Living Labs

Living Labs image

We make new things happen.

Living Labs (LL) develops and supports creative projects in art, design and media.

We collaborate with faculty and partners to produce projects with a focus on emerging and ascendent technologies.

A living lab is a research concept. It is a user-centred, open innovation ecosystem, often operating in a location-based context, integrating concurrent research and innovation processes within a partnership.

In 2018, we launched Shumka Centre for Creative Entrepreneurship to act as a hub for activities relating to entrepreneurship at Emily Carr University with the aim of establishing a place where creative practitioners can find community and knowledge, as well as a connection to the resources they need to launch, fund, and organize projects across the spectrum of contemporary art and design activities.

In 2022, we established AI Futures for Art + Design to catalyze dialogue about the evolving impacts of AI technologies on the fields of art and design.

Past and current partners include HIGHLINE, GrowLab, Microsoft, the Beedie School of Business (SFU), Mozilla, the International Symposium on Electronic Art (ISEA), Shelfie, Drive BI, Koho, Retsly, Spark CRM, Callings, Discovery Media House, Pressboard, Cognilab, Print2Peer, Control, Foodee, Silkstart, Farm at Hand, A & K Robotics, Curatio, Cassia Research, NearTuit, Downtown Prince George, Two Rivers Gallery, Citystudio, and the City of Vancouver.

Some Living Labs Projects

AI Futures for Art + Design
Led by Kate Armstrong, AI Futures for Art + Design catalyzes dialogue about the evolving impacts of AI technologies on the fields of art and design, including examining new models of collaborative production made possible by AI, exploring social, cultural, and economic conditions introduced by AI technologies, and tracing formal and aesthetic developments emerging as a result of AI technologies in art and design practice.

Mobil Art School Partnership
Led by Julia Conejero, the research project engages a team of Emily Carr designers to research and design a responsive high fidelity prototype of a new mobile app for Mobil Art School focused on collaborative drawing. Throughout November 2019 – March 2020, the team considered look and feel, visual identity, user onboarding, user flows relating to managing timed user responses, image/output sharing on social media, and points/rating systems relating to freemium model.

Float School
Led by Justin Langlois and Holly Schmidt, Float School explored the form of a School through an examination of the earliest understanding of the word, drawing from the etymological base of skholē, which translates as spare time, leisure, rest, or ease. The project embarked on collectively imagining and enacting multiple futures for the role that art, public engagement, and learning can play in Canadian society through inquiry, activity, and slow action. Float School aims to spark the next phase of dialogue around socially engaged art, one that draws from Canada’s specific history of artist-run-culture, and generates an innovative new approach to locating art in rich and complex proximities to public, commons, the natural environment, and learning.

Ten Different Things invited artists to create new works in the spirit of free inquiry at the intersection of public art, community engagement and civic process. Realized throughout 2017-2018, the ten artist-initiated temporary projects took a variety of forms—events, installations, residencies, interventions—and explored conditions of how culture is experienced in Vancouver or provoked new visions of art and civic life. Curated by Kate Armstrong, the series is a collaboration between the City of Vancouver Public Art Program, CityStudio Vancouver and Living Labs at Emily Carr University of Art + Design.

Omineca Arts Centre (established 2017) is an interdisciplinary, locally-led artist run centre established on occupied and unceded Lheidli T'enneh Territory in the heart of downtown Prince George, B.C. that is grounded in arts-based community development. Omineca Arts sets to facilitate collaboration and diversify opportunities for emerging and professional artists, performers, community organizations, Aboriginal and cultural groups, and citizens in Northern BC to co-develop meaningful artistic projects and experiences while exploring new models for catalyzing community development through the arts in Prince George and surrounding communities. Omineca Arts has been established through a partnership with Living Labs at Emily Carr University of Art + Design and Two Rivers Gallery.

The Neighbourhood Time Exchange | Downtown Prince George (2016-2017) is an artist residency model developed by Justin Langlois that operates on a simple principle: for every hour an artist spends in their studio, they contribute an hour of volunteer time working with a Community Partner. This residency uses the concept of time banking, in which artists and community members work together for mutual benefit. Community Partners provide ideas, their expertise on the needs of the city, and a context for the artist. Artists provide their vision, their unique perspectives, and their specialized skills.

Scotiabank Platform for Entrepreneurs
A platform to support entrepreneurship for artists and designers that includes a partnership with Launch Academy and a collaborative product development class for students from Emily Carr and SFU’s Beedie School of Business that won a Core 77 Design Award for Design Education in 2015

Living Labs applies art and design methodologies to projects at the intersection of the following key areas:

New ideas that work: Investigating partnered research as a form of creative praxis that establishes frameworks for art and design entrepreneurs to innovate, fostering the creation of “new ideas that work”.

Organizational models: Exploring emergent organizational models in business and technology by creating innovative partnerships that allow for both theoretical observation on the level of the model and the practical integration of students into real-world frameworks. What organizational constructs in business and technology are emerging now, and how can the art and design university work with, in and through them to achieve broader relevance?

Living Labs wants to hear from you:

livinglabs[at]ecuad.ca

Kate Armstrong, Director, Living Labs
karmstrong[at]ecuad.ca
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Let's Do Something Together.

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Research welcomes inquiries from industry and community groups who wish to partner. Contact livinglabs[at]ecuad.ca regarding partnerships, collaborations, and how to initiate access to our subject matter experts, leading edge technologies, and next generation talent.

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Partnership with Emily Carr Research enables industry partners and collaborators to access government funding available for innovation and the advancement of research. Review your funding opportunities on the Research page.