Attempts, failures, trials and errors. Notes on an exhibition of failed prototypes and rejected projects

In this paper, we present the history, the concept and the results of “Attempts, Failures, Trials and Errors” exhibition project which was first presented in the frame of Piksel Festival in Bergen, Norway (November 2017) and later on at “Salonul de Proiecte”, Bucharest, Romania (February 2018). The project aimed to incite the e-textiles artists and designers to reflect upon the way they are engaging with their failures, as well as to the way in which they use these failures to better understand the context in which they are working and to continue to experiment. Our approach reverses the common R&D constructivist methods, by using deconstruction as a process of investigation in the field of wearable technologies and e-textiles. By questioning the ideas and the concepts of failure and success, the project puts an emphasis on art’s capacity to be critical, while at the same time to poetically and self-ironically address contemporary challenges and concerns.