Materialities and experimental aesthetics

Gertrud Olsson is cluster leader of the research cluster Materialities and Experimental Aesthetics. She is a designer and architect with a PhD in Architecture (KTH School of Architecture, Stockholm), and Senior Lecturer in Design Studies at HDK-Valand. Besides being a researcher at GU, she is a visiting researcher at SFII Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul and a member of SFII's Research Council. Gertrud's research, often focusing on colour, perception and materiality, focuses on critical cultural heritage and mediation aspects of design and culture.
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Jessica Hemmings joined HDK in January 2017 as Professor of Crafts. My research interests focus on understanding how textiles contribute to contemporary society; representations of craft in postcolonial literature; how - and why - practitioners write. Indonesia and Zimbabwe are geographical areas of interest.
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Helena Hansson is a senior lecturer at the Design Unit, HDK-Valand. She has a background as an industrial designer, strategic designer and as a teacher. She has worked in several development projects in Sweden within strategic craft development.  
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Daniel Jewesbury is an artist, writer, researcher and curator. In recent years he has worked primarily with film and video installations, photography, text and performance. His work is often centred on issues of place, urban development and the ways in which personal memories and experiences intersect with public ‘events’ that ‘take place’ in the city. However, his research is broad and ranges from urban studies (such as questions around the use of public art in urban profiling and gentrification) to the material cultures of nationalism and postcolonialism, Irish and Northern Irish art historiography and art film.
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Linda Sternö works as Head of Unit for Film Photography and Literary Design and is employed as a lecturer in the subject of film at HDK-Valand. Previously, Linda has taught in the subject of film and within the framework of the government's initiative Kulturskoleklivet starting in 2019. Since 2011, Linda, together with colleagues and alumni from the film programme, has been running the Children's Film School project, which was started with the help of PU funding from the Faculty of Fine Arts. The Children's Film School was awarded Gullspira at the Guldbaggegalan 2016. Linda's research in recent years has focused on developing a film pedagogy based on a digital context.
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Arne Kjell Vikhagen teaches art theory to first year students in Fine Arts. Currently in a coding course for artists as an elective course within the bachelor programme, where they study how to use microcontrollers for artistic purposes. Arne Kjell Vikhagen has been teaching at HDK-Valand since 2000 and has over the years worked in many different constellations and with many subjects, e.g. art theory, media art, technology and art, ludic art, artistic research and physical computing. 
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Maddie Leach is a New Zealand artist of Ashkenazi, English, and Scottish descent. She holds a PhD from the School of Communication and Creative Arts at Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia. Before coming to Gothenburg in 2016, Maddie was a founding member of staff, and Programme Director of the MFA Fine Arts, at Whiti o Rehua / The School of Art at Massey University in Wellington, New Zealand. In September 2020, she was awarded a four-year research grant from Formas (the Swedish Research Council for Sustainable Development) for the project The Fountain: An Art-Technology Social Drama.
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