Qompendium by Hidayat Neo

Colophon This publication accompanies the exhibition Work-in-Progress (WIP) at the Lasalle College of the Arts, on view from October 20 through October 23, 2015, in D301, campus of Lasalle College of the Arts. Authors: Hidayat Neo Tutor: Stanley Lim Typeface: Adobe Caslon Pro, Bureau Grotesque Pro Paper Stock:– Paper Gsm:– Printer: – Distribution: – © 2015 by Lasalle College of the Arts, 1 McNally Street, Singapore 187940. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any manner without permission. All images are © the artists, reproduced with the kind permission of the artists and/or their representatives. Every effort has been made to contact copyright holders and to ensure that all the information presented is correct. Some of the facts in this volume may be subject to debate or dispute. If proper copyright acknowledgment has not been made, or for clarifications and corrections, please contact the publishers and we will correct the information in future reprintings, if any. ISBN 978-0-9802055-1-0

Innovation In Celebration of Copying

summer letter

project brief CELEBRATE To celebrate a chosen research topic is to understand everything about that particular subject. It’s history, it’s position in modernity, it’s infuence, it’s production or conception and application, etc. Only after a critical understanding of the said subject can one manifest a convincing celebratory stance in the message and outcomes. These mandatories are here to guide you through a research process that demands both rigor and criticality.

research studies â&#x20AC;˘ Gathering research from books, journal and articles and video. â&#x20AC;˘ Evaluating research content with conclusion.

research studies Steal Like an Artist Austin Kleon

A New York Times bestseller Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon is one of the books I bought when I chance upon it when i was browsing at Basheer. This books talks about how our lives is a mash-up of everything in our surroundings. Also strongly define that originality doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t exist.It also demonstrates the 10 ways to copy without facing any judgement.

research studies Austin Kleon on TED

translation Quoted from his talk at TED An artist job is to collect ideas. And nothing is completely original. All creative work builds on what came before. Every new idea is a remix or mash-up of one or two previous ideas. You are a remix or a mash-up of your parents. You are a mash-up of what you led into your life. How does an artist look at the world? First she ask herself what’s worth stealing and second she moves on to the next thing. When you look at the world this way there’s no longer good art or bad art. There’s just art worth stealing and art that isn’t. Everything in this world is up for grabs and if you don’t find something worth stealing today, you might find it worth stealing it tomorrow or the day after. T.S Elliot said that immature poets imitate, great poets steal. Bad poets take what they steal and they deface it. And the good poets turn it into something better or at least something different. And that’s really the key to creative theft. Imitation is not flattery. Instead of directly imitating my influences, I decided to push the poems into my own thing and keep going with them because I know that it’s actually transformation that is flattery—taking the things you stolen and turning it into your own thing. And that’s how you steal like an artist.

research studies Everything is a Remix Kirby Ferguson

Kirby Ferguson explores the challenges of originality and freshness in a world where creativity takes root in what has come before. Without previous inventions we would not have the iPhone, the Model T Ford, Star Wars, Warholâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s soup cans, or the electronic musician Girl Talk. Ferguson highlights that remixing, referencing and reproducing previous innovations allows artists to engage in a cultural dialogue and allows art, technology and society to continue evolving.

Everything is a Remix (2011) by Kirby Ferguson Online Video

research studies Brilliant quotes by Kirby Ferguson What Ferguson calls remixing many call plagiarizing. At the heart of US patent law is the desire to protect intellectual property rights and incentivize individual innovation by protecting it from copycatting. But Ferguson argues that these laws ultimately contradict their own intent to “promote the progress of useful arts,” stifling the root of creativity. The problem, says Ferguson, is that we think of creative works as individual property, rather than content that sits in the public domain. Creative powerhouses from Mark Twain to Beyoncé are open about their love of remixing — and about how referencing others is integral to their creative process. Below is a series of quotes from a wide variety of artistic innovators explaining what role reworking previous material plays in their creative process. Some have faced legal problems for their work while others consciously engage in remixing to open a dialogue about the images and culture that shape our world.

