VIRTUAL Prague Research & Teaching Conference
Abstract
This paper presents an educational approach developed within the Mindful Design Studio at the Eugeniusz Geppert Academy of Art and Design in Wrocław. Positioned at the intersection of design, critical humanities, and care ethics, the studio fosters a pedagogy of techno-empathy—a framework for design education that foregrounds emotional intelligence, sustainability, and critical reflection on technological systems. Addressing the emotional and cognitive pressures faced by today’s art and design students—such as digital overstimulation, eco-anxiety, and techno-fatigue—the studio invites learners to slow down, reflect, and design anti-products: interactive objects that resist commercial logic and instead provoke awareness, presence, and relational thinking. Examples include Moody, a scent-based device supporting memory and emotional processing through AI-driven feedback; Exerceye, a visual prosthesis for healthy screen use; and InMirror, a speculative mirror disrupting body-image loops. All projects emerge from a collaborative teaching model rooted in slowness, mindfulness, and participatory exploration. This post-growth pedagogy challenges dominant narratives of productivity in higher education, instead prioritizing wellbeing, ecological sensitivity, and long-term social value. Drawing on speculative design, ecological humanities, and critical pedagogies, the paper reflects on how small-scale studio practices can enable students to respond meaningfully to complex global conditions—by designing not for efficiency, but for empathy, reflection, and repair.
Dominika Sobolewska is a design professor, interdisciplinary artist and curator affiliated with the Wroclaw Academy of Art & Design (Poland). She leads the Mindful Design Studio for Interactive Spaces and Objects, a collaborative platform exploring socially engaged design, techno-empathy and environmental awareness. Her research and teaching combine critical design, participatory methods and simple interactive technologies. Sobolewska develops site-specific installations and empathy-driven prototypes addressing the emotional, ecological and ethical dimensions of design.