Co-creating sustainable futures – The MUSAE Factory Model for SDG-oriented innovation through art and technology
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.69143/2464-9309/19202026Keywords:
art-technology collaboration, anticipatory innovation, sustainable development, industry 5.0, art-driven design futuresAbstract
Innovation is central to advancing the Sustainable Development Goals and European agendas, yet current models struggle to address systemic complexity, trade-offs, and long-term transitions. This contribution presents the MUSAE project and its open-source Factory Model, an art-driven, futures-oriented operational framework aligned with the Industry 5.0 paradigm. At its core is the Design Futures Art-driven (DFA) method, which integrates trend analysis, visioning, ideation, and prototyping by combining artistic experimentation, design, technological development, and co-creation with artificial intelligence. Tested through art-and-technology residencies in the context of ‘food as medicine’, MUSAE shows how shared visions of the future can generate prototypes up to TRL5 and foster systemic synergies. The model interprets SDG 9 as an enabler of integrated, human- and planet-centred innovation under conditions of uncertainty.
Article info
Received: 10/03/2026; Revised: 24/04/2026; Accepted: 29/04/2026
Downloads
Article Metrics Graph
References
Ahern, D. (2025), “The New Anticipatory Governance Culture for Innovation – Regulatory Foresight, Regulatory Experimentation and Regulatory Learning”, in European Business Organization Law Review, vol. 26, issue 1, pp. 241-283. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1007/s40804-025-00348-7 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Barbero, S. and Ferrulli, E. (2023), “Transizione ecologica e digitale – Il Design Sistemico nei processi di innovazione aperta delle PMI | Ecological and digital transition – Systemic Design in SMEs open innovation processes”, in Agathón | International Journal of Architecture, Art and Design, vol. 13, pp. 269-280. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.19229/2464-9309/13232023 [Accessed 27 April 2026].
Bühring, J. H. and Liedtka, J. (2018), “Embracing systematic futures thinking at the intersection of Strategic Planning, Foresight and Design”, in Journal of Innovation Management, vol. 6, issue 3, pp. 134-152. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.24840/2183-0606_006-003_0006 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Bogers, M., Chesbrough, H. and Moedas, C. (2018), “Open innovation – Research, practices, and policies”, in California Management Review, vol. 60, issue 2, pp. 5-16. [Online] Available at: /doi.org/10.1177/0008125617745086 [Accessed 12 April 2026].
Candy, S. and Dunagan, J. (2016), “Designing an experiential scenario – The People Who Vanished”, in Futures, vol. 86, pp. 136-153. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2016.05.006 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Canina, M. and Monestier, E. (2023), “Design Futures to support Sustainable Food practices”, in De Sainz Molestina, D., Galluzzo, L., Rizzo, F. and Spallazzo, D. (eds.), IASDR 2023 – Life-Changing Design, 9-13 October, Milan, Italy, pp. 1-15. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.21606/iasdr.2023.521 [Accessed 12 April 2026].
Castillo-Rutz, N. and Purg, P. (eds) (2021), MAST Manual – Education for innovation through social values, Akademija Umetnosti – School of Arts. [Online] Available at: mastmodule.eu/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/MAST_manual_www.pdf [Accessed 12 April 2026].
Ceschin, F. and Gaziulusoy, I. (2016), “Evolution of Design for Sustainability – From Product Design to Design for System Innovations and Transitions”, in Design Studies, vol. 47, pp. 118-163. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2016.09.002 [Accessed 12 April 2026].
Design Council (2005), The Double Diamond design process model, Design Council, London. [Online] Available at: designcouncil.org.uk/our-resources/the-double-diamond/ [Accessed 12 April 2026].
Dolejsova, M., Ampatzidou, C., Houston, L., Light, A., Botero, A., Choi, J., Wilde, D., Altarriba Bertran, F. A., Davis, H., Gil, F. G. G. and Catlow, R. (2021), “Designing for transformative futures – Creative practice, social change and climate emergency”, in Sas, S. and Maiden, N. (eds), Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Creativity and Cognition – C&C’21, Venice, Italy, June 22-23, 2021, Association for Computing Machinery, New York (NY), article 3, pp. 1-9. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1145/3450741.3465242 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Dunne, A. and Raby, F. (2013), Speculative Everything – Design, Fiction, and Social Dreaming, The MIT Press, Cambridge (MA).
Efremenko, T., Bruno, C., Monestier, E. and Canina, M. (2025), “The Design Futures Art-driven (DFA) Method – Structuring Art-Tech Collaboration for Sustainable Future of Food System”, in Ahram, T., Karwowski, W. and Kalra, J. (eds), Human Factors in Design, Engineering, and Computing – AHFE (2025) International Conference, vol 199, AHFE International, USA, pp. 93-104. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.54941/ahfe1006821 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Escobar, A. (2018), Designs for the pluriverse – Radical interdependence, autonomy, and the making of worlds, Duke Press University, United States.