•“All ideas are secondhand, consciously and unconsciously drawn from a million outside sources. We are constantly littering our literature with disconnected sentences borrowed from books at some unremembered time and now imagined to be our own.” — Mark Twain •Ironically, several more quotes about the impossibility of originality have entered into the quotable cannon and been accepted as fact, even though their original sourcing has been lost somewhere on a dusty bookshelf. Bouncing around the internet, some of these quotes have been remixed along the way, with attributions shifting from Franklin P. Jones to Benjamin Franklin. But in an open source world, it’s the idea — rather than the creator — that really matters. “Only those with no memory insist on their originality.” — attributed to Coco Chanel •“Originality is the art of concealing your sources.” — attributed to Franklin P. Jones, or Benjamin Franklin, or Thomas Edison, depending on who you ask “It’s not where you take things from – it’s where you take them to.” — attributed to Jean-Luc Godard •“Good artists copy, great artists steal.” — attributed to Pablo Picasso “I go to the past for research. I need to know what came before so I can break the rules.” — attributed to Vera Wang •“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination … Authenticity is invaluable; originality is non-existent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery — celebrate it if you feel like it.” – Jim Jarmusch •“I had gotten the Jay-Z vocal tracks and wasn’t going to do anything with them. A week or so after that, I was at home in Los Angeles, listening to The Beatles and cleaning up my room. Then it hit me: Oh [bleep], White Album, Black Album. … At one point I saw that I had logged more than two hundred hours … It would have been easy just to slap the vocals over music of the same tempo. But I wanted to match the feel of the tracks, too.” — Danger Mouse, on mashing up Jay-Z and The Beatles’ classic albums into the The Grey Album •“I jump ’em from other writers but I arrange ’em my own way.” — Blind Willie McTell

research studies Design Piracy Institute Justin Zhuang

Knockoffs, fakes, and counterfeits are the bane of modern industrial design. They are unauthorized copies of designers’ intellectual property. They are the stolen profits of manufacturers. They are the products of piracy: a phenomenon wrecking an industry’s will to innovate and create “original” and “authentic” design. But to consumers, piracy offers affordable goods, diversity of options, and sometimes, even better design. Piracy isn’t blackand-white like a pirate flag, but a nebulous concept whose edges ebb and flow like the waves of the sea. What’s a copy to some is homage to another, what is original today is tomorrow’s evolution, what is piracy to the industry is competition to society.

Twilight Sparkle (2014) by Nikita Krutov Sandstone, 3D-printed 6.13 x 2.22 x 4.97 cm

How will we recognize piracy and intellectual property in industrial design with the rise of digital fabrication technologies like 3D printing? By democratizing access to the means of production, it will become easier for users to copy, remix, and self-repair objects in ways that traditionally infringe upon a designerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s intellectual property. This calls for a need to redefine what piracy means. In response to the digital revolution, some designers and manufacturers have strengthened protection over their designs via the law and technology, while others are opening up access to them, believing that design is a collaborative process that benefits from a community working on it together. Will the rise of open design see an end to piracy? This thesis examines more closely the relationships between piracy, intellectual property, and industrial design by studying a variety of case studies and interviews with practitioners. Beyond just a legal and economic issue, piracy is a reflection of societyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s assump- tions about the design process, who a designer is, and what design is for. Piracy is a ghost that will always haunt the world of design.

research studies

Borrowed Design

Steven Heller and Julie Lasky

Borrowed Design analyses the field of graphic design as a history of credits and debits by charting the transfer of ideas and images across historical, commercial and legal categories. Ranging from respectfully acknowledged influence to underhand theft or irreverent parody, such exchanges have become design’s second nature. Steven Heller and Julie Lasky lay out the varieties of “borrowed design” through a staggering array of visual examples, from a series of send-ups of Doyle Dane Bernbach’s legendary VW campaign to neoconservative appropriations of heroic realism.

research studies Are Original Ideas Possible Anymore? Andrew Vucko

We live on a saturated planet. At times it seems thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s no room for originality. Ideas churn at breakneck speed, from the physical to the virtual world, and the world inside our heads. And in our litigious society, we worry more than ever about being indebted to others.

