UTS x Shanghai University Creative Industries Showcase 2025
WHEN
15 October 2025
Wednesday
2.00pm - 8.00pm Australia/Sydney
17 October 2025
Friday
9.00am - 5.00pm Australia/Sydney
WHERE
City campus
UTS Buildings 1, 2, Data Arena
COST
Free admission
RSVP
CONTACT
Celebrating cross-cultural creativity
Celebrating more than 30 years of international relations between both universities, the UTS x Shanghai University Creative Industries Showcase, held between 15 and 17 October, is designed to strengthen academic and industry collaborations, bridging the creative communities in Australia and China.
This 2025 showcase celebrates the powerful intersection of creativity and commerce, highlighting how we collaborate with our respective creative sectors — spanning animation, film, sound, media, urban design, fashion, architecture, and design — shape economic, social, and cultural landscapes. Over these next three years, this initiative will bring together students, faculty, industry professionals, and cultural leaders to share knowledge, spark new ideas, and form lasting partnerships.
In addition to celebrating the creative industries, this initiative also highlights our UTS Faculty of Design and Society, showcasing our expertise in innovative creative education and practice. By engaging key academic, industry, and community stakeholders, this event aims to become a catalyst for innovation and interdisciplinary collaboration, benefiting not only students and faculty but also the broader creative sector.
This three year series collaboration (2025–2027) between UTS and Shanghai University (SHU) will not only deepen the relationship between Australia and China but also position both institutions as leaders in creative industries education and research, facilitating an ongoing exchange of ideas and expertise.
Open exhibition – 15 to 17 October
There will be an open exhibition and a series of experiential workshops across 15 to 17 October featuring creative research outputs from academics and students across both universities.
This is an exciting opportunity to engage with the best minds in creative industries, expand your global network, and be part of a lasting cultural and academic partnership between Australia and China. Whether you’re an academic, a professional, or simply passionate about the creative sector, we look forward to seeing you there.
Explore the full program below.
Open exhibition
The exhibits from Shanghai University (SHU) are split into three themes:
Exhibits showcase how Chinese Intangible Cultural Heritage draws inspiration from bamboo and how it is widely integrated into their daily lives through weaving and carvings.
Discover how the new Baowu Campus of the Shanghai Academy of Fine Arts at Shanghai University was transformed from a steel mill via a series of display panels and videos.
Exhibits include exquisite weaving and embroidery crafts (including kesi - silk tapestry), diverse and delicate weaving and embroidery crafts of Chinese ethnic minorities and contemporary trendy clothing integrating weaving the embroidery elements.
UTS exhibits
UTS exhibits include:
3D Formwork and Printed Products from our Advanced Fabrication Research Laboratory which focuses on sustainable design and custom fabrication, driving forward the boundaries of digital fabrication and advanced manufacturing.
Reveals the complex network of production behind the iPhone, an ordinary item used by people globally. The artists invite viewers to consider the vast supply chain footprint and their own involvement in the lifecycle of the iPhone and everyday objects more broadly.
Body Form explores distorted human body forms and defamiliarisations through studio-based photography.
Home featuring posters of students’ work that are currently exhibited in the Australian Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale. A presentation of what home means to them – based on Indigenous-led design, storytelling, and objects (Living Belongings) that reflect deep connections to Country, culture and community.
Using generative artificial intelligence and cutting-edge seamless knitting technology, two seamless knitted pullovers were produced, inspired by Australian knitter Myra Mogg's award winning original 1930s hand-knitted garments held in the Powerhouse Collection.
Together Apart is a powerful and intimate new album by Australian composer and multi-instrumentalist Brent Keogh. Written during the isolating years of the COVID-19 pandemic, these reflective chamber works draw on global folk traditions, contemporary classical forms, and acoustic improvisation to explore themes of distance, memory, and resilience.
Yarns about Blak Joy explores concepts of Blak Joy and knitting through conversations with Aboriginal Australians. Through Blak Joy of knitting, garments where created for each participant - a conduit for their stories and materialisation of their Joy.
The purpose of Wild Futures is to study urban habitats that promote pollinator ecologies in symbiosis with humans within the city of Sydney.
Experiential workshops and screenings
Explore past and current student animation films from our undergraduate and postgraduate animation degrees at UTS and UTS Animal Logic Academy.
An exploration of the evolving concept of the body in the digital age, using a practice-based methodology that integrates motion capture, 3D computer graphics, and performance that showcase the embodied dimensions of digital fashion.
This interactive showcase explores the complex and evolving relationship between creativity, copyright law, artistic practices, storytelling and technological innovation in the data-driven, digital age.
The development of 3D fashion, textile and costume designs which can be integrated into various mediums for presentation and interaction, including Gaming Engines and cinematic renderings as well as integration with AR, VR, XR.
Primarily for UTS students, participants in this workshop will have the opportunity to experience basic bamboo weaving techniques and create small decorative artworks. Conducted by Professor Song from Shanghai University.
In response to national policies and against the backdrop of the inheritance and activation of intangible cultural heritage (ICH), this project fully leverages SHU's research capabilities and domestic & international influence in cultural inheritance and art design.
This Extended Reality/Virtual Reality exhibition immerses you in alternate realities crafted by leading researchers and artists at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS).
by Professor Yang from SHU
Art has played a significant role in the renewal of Shanghai’s urban space. From the perspective of the Shanghai Urban Space Art Season (SUSAS), this lecture takes a “city–space–art” cross-section to introduce how the past decade of art seasons has contributed to urban development and influenced the city’s spatial fabric.