Frictional Symbiosis
Belonging, and the Practice of Holding Difference
Curated by June Kyong Trondsen, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, and Ann-Marie Conrado, Notre Dame Department of Art, Art History, and Design
Derived from the Greek for “living together,” symbiosis often suggests harmony. Yet living together is rarely seamless. Belonging is shaped through ongoing negotiation—small adjustments of voice, posture, movement, visibility, and pace. These adaptations are seldom named, but they structure how bodies and institutions coexist. Symbiosis, then, is not the absence of tension but the ongoing work of living together across differences.
Frictional Symbiosis, led by Ann-Marie Conrado of Notre Dame’s Department of Art, Art History, and Design, brings PhD candidate June Kyong Trondsen of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) to Notre Dame for a four-week residency and that culminates in a participatory, site-responsive exhibition and public dialogue at LangLab in South Bend. The exhibition, Holding Difference, will be shaped by materials created during residency activities such as listening sessions, informal encounters, and hands-on workshops across campus and community spaces. Holding Difference will function as an evolving archive of a community’s practice of symbiosis by investigating how cultural values become part of communal life, material environments, and shared spaces.
Credits
June Kyong Trondsen
June Kyong Trondsen is a design researcher working across critical design, participatory practice, and research-driven exhibition formats. She is currently completing a PhD in Design at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in Trondheim, Norway. Trondsen’s work examines how cultural values and affective experiences— particularly friction, displacement, and vulnerability— become materially enacted in objects, rituals, and institutional contexts. Through workshops, speculative tools, and spatial experimentation, Kyong Trondsen investigates how design can surface normative structures and open space for plural forms of belonging.
Ann-Marie Conrado and Notre Dame's Department of Art, Art History, and Design
Ann-Marie Conrado's research uses design to address social and humanitarian concerns. Working primarily in Nepal, she has collaborated with fair trade artisans to design and develop products more in line with contemporary lifestyles. Her interventions have significantly impacted artisan communities struggling to compete in the global marketplace, resulting in increased demand and sales for traditional handicraft communities. She is the founder of Hope Initiative, an international nonprofit working in Nepal to utilize design thinking to address humanitarian concerns in developing countries.
The Department of Art, Art History & Design (AAHD) is a multidisciplinary department offering undergraduate and graduate programs in studio art, art history, and design. Under the guidance of a talented and diverse faculty, students acquire the technical skills necessary to work creatively, develop the ability to think critically, and cultivate the discipline to reflect thoughtfully on the world and our place in it.
Ann-Marie Conrado Discover AAHD
LangLab South Bend
In 2010, LangLab set out to change things by building an arts and trade space, a center of energy, in a 33,000 sq. ft. warehouse. Today, LangLab is a continually growing multi-use co-workspace facility that can be used to engage multiple demographic groups in artistic, musical, and intellectual experiences representing the culture of the South Bend community. The space is able to host a variety of events including: concerts, forums, poetry readings, film screenings, art exhibitions, debates, book signings, theater works, workshops, and community gatherings.
Funding & Support
This is a partner program of the 2027 Notre Dame Arts Biennial, supported with funding from the Notre Dame Arts Initiative.
This project is also made possible with funding from Notre Dame’s Department of Art, Art History, and Design and the Stoekert Design Endowment Grant Award. Venue staffing support provided in kind by LangLab South Bend through the Notre Dame Arts Biennial Venue Activation program.
Images
Artwork by June Kyong Trondsen.