“Originality comes from making connections— seeing patterns where others see chaos, and taking old ideas and elevating them to new perspectives,” says one quote, among many that pepper the short film. He adds: “Eventually, I took a step back and chose to build something on the very topic that was plaguing me—the theme of originality. From there, I searched for references and inspiration, coming across all of these interesting quotes on the subject. While at first each quote felt like a separate idea, as I continued to read, I realized that they could be combined into a single narrative.”

research studies Copycats

Oded Shenkar

Humans, as well as other species, have always relied on imitation to survive in hostile environment, make tools, and outdo rivals and protagonists. They have learned not to reinvent the wheeleven before there was one. As communication and transportation have advanced, opportunities for imitation have burgeoned: globalisation and technological advances have expanded the ranks of imitation and have made imitation more feasible, more cost effective, and much faster.

The imitatorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s edge Why are many imitators successful? With the innovator and pioneer paving the way (and paying for it), the imitator enjoys free ride. It saves not only on research and development but also on marketing, because customers have already been primed to use normal product or service. The imitators avoids dead ends, whether a losing bet on a dominant design, such as Sonyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Betamax VCR format, or an innovative prescription drug that proves not to work. Because most productivity gains comeÂ not from the original innovation but from subsequent improvements, imitators are often better positioned to offer the customer something that is not only potentially better but also considerably cheaper. It should not come as a surprise that the most profitable innovations often are those containing a strong dose of imitation

research studies The Knockoff Economy Paul Detrick

What do you think of copy-cats? Are they stealing property from the creator? Co-author of the book, The Knockoff Economy, Kal Raustiala, says no. “A lot of innovation grows out of imitation,” Raustiala tells Reason TV’s Paul Detrick. “So it’s not so much riding on the coattails as it is standing on the shoulders.” Raustiala and Christopher Sprigman write in their book that when you look at the inner workings of football, fashion, food, as well as many other industries: When people have the freedom to knockoff or copy items, creators and consumers benefit. “Every time a college coach or a pro coach comes up with a new formation, that is going to be copied, if it’s successful, by their opposition,” says Raustiala.

Conventional wisdom holds that copying kills creativity, and that laws that protect against copies are essential to innovation--and economic success. But are copyrights and patents always necessary? IKal Raustiala and Christopher Sprigman provocatively argue that creativity can not only survive in the face of copying, but can thrive. We need to question of incentives and innovation in a wholly new way--by exploring creative fields where copying is generally legal, such as fashion, food, and even professional football. By uncovering these important but rarely studied industries, Raustiala and Sprigman reveal a nuanced and fascinating relationship between imitation and innovation.

research studies word by word we build ourselves H55: Hanson Ho

On Appropriation This piece of writing appropriates from many of the words and thoughts of other writers, artists, and designers. Many art and design works also appropriate from existing objects or ideas. ‘New’ works are created by borrowing and sampling elements from the or the past, and some strategies include imitating, reintepreting, improving upon, paying homage, and parodying. From artists Marcel Duchamp’s decontextualisation of a urinal to Andy Warhol’s re-representation of commercial images, and DJ’s remixing music to designers referencing existing designs, it is almost impossible to not appropriate from something else in this information age that we live today. Even photographing an object is an act of appropriating environment, suggest critic Susan Sontag, in her book On Photography. Appropriation raises questions about originality, ownership, and plagiarism: if a work is an imitation or a copy of another. It is interesting to note that the word ‘appropriation’ originates from ‘appropriate’. Particularly in the context of design, it is important that this act is relevant to its original intention. Two similar looking designs may appropriate from the same source, but it is often the more appropriate application which turns out to be the stronger piece of work.

On Authorship An author is broadly defined as the person who originates or gives existence to anything. In graphic design, a designer is said to have authorship when his or her personal interpretation and expression are identifiable in a body of works. In today’s world, it is not enough for graphic designers to just be more visual messengers for clients. To be distinctive, they need to display unique visual sensibilities and even generate their own content. A designer who has found his or her identity and intellectual position is more likely to have a ‘voice’ and attain the position of an author. Many designers lack a clear approach, however, because of the nature of the profession as a service. We spend most of our time ‘packaging’ the voices of clients’ instead of finding our own. We need to become more self-aware, and search within ourselves to find that inner voice in order to be distinct authors. On Derivatives My designs are normally derived from a logical process that allows me to map out step by step how a design is developed, and to gauge its possible outcomes. This systematic approach helps me anticipate the challenges of each project, and provides clarity for my choice of design. It also results in design derivatives in the form of sketches, written notes, and workin-progress graphics that document the dialogue and negotiations we have in H55 when conceptualising an idea. Design derivatives come in handy for our proposals when we show them how we rationally derived our designs. Like the personal thoughts we record in a diary, these design derivatives are also useful for introspection, and as a departure point for developing future projects.

