Archive for the 'design' Category
Reading design magazines and blogs, I used to get so upset that I had to stop and react to the apparent lack of reflection. Isn’t the problem that most general writing about design for a public audience is just that – general? Or, even, uncritical, irrelevant and shallow?
The recent book titled In Case of Design – Inject Critical Thinking (2010), which I co-authored and edited, suggests a generous input of critical thinking into public mediums that share responsibility for generating design knowledge. The areas discussed include daily and trade press, web magazines and blogs, but also public programme activities within organisations and institutions, which all (in writing) contribute to an image of our contemporary society which does not necessarily represent a fair illustration of the design profession in its wider meaning.
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Design culture is being transformed by collaborative practices and hybrid media forms which allow for instant feedback from user to provider, user to user and practice to practice.
In our book ‘Limited Language: Rewriting Design: Responding to a feedback culture
‘ we explore how these processes inform writing on design and how we engage with digital technology as a creative catalyst. Readers can become writers, articles provide starting points for new ideas and the immersive capabilities of the Web are used to provide a platform for design thinking.
Rewriting design in this way corrupts the boundaries between practices and so themes are explored across design, architecture, art and sonic cultures. The book – like this site – is aimed at practitioners, critics, historians and students alike, as all of these have contributed to the Limited Language project over the years.
“This is a rare book about design that embraces ideas with as much enthusiasm as objects. It illustrates its premise by showing feedback culture in action. If you find yourself wanting to join in the dialogue with thoughts of your own – and you will – their website is ready and waiting.” – “Rick Poynor”
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Designers and producers have forgotten that the production of graphic material is crucial in the construction of global and local identities.
Unfortunately, Graphic design has generally quite unappreciated impacts upon many significant areas of social and cultural life. Graphic Design as a profession has been regarded as inferior compared to other design practices, such as Industrial Design or Interior Design. It has been affected by the conceptions of low and high art and usually compared with the fine arts and applied arts modifying its purposes. Also, technology has created liminal zones around the role of the designer generating perceptions around the passive voice of Graphic Design. The latter may be motivated by the fact that many of the visuals produced with commercial purposes are not created by Graphic Design professionals, but for those called ‘computer drivers’ who are limited to follow ‘client instructions’.
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