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In this episode of History Now, Livia Rezende and Isabel Rousset explore the ways in which international exchange and transcultural connections inform design and visual histories.

History Now seminars explore current and compelling issues affecting the practice of contemporary history. It is a long-running series of public talks and discussions, bringing new perspectives to all aspects of historical practice. This year History Now is a collaboration between the History Council of NSW (HCNSW), the State Library of NSW and the Australian Centre for Public History (ACPH) at UTS. History Now 2024 is programmed by Jesse Adams Stein (Vice President of HCNSW / Member of ACPH).

Dr Isabel Rousset is an architectural historian and a Research Fellow at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). Her research explores historical cross-sections between art, architecture, and politics. Her book The Architecture of Social Reform: Housing, Tradition and German Modernism was recently published by Manchester University Press and explores how the past was used to shape debates on housing design in modern Germany. Her current research project at UTS explores the experiences and impact of Central European migrant architects in Australia.

Dr Livia Rezende, SFHEA, has a PhD in History of Design, is Senior Lecturer and Postgraduate Research Coordinator at UNSW Art & Design, Sydney. Her current research project examines the formation of transnational networks that led to the institutionalisation of modern design in Latin America during the Cold War. Her previous research discussed national identity formation and raw material displays in nineteenth-century International Exhibitions, Expositions Universelles and World’s Fairs. Dr Rezende’s work have been published in Design & Displacement (Routledge, 2023), Building-Object(2022), Schools of Departure (Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, 2022), and various academic journals. She serves as Book Series Editor for the Manchester University Press and Editor for the Journal of Design History.

Dr Jesse Adams Stein is a Senior Lecturer and ARC DECRA Fellow at UTS School of Design. She is an interdisciplinary design researcher whose work explores less popular and hidden sides of design, such as industrial craft, repair, small-scale manufacturing and human labour, in both historical and contemporary contexts. Stein is the author of Hot Metal (Manchester 2016) and Industrial Craft in Australia (Palgrave 2021). With Dr Chantel Carr, Stein was founder and organiser of the interdisciplinary 2023 symposium All Hands on Deck, which led to the development of two scholarly book collections (edited with Carr), Designing through Planetary Breakdown and Working through Planetary Breakdown (both Routledge, forthcoming). Stein is deeply involved in the Australian history sector, as an oral historian, as Vice President of the History Council of NSW, and as 2024 Program Director of the history talk series, History Now.

Recording date: 7 August 2024.

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