research studies In Praise of Copying Marcus Boon

The “problem” of copying is not necessarily a legal or ethical one in the strict sense of those words. It cannot be resolved by having people take a stand on either side of a line that says that copying is either good or bad, or that copyright and intellectual-property laws should be supported or abandoned. tOne of the principal arguments made against copying is that it involves an act of deception. Something is presented in the guise of something else. This something is produced so that its outward appearance corresponds to something else, to something that it is not. This is particularly the case in the business world that students are likely to find themselves in upon graduating—a world in which, despite exhortations to “think outside the box,” they will also need to master what’s “in the box,” much of which consists of the ability to manipulate copies.

research studies The Designer as the Author Michael Rock

Authorship has become a popular term in graphic design circles, especially in those at the edges of the profession: the design academies and the murky territory between design and art. The word has an important ring to it, with seductive connotations of origination and agency. But the question of how designers become authors is a difficult one. and exactly who qualifies and what authored design might look like depends on how you define the term and determine admission into the pantheon. Authorship may suggest new approaches to the issue of the design process in a profession traditionally associated more with the communication rather than the origination of messages. But theories of authorship also serve as legitimising strategies, and authorial aspirations may end up reinforcing certain conservative notions of design production and subjectivity â&#x20AC;&#x201C; ideas that run counter to recent critical attempts to overthrow the perception of design as based on individual brilliance. The implications of such a re-definition deserve careful scrutiny. What does it really mean to call for a graphic designer to be an author?

The meaning of the word ‘author’ has shifted significantly through history and has been the subject of intense scrutiny over the last 40 years. The earliest definitions are not associated with writing per se, but rather denote ‘the person who originates or gives existence to anything’. Other usages have authoritarian – even patriarchal – connotations: ‘the father of all life’, ‘any inventor, constructor or founder’, ‘one who begets’ and ‘a director, commander, or ruler’. More recently, Wimsatt and Beardsley’s seminal essay ‘The Intention Fallacy’ (1946) was one of the first to drive a wedge between the author and the text with its claim that a reader could never really ‘know’ the author through his or her writing. The socalled ‘death of the Author’, proposed most succinctly by Roland Barthes in a 1968 essay of that name, is closely linked to the birth of critical theory, especially theory based in reader response and interpretation rather than intentionality. Michel Foucault used the rhetorical question ‘What is an Author?’ in 1969 as the title of an influential essay which, in response to Barthes, outlines the basic characteristics and functions of the author and the problems associated with conventional ideas of authorship and origination. Foucault demonstrated that over the centuries the relationship between the author and the text has changed. The earliest sacred texts are authorless, their origins lost in history. In fact, the ancient, anonymous origin of such texts serves as a kind of authentication. On the other hand, scientific texts, at least until after the Renaissance, demanded an author’s name as validation. By the eighteenth century, however, Foucault asserts, the situation had reversed: literature was authored and science had become the product of anonymous objectivity. Once authors began to be punished for their writing – that is, when a text could be transgressive – the link between the author and the text was firmly established. Text became a kind of private property, owned by the author, and a critical theory developed which reinforced that relationship, searching for keys to the text in the life and intention of its writer. With the rise of scientific method, on the other hand, scientific texts and mathematical proofs were no longer seen as authored texts but as discovered truths. The scientist revealed an extant phenomenon, a fact anyone faced with the same conditions would have uncovered. Therefore the scientist and mathematician could be the first to discover a paradigm, and lend their name to it, but could never claim authorship over it.

