10 Unforgettable Facts You Didn’t Know About the class of 2017

Shenkar Institute for the Innovation and Research of Design in Israel bestowed for the second time it's Bachelor's graduates and graduates of the Masters Program this year. In order to find out what makes this generation of engineers, designers, and artists unique, we sent them a questionnaire full of questions about themselves and their final projects. We synthesized their answers for you below in “10 Unforgettable Facts You Didn’t Know About the class of 2017”

1. It’s Happening!

658 Bachelors and Masters Graduates from the Faculty of Engineering, Design, and Multidisciplinary Art School are off on their way!

2. Not just Israelis, but 32 international students came to study in Shenkar from around the world

Amongst them are students from Iran, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan - and these are just the nations that rhyme with “Khan”.

3. Boys in blue and girls in pink - if not here, then where?

Let us pay our respects to the 5 men who chose to study Jewelry Design (1), Textile Design (2), and Interior Building & Environment (2), and to the 7 women who chose to study Electrical & Electronic Engineering.

4. 43

43 is the age difference between our oldest and youngest graduates, 65 and 22 respectively. The average age of our 2017 graduates is 29 years old.

5. Tiny & large, multisensory, 3 dimensional, and atemporal

2017’s graduates created some very large projects. How large, you ask? Imagine a fridge - now, imagine something larger... About the same amount of projects belong to entirely different dimensions, made of a trillion bites or a million pixels. In the faculty of Jewelry Design, Visual Communication, and Polymers & Plastics Engineering, one can find projects so small that they can fit into your pocket.

6. It’s never too late to fulfill your dreams

Some of Shenkar’s 2017 graduates arrived here after studying Mechanical Engineering, Audio Engineering, Mathematics, Informatics, Economics, Expedition Guidance, Psychology, Biology, Accounting, Yoga, Landscape Architecture, Makeup Art, Photography, Anthroposophy, and even Diamond Evaluation - and we all know diamonds are forever.

7. Here are some juicy details about our graduates that only we know (Shhhhh…)

“I once accidentally showered with a squirrel; When I sing, tears come down my eyes; When I was a toddler, I was in a Pampers commercial; I am the Israeli Sailing Champion and received second place in the World Sailing Championship; I am a fan of royal ceremonies; I only begin my work at every round hour or every half hour on the mark; I once sang with Iggy Pop on stage in the Tel Aviv Convention Center; I love magnets in a way even I cannot explain; I’ve never learned how to ride a bike yet I have an APC tank license; I studied agriculture in high school with a specialty in dairy farming; I can’t wink; I lived without a cellphone for two years and tried to communicate with my partner through telepathy when I didn’t have internet (and sometimes it worked!)”

8. Green is the most prominent color in Shenkar’s 2017 final projects, right after black & white

This is how it might sound like if you try to describe the final projects in their full and subtle range: “grayish-blue; dessert color; water color; denim; dark blue; nude and navy; silver-gray; khaki green; dark purple; metallic silver; brass; orange-red; cement gray; blackened silver; blue-green”, and “the colorfulness of the Israeli street combined with the tonality of a ruined house”.

9. We saw that where there is a keen eye and a sensitive heart, inspiration will always be present

Here is just a partial list of all the objects, persons, and moments that inspired our graduates during their final projects: “fish scales, books; Yaacov Agam and the world of origami; water pollution; Katsaridaphobia - fear of cockroaches; owls; my personal experience of sexual assault; Zoology and scrapbooking; the army service; the current political state in Israel; the question of ‘what would happen if...?’; video games; illustrations in Russian children’s novels; an MBA paper published at Yale University; Biomimetics; Chopin’s Ballade No. 2; movies like ‘Thelma & Louise’; Bonnie & Clyde; American literature and movie series; collaborations between designers; agriculture and nature; dyslexia; the Sinai desert; the everyday; people who think and operate differently than me; women in the Bedouin community and female culture in the 19th century; childhood disproportion; myself; life; music; my grandfather’s dementia; portraits; dog pounds; imagination and reality; color; repairs; buildings in Tel Aviv; human nature; my daughter; the animated series ‘Adventure Time’; Tel Aviv; curious people; Japan; my grandmother; mental health; Eucalyptus trees; kids on the Autism spectrum and second skin; calligraphy and lettering; a person close to me; ritualistic objects; Hayim Nahman Bialik’s poetry; birds; stones; sustainable construction; my parents; Kabuki Theatre in Japan; Israeli Independence banners; my mixed Colombian-Argentinian-Israeli heritage; Disney’s animated film Cinderella; Nino Biniashvili’s graphic novel ‘On the Edge of the Black Sea’ ; travel; kitsch artists; bachelorettes in Tel Aviv; prisons; Wisława Szymborska’s poetry; everyday objects; my family”, and finally, one studetn said: “It started with sand. I have no idea how it got to where it is today.”

10. Turn up the music!

Tune into some of the music that played in the background while our graduates were hard at work on their projects: Norah Jones, John Mayer, Ed Sheeren, Malukah, Girl talk, Amir Benayoun, Radiohead, Static & Ben El Tavori, Queen, Midlake, Justin Bieber ,Agnes Obel, Tori Amos, The Smiths, The Cure, Not On Tour, Rag'nBone Man, The Beatles, Kendrick Lamar, Tal & Aviad from radio Eco99FM Sia, Dudu Tassa & The Kuwaitis, David Bowie, Max Richter, LP, Britney Spears, Kanye West, Portugal the Man, Sagi Kariv, Rhye, Splashh, the soundtrack to Guardians of the Galaxy,Yossi Banai, Coldplay, Alt j, Deep House Music Chill Out, Arabic Music, Gente de zona, Meir Ariel, Shalom Hanoch, Arik Einstein, Daddy Junky, Marina Maximilian, Talking Heads, Foo Fighters, 106FM, Kreator, Neil Young, Sam Smith, Michael Nau, Erykah Badu, Lord of the Rings soundtrack, אהובה עוזרי, Diplo, Loud, Ravi Shankar, Cosma, Zebra Katz, Billie Joel, Gay fm, שלמה ארצי, Arbolito, Rejjie Snow, Indie Music, Israeli Music, Infected Mushroom, Space Cat, Jimi Hendrix, Migos, Beck, Omer Adam, One Republic, Opera, Luciano Pavarotti’s 'O sole mio, Glass Animals, Ricardo Villalobos, and Ethnix.

And that’s it folks - now you can throw your hats in the air because you just graduated from Shenkar!

Published on07-20-2017

Final Projects 2014

Textile Design

From Rags To Apps

Industrial Design

Shenkar Alumni Gathering

Wearable Art Project

עיצוב טקסטיל

Green or Bust: The Department of Fashion Design Presents Sustainable Apparel