Dhyaan Design

ACTION & INSPIRATIONObservations by Abhay Adhikari of Dhyaan Design

The 2Project single received media coverage in India and the Netherlands and was voted as single of the year.

Dhyaan Design works with developers and designers from various cultural backgrounds to deliver sustainable multimedia projects for corporations, small businesses and individuals from UK, India, USA, Japan and Australia. This includes BBC, British Council, Hertz, Penguin, The Human Rights Law Network and Zubaan Books.

In 2004 Abhay produced an online musical project in partnership with leading Indian classical musician Shubha Mudgal and Dutch electronic artist Hygge. The project received front-page news coverage in all Indian national dailies (Hindustan Times, Times of India, India express). It was also voted as single of the year and was featured on Radio 1 – The Netherlands.

Since then Abhay has continued to work within the creative sector and undertaken promotional projects for Caroline Lavelle, Loreena McKennit, Manjushree Thapa and Githa Hariharan. Please visit the Projects Showcase for more information.

Abhay has carried out a number of social media campaigns, including a twitter campaign for Humberside Police Department’s Alcohol Awareness initiative, which was picked up by the BBC Breakfast Show.

In December 2009 he helped organize the first Social Media Surgery (YorkSMS) aimed at getting charities and community groups in the city to engage with social media. This initiative now receives support by the Learning City York consortium which includes the City of York council.

Abhay also conducts workshops for HEIs on engaging with the WWW. The themes range from facilitating enterprise and entrepreneurship to exploring learning and research through social media platforms.

The research led to a 5 city tour of of Japan working with over 150 school children and 25 primary school teachers.

In 2009 Abhay completed his PhD research at the University of York for which he was awarded the highly competitive Sir Jack Lyons Research Scholarship. The focus of this research was to introduce breath-control training as part of music education in the primary school curriculum Key Stage 1. The research led to the development of a prototype biofeedback breath-training device. Abhay received the CETL White Rose grant to develop a commercial application of this gaming device.

In November 2009 conducted a 5 city tour of Japan working within the education sector delivering breath-awareness workshops to over 150 school students and 25 primary school teachers. This project was part funded by UK Trade and Investment (UKTI). He is currently working with the department of computer science at Sheffield University to develop a variant of the biofeedback game suitable for mobile phones.

Abhay is an excellent communicator (…) He works brilliantly with our students.

- Dr. Sunil Manghani,
York St John University

Since coming out of research, Abhay has been invited as guest lecturer on modules such as Media Enterprise development. The focus of these workshops is to introduce students to key technical and strategic skills to enable them to use social media and web 2.0 platforms to their advantage.

In 2009 he presented his work at the Phoenix Centre showcase at York St John University. In July 2010 he was invited to speak at Shift Happens – the Arts, Learning and Technology conference. The event was attended by representatives from cultural organizations around the UK.