research studies Fuck Content Michael Rock

We are envious of the power, social position and cachet that artists and authors seem to command. By declaring ourselves “designer/ authors” we hope to garner similar respect. Our deep-seated anxiety has motivated a movement in design that values origination of content over manipulation of content. The problem is one of content. The misconception is that without deep content, design is reduced to pure style, a bag of dubious tricks. In graphic-design circles, form-follows-function is reconfigured as form-follows-content. If content is the source of form, always preceding it and imbuing it with meaning, form without content (as if that were even possible) is some kind of empty shell. At a 1962 conference at the Museum of Modern Art, conservative art critic Hilton Kramer denounced Pop Art as “indistinguishable from advertising art” because “Pop Art does not tell us what it feels like to be living through the present moment of civilization. Its social effect is simply to reconcile us to a world of commodities, banalities and vulgarities.” But perhaps the content of graphic design is exactly that: an evocation of “what it feels like to be living through the present moment of civilization,” with all its “commodities, banalities and vulgarities.” How else can we discuss the content of a typeface or why the typography of a surfing magazine suddenly becomes relevant? Or how a series of made-up or ‘self-initiated’ posters— already a medium of dubious functionality— can end up on the wall of a major design museum? Work must be saying something, which is different than being about something.

Because the nature of the designed object is limited, individual objects are rarely substantial enough to contain fully rendered ideas. Ideas develop over many projects, spanning years. Form itself is indexical. We are intimately, physically connected to the work we produce, and it is inevitable that our work bears our stamp. The choice of projects in each designer’s oeuvre lays out a map of interests and proclivities. (I use the singular designer in the categorical sense, not the individual.) The way those projects are parsed out, disassembled, reorganized and rendered reveals a philosophy, an aesthetic position, an argument and a critique. This deep connection to making also positions design in a modulating role between the user and the world. By manipulating form, design reshapes that essential relationship. Form is replaced by exchange. The things we make negotiate a relationship over which we have a profound control. The trick is to find ways to speak through treatment, via a range of rhetorical devices—?from the written to the visual to the operational— to make those proclamations as poignant as possible, and to return consistently to central ideas, to re-examine and re-express. In this way we build a body of work, and from that body of work emerges a singular message, maybe even what it feels like to be living now. As a popular film critic once wrote, “A movie is not what it is about, it’s how it is about it.” Likewise, for us, our What is a How. Our content is, perpetually, Design itself.

Why are so many of us chasing the notion of being original and new? Part of this I believe, can be attributed to the weight that our culture puts behind being new or innovative. Few are interested in something that works well, when the promise of something new is present. Of course, this sort of thinking leads us to seemingly preposterous ideas such as disposable razors which incorporate five or six blades. Additionally, I have to lay some industry-specific blame on the advertising and design awards which our practice holds in such high regard. In some part, I’m always critical of design awards. Don’t get me wrong, I’d like to receive more of them, but when I peruse design annuals, I can’t help but wonder if they really make any sense at all. Very few of these award shows seem to acknowledge how effective a campaign was, and instead focus on how fun or “clever” the idea is. This is great, as it makes for very beautiful design annuals, but was that ever really the point of our profession? As designers, it is important to remove the ego from the work... We are communicators whose responsibility it is to articulate thoughts more efficiently and persuasively than the untrained. In order to communicate that capably, we simply must posses a stronger comprehension of many topics than most, as well as a greater visual or “idea” vocabulary than the general public. This of course takes time and dedication to develop; nevertheless, I believe that it is simply necessary, in order to become a good designer. Designers should always be expanding their knowledge of design, history, popular culture, politics, music, art, social conditions; moreover, we have to try to understand what motivates our own human interaction. This cumulative knowledge and experience is what helps us build more insightful design. We aspire to be those who can command visual and verbal language in order to articulate a message in the most poignant fashion. To accomplish this, we have to know what that crisp shower feels like after a morning run, where we push ourselves to the limit. We should understand references to Seinfeld and appreciate the cultural importance that musicians like Kanye West have to a new generation.

