ALL THE INVISIBLE THINGS

All The Invisible Things is a co-design project with a focus on explorative design inquiries and experiments on how to create dialogue within the topic of mental illness.

Words are sometimes not covering, when it comes to explaining mental vulnerabilities. Therefore we tried to tell stories through materials, rather than words. With our project we want to create a relatable experience that can help people gain empathy with people challenged by vulnerable minds.

Our motivation for doing this project stems from experiences with witnessing how people we love have struggled to explain what mental illness feels like in order for other people to understand it. Often people try to explain mental illness with metaphors, but what if we tried to create some of these metaphors in a material way, could that perhaps help the understanding between people?

This project has been an experiment in what we chose to call material talk. We wanted to explore how we could use co-design methods in trying to create an experiential dialogue tool that could help people to experience what mental illness feels like. Whit experiential dialogue tool, we mean that we aim for an object that provides an experience which provokes reflections in order to broaden one’s perspective, which can feed into a more reflected dialogue.

8 yuong adults contributed to the project by telling their stories through materials. There were obvious simiralities between the contributers' experiences. We condensed the experiences to three big pieces which was exhibited at Bryggekælderen, a part of Islands Brygges Library. The visitors at the exhibition were invited to interact with the pieces in order to get a better understanding of how mental illness can feel. Furthermore the exhibition gave the visitors the chance to do material responses and share material stories as well.

The project is carried out in collaboration with Kirstine Elmhøj Hansen