Two receive RCA’s Misha Black Medals

The 2009 Sir Misha Black Medal for Distinguished Services to Design Education will be presented to Judy Frater at a ceremony at the Royal College of Art on the 17 March. At the same time, the 2009 Sir Misha Black Medal for Innovation in Design Education will go to the RCA’s head of design interactions, Anthony Dunne.

The Misha Black medals are awarded annually by a group of five institutions including the RCA, the Royal Society of Arts, the Design and Industries Association, the Chartered Society of Designers and the Royal Academy of Engineering.

US-born Frater is to be recognised for her work as project co-ordinator of the Kala Raksha Vidhyalaya design school in western India.

The school was founded in 2005 to help traditional artisans to take a more proactive role in designing their products for a contemporary market, and to empower them to have a greater influence on the crafts market.

Students live on an 3ha campus, featuring a CAD centre, a guest house designed by architect RJ Vasavada, and craft studios, student accommodation and an exhibition hall by architect Hemen Sanghvi.

Holding two MAs in anthropology and museology from the universities of Washington and Minnesota, Frater is also the author of Threads of Identity: Embroidery and Adornment of the Nomadic Rabaris.

Meanwhile, Dunne will be recognised for leading the RCA’s engagement with bio- and nano technologoe