EUNIC – EU National Institute for Culture (2019), Art + Tech Report – Stakeholder investigation. [Online] Available at: eunic.eu/media/site/4f725e1ad1-1753182943/art-tech-report-2019_eunic-silicon-valley.pdf [Accessed 24 March 2026].
European Commission (2021), Industry 5.0 – Towards a sustainable, human-centric and resilient European industry, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg. [Online] Available at: data.europa.eu/doi/10.2777/308407 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
European Commission (2020), A Farm to Fork strategy for a fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly food system. [Online] Available at: food.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2020-05/f2f_action-plan_2020_strategy-info_en.pdf [Accessed 10 April 2026].
European Commission (2019), Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the European Council, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions – The European Green Deal, document 52019DC0640, COM/2019/640 final. [Online] Available at: eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52019DC0640 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Guston, D. H. (2014), “Understanding ‘anticipatory governance’”, in Social Studies of Science, vol. 44, issue 2, pp. 218-242. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1177/0306312713508669 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
In4Art (2020), Art-driven innovation – A new path to innovation-led sustainable growth. [Online] Available at: in4art.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/In4Art-ADI-Whitepaper.pdf [Accessed 10 April 2026].
Irwin, T. (2015), “Transition design – A proposal for a new area of design practice, study, and research”, in Design and Culture, vol. 7, issue 2, pp. 229-246. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1080/17547075.2015.1051829 [Accessed 10 April 2026].
Klein, M., Gerlitz, L. and Spychalska-Wojtkiewicz, M. (2021), “Cultural and creative industries as a boost for innovation and sustainable development of companies in cross-innovation process”, in Procedia Computer Science, vol. 192, pp. 4218-4226. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2021.09.198 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Mazzucato, M. (2018), “Mission Oriented Innovation Policy – Challenges and Opportunities”, in Industrial and Corporate Change, vol. 27, issue 5, pp. 803-815. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1093/icc/dty034 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Miller, R. (ed.) (2018), Transforming the Future – Anticipation in the 21st Century, Routledge, London. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.4324/9781351048002 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Minski, K. (2020), Collaboration in experimental art – Case studies in co-creation, transdisciplinarity, and art-science practice at Ars Electronica Futurelab, Doctoral Thesis, University of Newcastle, Callaghan. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.34658.66242 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Monestier, E., Efremenko, T., Fiore, M. and Canina, M. (2024), “Beyond Boundaries – Art-Tech Collaboration Driving Future-Oriented Innovation”, in Markopoulos, E., Goonetilleke, R. S. and Luximon, Y. (eds), Creativity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship – Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics and the Affiliated Conferences, Nice, France, July 24-27, 2024, AHFE International, New York, AHFE International Book Series, vol. 125, pp. 134-143. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.54941/ahfe1004729 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Morin, E. (2020), “Per l’uomo è tempo di ritrovare sé stesso”, interview by Scialoja, A., in Avvenire.it, 15/04/2020. [Online] Available at: avvenire.it/agora/pagine/per-luomo-tempo-di-ritrovare-se-stesso [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Nambisan, S., Wright, M. and Feldman, M. (2019), “The digital transformation of innovation and entrepreneurship – Progress, challenges and key themes”, in Research Policy, vol. 48, issue 8, pp. 1-9. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2019.03.018 [Accessed 10 April 2026].
Nazarko, Ł. (2019), “Responsible research and innovation – A conceptual contribution to theory and practice of technology management”, in Business | Theory and Practice, vol. 20, pp. 342-351. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.3846/btp.2019.32 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Nilsson, M., Griggs, D. and Visbeck, M. (2016), “Policy – Map the interactions between Sustainable Development Goals”, in Nature vol. 534, pp. 320-322. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1038/534320a [Accessed 8 April 2026].
OECD – Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (2024), 7th OECD World Forum on Well-being – Summary of key messages. [Online] Available at: oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/networks/oecd-well-being-world-forums/7wf/7wf-summary-key-messages.pdf [Accessed 27 April 2026].
