tactile graphics : emerging methodologies

There is a (now) widely recognised tendency within contemporary Graphic Design towards the production of work that intentionally asserts its off-screen condition, placing itself in the context of a fully rounded three-dimensional world of the maker and his/her creative process. From the textile assemblages of Lizzie Finn to the embroidered newspapers of Karen Reimer, Graphic Designers are actively generating artefacts that, initially at least, resolutely occupy the time and space of hand-rendered production. They emerge as objects of design, which are then made ready for contemporary cultures of consumption. As the work of Julien Vallée testifies, they are invariably transposed into slick imagery, transformed from highly structured paper installations, in this instance, into book jacket designs (for Hubner & Klanten 2007) and/or tele-visual stings (for MTV).

Typically, designers and critics have discussed such work in terms of their ‘tactile’ attributes, describing how off-screen artefacts bring a sense of ‘touch’ and the whole haptic sensorium (back) into play. In Touch Graphics, for example, Rita Street proposes that ‘handmade work conveys a sense of personal contact between the sender and the recipient because it’s not something you just look at but also have to handle. Even if it’s printed in some aspect, the tactile element makes the printing seem more personal’ (2003: 11). In this sense, ‘tactile design’ is viewed in terms of a craft revival, inserting the hand-rendered artefact into an oppositional relationship with digital techniques, even though it frequently (and ironically) ends up being channelled through computer-based systems of post-production and distribution. Indeed, it is frequently signalled as the return of ‘the hand’ (Heller & Arisman 2000).

Generally, these objects of design are interpreted as creative and human(e) responses  to an historical context whereby ‘postmodern’ digital imagery is eroding the heartfelt immediacy of handmade work. As a result, many interpretations of tactile design are viewed in the context of unholy and conflicting unions, such as between: man and machine, stitch and screen or 3D and 2D animation techniques. I would argue, however, that the emergence of ‘the hand job’ (Perry 2007) and/or the physical trace of ‘authorship’ (Rock 1996) in contemporary discourse creates an opportunity to explore and extend existing Graphic Design methodologies. I would argue that this perceived dialectic or tension between a three-dimensional hand-rendered process and its ‘new’ technological context is conducive to re-thinking the currency of dominant methodological schemes within Graphic Design criticism; in particular, the tendency to describe social and cultural changes in simplistic, deterministic ways.

At least since the early 1990s, Graphic Design discourse has been dominated by language-based methodological schemes (Crow 2007). In the dominant semiotic mode of analysis, for instance, the products of design have been predominantly viewed in terms of their overall visual appearance (or style), the honed decision-making skills of the designer and the semantic significance of individual formal elements. Typical examples of this approach appear in Design Studies: Theory and Research in Graphic Design, a collection of methodological schemes, based in linguistic theory. In the introduction, Audrey Bennett argues that Graphic Design theory needs to concern itself with ‘rigorous’ and highly ‘structured’ models of ‘empirical’ research, challenging those methods of analysis that merely seek to identify the individual genius of a practitioner (Bennett 2006: 5). In this way, semiotic modes of analysis are attributed with almost scientific qualifications.

Whilst I agree with the general sentiment of this text, Bennett argues that traditional theories about the ‘creativity’ of the designer and his/her ‘intuition’ are no longer ‘adequate’ to understandings of contemporary creative practice where a new technological, interdisciplinary and collaborative context of making has emerged. This effectively marginalizes a discussion of process in any other terms than those relating to ‘a new visual language … that integrates both textual and visual objects’ (D’Ammasso Tarbox in Bennett 2006: 74). As the wording suggests, the focus of such critical analysis is resolutely located in the domain of products and outcomes rather than processes and nuanced practices of design. In this respect, social, technological and cultural contexts are reduced to historical inflections which merely contemporize otherwise continuous perceptions of the designer’s role and the centrality of objects. Matt Cooke typically concludes, from the semiotic perspective, that:

The thought of strictly following a process goes against our perception of design as an instinctive, intuitive and artistic practice. But the truth is, however informally, the majority of us follow a methodology when designing. (Cooke in Bennett 2006: 131)

Semiotics, therefore, is generally offered an analytical model that simply formalizes and structures the otherwise ‘intuitive’ approaches of everyday design. For this reason alone, I can see renewed value in traditional theories that have already investigated and framed these ongoing themes. I would argue for an intellectual return to the language of creativity and intuition, foregrounding these terms as significant concepts. Rather than bracketing-off and marginalizing these concepts - as beyond the domain of contemporary Graphic Design criticism - let’s make them central to its discourse and available for scrutinizing. Notions of creative intuition clearly constitute dominant concepts and concerns among practitioners and indicate, I would suggest, more than a nostalgic turn in this age of computing. Such a return to past values is to be interpreted, I would suggest, as a clear demonstration - not of a crafty yearning for the good ol’ days of analogue design, but - of a continuing interest in discussing the vagaries and happenstance of design process. To this end, publications around the rise of ‘the hand job’ are to be read as symptomatic of a general desire to discuss practice and, in this regard, semiotic models may - surprisingly - be slightly out of step.

