Ranjit Makkuni
President, Sacred World Foundation

Ranjit Makkuni is a multimedia researcher, designer and musician. He is the President of the Sacred World Foundation, and Director of the Sacred World Research Laboratory, where he leads a design and research think-tank pioneering new applications in culturally rooted computing. Prior to this, Makkuni spent nearly two decades at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), where he carved out new spaces of multimedia computing interfaces and learning applications, starting from the visionary explorations of the small talk object-oriented programming language in the 1980s to body-friendly, touch-friendly and culture-friendly multimedia computing in the 2000s. Makkuni’s projects go beyond just demonstrating futuristic technology. In his projects, Makkuni brings to life the authenticity of traditional ideals on primal ecology, learning, and healing that are simultaneously contemporary. His projects allow for the participation of diverse viewpoints of people whose skills face the threat of extinction. Proficiency in multimedia technology as well as traditional art allows Makkuni to bridge multiple worlds: between technology and art, the techno-man and traditional man, and between the developed and developing worlds.