research studies Discovery by Design Zuzana Licko

New design is the creation of new meanings; that is, new contexts for typographic possibilities. However, must be linked to existing ones. Even that design which “pushes the envelope” must build upon existing preconceptions. For unless a critical portion is understandable, the entire piece will be dismissed as complete nonsense. On the other hand, if no portion of the design is new, then it will appear so uninteresting that it might result in boredom and therefore be equally dismissed. Intriguing consumers with just the right amount of unrecognizable information spurs their interest. By initiating these changes of meaning, design educates the consumer to the changes in culture. Thus, design is a vet powerful component in controlling our collective consciousness. However, design is also a subconscious process, and it is therefore nearly impossible for a designer to intentionally alter a specific cultural concept. This process of reassimilation and adding or changing of meaning with each step creates an environment in our popular culture that is conducive to the assimilation of particular ideas. As this environment changes, it makes certain ideas ripe, or “ready to be liked.” In this manner, meanings change, and over time great shifts take place. Since the creation of new meanings usually results in the replacement, displacement or change of older meanings, we may also wonder if some meanings become obsolete. We may ask, “Does obsolescence exist in design, and can we plan obsolescence?”

So, who owns these design discoveries, if we are facilitating their existence through the appropriate contexts? It may be true that all designs exist in the fabric of typographic possibility. However, since not all possibilities can exist at the same time, there must be some way to intelligently choose possibilities that will have meaning; that intelligent force comes from designers. The discovery of a design possibility is therefore largely a matter of the designer being in the right place at the right time. However, it is the designerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ability to recognize the opportunity, the talent to apply the idea to a specific creative work, the willingness to sometimes go out on a limb, and the perseverance to convince others that the idea has validity, that deserves claim to ownership. Because, in the end, it is the expertise to communicate new ideas to others that gives credibility to the designerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s existence.

research studies Why Originality is Overrated? Howard Tullman

If you’re in sales, you probably know this: Selling something new and different is a lot harder than selling something that’s familiar or something that’s just a little bit different and hopefully better. Most people are reluctant to try new things. This is probably a lot less true for entrepreneurs, but the vast majority of your potential buyers aren’t going to be entrepreneurs or risk-takers. That means you’ve got to learn to speak their language and put your selling proposition into a framework that they understand, appreciate and are comfortable with. So where does that leave us? With the simple fact that the decision criteria are not at all what you’d expect them to be. The office managers, not the senior partners, are the real buyers. And in a survey of hundreds of professional office managers (including, but not exclusively, for law firms), the factors which consistently ranked highest had everything to do with keeping the machines up and operating successfully and almost nothing to do with costs. 1.Reliability 2. Copy quality 3. Service 4. Ease of use 5. Price

If you asked the office managers about their choices, they would initially offer you really nice clichés such as: “When our copiers are working, our people are working.” But the truth, which always came out sooner or later, was more like, “I want to keep my job,” or, “I don’t want those jerks yelling at me.” Saving money for the firm never even entered into the equation. The most successful copier salesmen didn’t pitch price, speed or performance. They focused on stability, security and the ever-golden “silence.” They aimed their presentations directly at the pain points of the purchaser. That won the day. The same approach and strategy works in almost any sales situation. You just need to remember five basic propositions: 1. Originality is overrated. Pioneers end up with arrows in their back, and not a whole lot more. Don’t invent. Innovate. 2. Novelty is a nuisance. It means expensive training, a new learning curve, and lots of mistakes. Tried and true trumps all. 3. No one likes to cross the chasm--especially when they are first. Short, sure steps forward, and a lot more of the same, really sell. 4. Don’t tell me how different your product or service is. Tell me how easy and familiar and fail-safe it will be. 5. Analogies are better than apple pie. Show me anything I’m doing now and then tell me not how different things will be, but how much the same they will remain. In the movie business, they call this process “high concept.” You give me a snapshot that tells me all I need to know. Like using the latest slick and suave incarnation of Justin Timberlake to play the Frank Sinatra role in remakes of any classic Sinatra films. Says it all. I don’t have to love the idea to understand exactly what you’re telling me. Or having Tom Hanks play the Jimmy Stewart roles in anything except “It’s a Wonderful Life.” You get the picture.

research studies The Myth of Originality and the Joy of Copying Adrian Shaugnessy

“You Shall not copy!” You are all told, since school. But why not? And actually how can we do that? Or rather avoid doing it? How can we be sure we are not copying, when the very notion of learning is based on a mimetic process? