cooperative and interdisciplinary working methods and to develop interdisciplinary skills in the areas of business, culture, science, digitisation, diversity & inclusion and communication. CoCreate also offers space for testing innovative teaching and learning formats and makes a significant contribution to a common, inter-school culture.

Structure CoCreate

CoCreate is organised on a weekly basis and takes place on two separate weeks per semester.
One week (the Essential Week) offers workshops and courses on a wide range of topics, while the other (the Campus Week) has a common thematic focus.
CoCreate is a compulsory elective programme. Depending on their needs, students can choose either two “small” courses (1 ECTS credit) or one “large” one (2 ECTS credits). In addition, CoCreate offers a lecture programme with discussion formats once a week, from which, likewise, two “small” (1 ECTS credits) or one “large” (2 ECTS credits) lectures can be selected.
Only second- and third-year students take part in the CoCreate week at the beginning of the autumn semester. Sixth semester students do not take part in the CoCreate weeks in the spring semester.

To the course catalogue: vorlesungsverzeichnis.hgk.fhnw.ch
Information sheet CoCreate (in German, soon in English): Download PDF

CoCreate areas of expertise:

Fitness for the future, cooperation, communication, critical thinking and interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary working methods. Students and participants acquire skills that prepare them for the challenges of the future, including critical thinking, effective communication and the ability to collaborate in the interdisciplinary teams of the art and design degree programmes. They learn to analyse complex interrelationships and develop sustainable solutions in a global context.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants can apply critical thinking in preparation for the challenges of the future.
• Students can communicate effectively and present their ideas clearly and convincingly.
• Students can work together in interdisciplinary teams in the art and design degree programmes.
• Students understand complex relationships and learn to analyse them.
• Students can integrate self-management and self-organisation methods into their day-to-day learning.

Use of new digital technologies and media as well as applications and forms of expression in the field of artificial intelligence. Students and participants learn how to make targeted use of digital technologies and media based on specific topics in order to solve complex tasks creatively and efficiently. They develop a critical understanding of the applications of artificial intelligence and discover new forms of artistic and creative expression.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants can make targeted use of digital technologies and media based on specific topics to solve complex tasks creatively and efficiently.
• Students develop a critical understanding of digital applications and artificial intelligence applications.
• Students are familiar with new digital-based artistic and creative forms of expression.

Sustainability, diversity, equality and inclusion. Students and participants develop an awareness of sustainable practices and their importance for a fair and inclusive society. They learn to incorporate diversity and equality as core values into their creative and artistic decisions and actions.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants develop an awareness of sustainable practices and their importance for a fair and inclusive society.
• Students can incorporate diversity and equality as core values into their creative and artistic decisions and actions.
• Students can integrate ecological principles into their design and artistic decisions in order to promote environmentally conscious solutions.

Scientific methods and working methods. Students and participants acquire in-depth knowledge of scientific methods in order to critically analyse information and/or data and draw well-founded conclusions. They learn to work scientifically and to communicate their findings clearly and precisely.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants have a basic knowledge of scientific methods to critically analyse information and data and draw well-founded conclusions.
• Students can work scientifically and apply systematic approaches.
• Students understand how to communicate their scientific findings clearly and precisely.

Innovation, circular economy, entrepreneurship, financial planning, external funding and legal principles. Students and participants learn the basics of financial planning as well as the legal aspects of design and art activity in order to successfully run projects and undertakings. They develop an understanding of the circular economy and innovation as key elements of sustainable entrepreneurship.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants know the basics of financial planning.
• Students understand the legal aspects of design and art activity in order to successfully run projects and undertakings.
• Students develop an understanding of the circular economy and its importance in sustainable projects.
• Students understand innovation as a key element of sustainable entrepreneurship and can incorporate this knowledge into their projects.
• Students can apply critical and equitable perspectives to the depiction and visualisation of cultures and their reception.

Cultural, art and visual studies. Students and participants engage with cultural, art and visual studies in order to develop a deep understanding of the diversity of cultural forms of expression and their historical contexts. They reflect critically on colonialism and strive for fairer perspectives in the representation and reception of culture.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants have basic knowledge in the fields of cultural, art and visual studies in order to develop an understanding of the diversity of cultural forms of expression and their historical contexts.
• Students can reflect critically on colonialism and its impact on art and culture.
• Students can apply critical and equitable perspectives to the representation and visualisation of cultures and their reception.

Visualisations, materiality, techniques and aesthetic forms of expression from an interdisciplinary perspective. Students and participants learn to critically question specific visualisations and aesthetic forms of expression and to understand their effect in different cultural contexts. They work with techniques and materials in order to present their own works concisely.

Target competencies:
• Students and participants can critically question specific visualisations and aesthetic forms of expression and understand their impact in different cultural contexts.
• Students work with different forms of expression, techniques and materials in order to expand the possibilities for their own creative work.
• Students understand how to visualise and present their own work concisely and effectively.

Intergenerational learning, unlearning strategies, peer-to-peer approaches, AI and technology-based learning. Students and participants learn and practise intergenerational and peer-to-peer approaches in order to share knowledge on an equal footing and benefit from each other. They explore AI- and technology-based learning methods to expand their skills in a dynamic, digital learning environment.

Target competencies:
• Students learn and practise intergenerational and peer-to-peer approaches in order to share knowledge on an equal footing and benefit from each other.
• Students explore AI- and technology-based learning methods to expand their skills in a dynamic, digital learning environment.
• Students understand the importance of intergenerational and collaborative learning and knowledge transfer for their personal and professional development.

CoCreate "Spring semester 2025"

Download CoCreate Booklet 25

CoCreate Weeks

Culinary approaches to Basel 2050. A culinary performance along the Rhine from the source, via Basel, to the estuary.
Service project HGK Basel, Institute Arts and Design Education, CoCreate and FoodCultureLab in cooperation with the City of Basel and Forum Städtebau Basel 2025, September 2024.

HGK Basel project management:
Prof. Dr. Nicolaj van der Meulen

Curation Implementation:
Marente van der Valk (NL), marentevandervalk.com; Céline Pelce (F), celinepelce.fr

Other people involved:Romano Zaugg, Maya Müller, Aline Stalder (alumnae:i of the HGK Basel) and students of the Basel Academy of Art and Design FHNW

Concept / Idea:
How does a river interact with its landscape, urban, social and political environment? The concept understands the river in a material and metaphorical sense as an object of networking and transformation of spatio-temporal, social, logistical and physical energy. With regard to the Rhine, which flows through Basel as a ‘blue identity’ and connects the city with its immediate and wider surroundings, with its neighbours, a culinary experience is to be developed as a journey through various ecosystems and questions of future nutrition that the river encounters and carries with it along its movement. From its source high in the mountains to its terminus on the coast of Rotterdam, the Rhine transports as many plants, microorganisms and minerals as it does contemporary questions about the future of its ecosystem and the future of the city itself. What do you taste like, Rhine? Who are you? How do you connect and energise? Are you, Rhine, drinking water, resource or riverbed body?

In the culinary experience of the Network Dinner, food and drink will be the vessels of the questions above, channelling both poetic and political data to create a dialogue between actors and spaces. Orchestrated by culinary artists Marente van der Valk (NL) and Céline Pelcé (FR), former and current students/artists (including Romano Zaugg, Maya Müller and Aline Stalder) from the Basel Academy of Art and Design will develop culinary perspectives and positions.

Design ideas:
B(r)otschaften (Messages out of bread), row of tables as Rhine bend, possible special glass or ceramic designs.