Vacation with an Artist: Anti-Program for Designer Burnout

The online platform Vacation with an Artist (VAWAA) offers designers an alternative to formal education by arranging immersive apprenticeships with artists and artisans worldwide. Instead of following a structured curriculum, participants travel to work alongside practitioners such as a stencil art master in Buenos Aires, a wood turner in Montevideo, a tango teacher in Buenos Aires, an ikebana priestess in Kyoto, a fashion designer and a stamp designer in Hanoi, a bamboo bicycle builder in Bangalore, a healing cuisine expert in Penang (Malaysia), a scholar of sacred Anatolian movements in Istanbul, an engraver in Ljubljana, and fashion brand founders reinterpreting traditional clothing in Prague. Each session involves several hours of hands-on learning in a family-like, informal atmosphere. The program is conceived as an antidote to burnout, allowing designers to regain intensity in their practice by acquiring new skills directly from artists and craftspeople. The article was published in Artribune Magazine #35 and written by Ginevra Bria, art critic and curator at Isisuf – International Institute of Futurism Studies in Milan.