Abigail Durrant
Throughout my career I have engaged in creative practices to explore peoples' relationships with digital technologies.
Nowadays, there are few places that are untouched by some kind of digital network, hence the emergence of new and interesting challenges for the design of sustainable interactive systems.
I am particularly interested in understanding peoples' changing conceptions of the personal computer and its role in our everyday lives.
I am currently undertaking an inter-disciplinary PhD, sponsored by Microsoft
Research, at the University
of Surrey.
Combining social psychology and interaction design research, this project
explores how photographs become resources for the everyday expression
and empowerment of people's identities in the family home, in order to
inform digital display innovation in domestic spaces.
The project is positioned in the field of Human Computer Interaction (HCI).
A one-page overview is available to download [PDF]:
Designing
Photographic Experiences to Support Autobiographical Memory.
I recently co-authored a paper for the ECSCW conference in September 07,
entitled 'Designing
family photo displays'.
I am co-organising a workshop at CHI2008: Collocated
Social Practices Surrounding Photos; Florence, 05-10
April 2008. I will also be participating in CHI Interactivity: Speculative
Devices for Photo Display (to appear).
The inter-disciplinary nature of my inquiry raises questions about the
role of design as a research activity. [I co-organised a workshop at CHI2007
conference: Exploring
Design as a Research Activity.]
My critical approach to interaction design research has been fuelled by
my professional experience as a filmmaker, ethnographer and fine artist.
I gained my Masters degree in Interaction Design from the Royal College
of Art in 2004 and my Bachelors degree in Fine Art from the University
of Newcastle in 2000. Select links to view a project from my Masters portfolio,
Muse for Lost Memories (2004), and my Masters
dissertation Virtual
Memory: Vulnerable by Design (2003).
Since
October 04 I have been working as a design ethnographer for Naked
Eye Research, conducting qualitative research to inform
commercial innovation strategies. Clients include healthcare, consumer
goods and telecommunications sectors.
The project portfolio includes research conducted with a healthcare client
on an international study for the development of clinical trials, assistive
services and technologies to support Alzheimer's Disease through understanding
daily experience for patients & carers.
I continue to practise as a professional artist, represented internationally. Select link to view examples of past work: fine art projects.