Best Etab II – New Exploitation Concepts for Collaborations of Artists and Scientists

Background

The programme »Artist in Lab« enables collaborations between scientists and artists/designers by funding interdisciplinary projects. Oriented along the goal of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, selected artists and designers gain the opportunity of collaborating with scientists of the Fraunhofer institutes engaging in the network »Science, Art and Design« (WKD). Thereby, innovative participative approaches for the inclusion of new stakeholders in scientific processes are developed. Additionally, the programme fosters the trans- and interdisciplinary exchange between the diverse institutes of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft.

Goal

The subproject »Open-IP« aims to develop an approach that supports both partners, the artists/designers and the scientists, in finding a joint decision concerning the exploitation of their results. This is about hybrid exploitation approaches, i.e. a combination of Intellectual Property (IP) protection on the one hand, and wide dissemination of the gathered results (e.g. by art exhibitions or scientific publication) on the other hand.

The knowledge gained from this approaches shall be implemented into exploitation-strategic considerations to continuously foster collaborations between heterogeneous partners, and to shape them legally secured. Moreover, these findings are transferred into practical help and tools for the cooperating partners of the residence programme »Artist in Lab« to medium term enable them to deal with different matters of exploitation sovereignly.

Role of Fraunhofer IRB

The Fraunhofer IRB offers the network WKD guidance and support regarding the tension field of IP protection and exploitation of project results (Open Science), and the in collaborations between scientists and artists up-coming questions regarding scientific and economic exploitation.

Besides qualitative surveys for detecting needs and previous practices, the existing contract works are analysed in respect of their applicability in such new forms of collaboration in close cooperation with the Fraunhofer headquarters. Based on these analyses additional practical guidance will be developed.

Results

The practical guidance is provided by a guideline (German only), in correspondence with a license factsheet (German only) completed by an overview (German only). All members of the network WKD, as well as their project partners can use these tools and information for future projects.