The Production Platform is the collaborative structure through which new design-research projects are developed within BIO 29. Rooted in Slovenia and connected to a wider network of practitioners, researchers, institutions, industries and communities, it supports situated forms of inquiry, experimentation and knowledge exchange.

Guided by Martina Muzi and Ro Pérez Gayo, the platform supports projects developed across three of the biennial’s four frameworks: Experimental Practices, Extended Transmissions, and Afterclass. At its core are twenty-one participants selected through the BIO 29 Open Call, working in collaboration with the Curatorial Team, the BIO 29 team, and a broad network of Slovenian and international contributors.

The platform emerged through five points of departure—Eco-technical Entanglements, Industrial Cycles, Bordered Infrastructures, Maintenance, and Experience Regimes—which continue to inform the projects as fields of inquiry. Through research, site visits, workshops, prototyping and long-term collaboration, the Production Platform creates the conditions for design to engage with the social, ecological and technological realities that shape contemporary life.

Experimental practices

Experimental practices supports the development of new design-research projects through collaboration between selected designers, the curatorial team, local expertise in Slovenia, and institutional and industry partners. While a shared thematic orientation provides a common point of departure, each new design-research project is a locally situated case developed through its own methodology and in response to its specific context, needs and working conditions.

Afterclass

In the Biennial process, this framework functions as a laboratory for understanding local practices in relation to international design urgencies, and as a curatorial experiment for supporting the development of the other BIO 29 frameworks.

It operates as a transversal layer, engaging with interdisciplinary research, cultural and educational institutions, industry partners, and local knowledge holders and their ongoing inquiries, projects and expertise for the formulation of the publishing outcomes. It directly connects with local agents and their sites of work, documentations, publications, archives, stories and processes.

Works of Resonance

Works of Resonance connects BIO 29 with designers, collectives and initiatives operating in diverse localities through satellite projects and parallel activations. Instead of exporting the biennial’s structure, this platform engages with existing practices, reactivating or amplifying ongoing activities that resonate with BIO 29’s concerns and modes of engagement through design.