24H WORLDWIDE DESIGN CONVERSATIONS. AN AUDIOVISUAL FORMAT TO ENHANCE THE CREATION OF A WORLDWIDE RESEARCH NETWORK

The pandemic that the whole world has been facing has highlighted some of the fragilities of society. From a system of values that we took for granted and has, at the same time, brought to the surface limitations in the economic system to new paradigms and unexpected energies we did not dare to put into practice before. Different challenges and initiatives are trying to explore this theme, such as the New European Bauhaus launched by the EU trying to shape a collaborative movement of designers to rethink and replan promising practises for our future. Following this direction, we'd like to contribute to shaping this movement, giving voice to designers and researchers that can and must play a leading role in the current transformation. In doing so, we decided to open a worldwide debate dedicated to the culture of the project in June 2020, during the COVID-19 outbreak. The result was an educational and research experience named 24h Worldwide Design Conversations, powered by the PoliMi Design System community (Department of Design, School of Design, and POLI.design Consortium): a continuous 24-hour live broadcast dedicated to the culture of the project, oriented towards reflection on design practice changes. The article's focus is the 24H Worldwide Design Conversations experience that has been designed from the beginning as an audiovisual format to support internationalisation and sharing knowledge. Since the emergency we faced seems to have generated, among its side effects, a better individual relationship with technology, we would like to propose some reflections on how we should maintain and integrate this audiovisual format as a learning device within design curricula in terms of 1) use of storytelling as a coping device; 2) use of digital technologies and digital platforms for the enhancement of debates, networking, and connections among educators, researchers, students and practitioners within the design field.