OECD – Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (2018), OECD Science, Technology and Innovation Outlook 2018 – Adapting to Technological and Societal Disruption, OECD Publishing, Paris. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1787/sti_in_outlook-2018-en [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Pham-Truffert, M., Metz, F., Fischer, M., Rueff, H. and Messerli, P. (2020), “Interactions among Sustainable Development Goals – Knowledge for identifying multipliers and virtuous cycles”, in Sustainable Development, vol. 28, issue 5, pp. 1236-1250. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1787/sti_in_outlook-2018-en [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Purg, P., Cacciatore, S. and Gerbec, J. C. (2023), “Establishing ecosystems for disruptive innovation by cross-fertilizing entrepreneurship and the arts”, in Creative Industries Journal, vol. 16, issue 2, pp. 115-145. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1080/17510694.2021.1969804 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Schnugg, C. and Song, B. (2020), “An organizational perspective on ArtScience collaboration – Opportunities and challenges of platforms to collaborate with artists”, in Journal of Open Innovation | Technology, Market, and Complexity, vol. 6, issue 1, article 6, pp. 1-20. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.3390/joitmc6010006 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Schot, J. and Steinmueller, W. E. (2018), “Three frames for innovation policy – R&D, systems of innovation and transformative change”, in Research Policy, vol. 47, issue 9, pp. 1554-1567. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1016/j.respol.2018.08.011 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Stirling, A. (2015), Emancipating transformations – From controlling ‘the transition’ to culturing plural radical progress, STEPS Centre, University of Sussex, Brighton. [Online] Available at: steps-centre.org/wp-content/uploads/Transformations.pdf [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Tonkinwise, C. (2015), “Design for transitions – From and to what?”, in Design Philosophy Papers, vol. 13, issue 1, pp. 85-92. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1080/14487136.2015.1085686 [Accessed 8 April 2026].
Tõnurist, P. and A. Hanson (2020), Anticipatory innovation governance – Shaping the future through proactive policy making, OECD Publishing, Paris. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1787/cce14d80-en [Accessed 8 April 2026].
UN – United Nations (2023), The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2023 – Special Edition, United Nations, New York. [Online] Available at: unstats.un.org/sdgs/report/2023/The-Sustainable-Development-Goals-Report-2023.pdf [Accessed 27 April 2026].
UN – United Nations (2015), Transforming our World – The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. [Online] Available at: sdgs.un.org/2030agenda [Accessed 8 April 2026].
UNDRR – United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (2022), Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction 2022 – Our world at risk – Transforming governance for a resilient future. [Online] Available at: undrr.org/media/79595/download?startDownload=20260429 [Accessed 27 April 2026].
Valenti, A., Scalisi, F., Sposito, C., Dellamotta, L. and Masserdotti, A. (2024), “Energia, tecnologia emotiva e valore culturale dei dati – Creare consapevolezza nell’utente con lo storytelling | Energy, emotional technology and cultural value of data – Creating user awareness through storytelling”, in Agathón | International Journal of Architecture, Art and Design, vol. 15, pp. 70-83. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.19229/2464-9309/1552024 [Accessed 27 April 2026].
van Vliet, R. G. (2020), S+T+ARTS – Collaboration toolkit, STARTS Ecosystem. [Online] Available at: starts.eu/wp-content/uploads/starts-toolkit-13july2020.pdf [Accessed 10 April 2026].
van Vliet, L. G., Coto, M., Duarte, M., Soldati, M., Wierinck, N., van Vliet, R. G. and Birsel, Z. (2024), Creativity meets industry – A practical guide to transformative partnerships, Better Factory. [Online] Available at: starts.eu/wp-content/uploads/Better-factory-toolkit.pdf [Accessed 10 April 2026].
Voros, J. (2003), “A generic foresight process framework”, in Foresight, vol. 5, issue 3, pp. 10-21. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.1108/14636680310698379 [Accessed 10 April 2026].
Whitaker, A. (2016), Art thinking – How to carve out creative space in a world of schedules, budgets and bosses, HarperBusiness, New York.
Zannoni, M., Succini, L., Rosato, L. and Pasini, V. (2024), “Transitional industrial designer – La responsabilità di progettisti e imprese per una transizione sostenibile | Transitional industrial designer – The responsibility of designers and companies for a sustainable transition”, in Agathón | International Journal of Architecture, Art and Design, vol. 15, pp. 332-343. [Online] Available at: doi.org/10.19229/2464-9309/15282024 [Accessed 27 April 2026].
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
Categories
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Marita Canina, Tatiana Efremenko
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
This Journal is published under Creative Commons Attribution Licence 4.0 (CC-BY).
License scheme | Legal code
This License allows anyone to:
Share: copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format.
Adapt: remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.
Under the following terms
Attribution: Users must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made; users may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses them or their use.
No additional restrictions: Users may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
Notices
Users do not have to comply with the license for elements of the material in the public domain or where your use is permitted by an applicable exception or limitation.
No warranties are given. The license may not give users all of the permissions necessary for their intended use. For example, other rights such as publicity, privacy, or moral rights may limit how you use the material.