In particular, I would advise a timely re-visitation of a Gestalt methodology, one that focuses on the immediacy of the present moment (of making and viewing, for example), and respects the internal and subjective experiences of the maker as the object unfolds through time. Its relevance is all the more pertinent because it aspires to analyse and understand the process of doing something, placing the idea of real-time experimentation firmly on the methodological agenda. Contemporary psychotherapist Joseph Zinker argues:

The experiment is the cornerstone of experiential learning. It transforms talking about into doing, stale reminiscing and theorizing into being fully here with one’s imagination, energy and excitement. (Zinker 1989: 123).

Within a Gestalt approach to everyday practices, experimentation is viewed in terms of many forms and usually involves consideration of the body, voice and/or a capacity for imagination within an individual’s actions and activities. The focus of Gestalt methodologies is clearly on experiential learning, placing value on the exploration of the human subject in terms of his/her relationships (such as relationships with people/audience and objects of design). The goal of a Gestalt framework is to support an individual in finding his/her own answers and to develop a heightened sense of self-awareness and increased self-understanding. To my mind, this seems a valuable framework for analysing the three-dimensional, evolutionary worlds of ‘tactile’ design, as it pays attention to the experiential aspects of the production and consumption of artefacts, facilitating a fuller investigation of the immediate (and often physical) processes of making and doing.

Gestalt is generally encountered within the discourse of counselling. However, I believe its concepts and concerns lend themselves well to re-vitalising creative methodologies within the field of Graphic Design. As a type of therapy, for example, Gestalt identifies three zones of awareness: inner, outer and middle. Within the course of a counselling session, the client is invited to put these zones into contact with one another; the body, the mind and the wider world are put into an active and conscious relation. Indeed, the aim of the Gestalt approach is to invite a shift from one state of awareness to another, always with the understanding that each zone exists in the context of a wider field of personal and social complexes. In this way, Gestalt offers a heightened sense of integration within and between these areas of everyday life or practice, with attention being paid to the ways in which the intimate and public aspects of one’s ‘self’ and one’s work are working together. It is simultaneously a macro and micro methodology.

One of the main aspirations of Gestalt experiments is ‘to create conditions under which the person can see his life as his own creation’ (Zinker 1989: 126). I believe it can assist designers in making decisions about how things are going to be (from now on); no longer acting as intuitively creative but as self-conscious agents of their own creative process. A Gestalt methodology can assist the designer in exploring the way in which aspects of his/her personal and social agency are integrated. Indeed, within a counselling situation, Gestalt techniques are adept at raising awareness of what ‘figures’ currently in a person’s immediate field of operation, then encourages a stepping aside from this perspective to see what else exists in the field of his/her horizons.

In this way, one can begin to see how a Gestalt understanding of the therapeutic relation might serve as a useful model for thinking about one’s own relation to the creative field, whether as practitioners, clients or audience. I believe it offers an effective way of approaching the notion of process that lies at the heart of contemporary discourse around the creative endeavour, and could assist in the process communicating memorable, figural experiences for audiences. In particular, the ‘zones of awareness’ and the notion of figure/ground relations could provide a useful corrective to current emphasis, within semiotics, on the production of meaning within structured, syntactic and predominantly formal relationships.

Finally, I would suggest that a return to Gestalt methods of analysis - first explored by pioneering designers such as Laszlo Moholy-Nagy and Gyorgy Kepes in the interwar years - would complement the currently retroactive tendencies of graphics practice, where the context of production is momentarily privileged over the context of consumption and/or post-production.

Dr. Julia Moszkowicz 2009

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References:

Bestley, Russell. & Noble, Ian. (2005). Visual Research: an introduction to research methodologies in Graphic Design. London: AVA Publishing.

Heller, Steven & Arisman (Eds.). (2000). The Education of an Illustrator. New York: Allworth Press.

Heller, Steven. & Ilic, Mirko. (2006a). Handwritten: expressive lettering in the digital age. London: Thames and Hudson. (Second Edition).

Hubner, M. & Klanten, R. (2007). Tactile: high touch visuals London: DGV.

Street, Rita & Ferdinand, Lewis. (2003£. Touch Graphics. London: Rockport.

Zinker, Joseph. (1989). Creative Process in Gestalt Therapy. London: Vintage Books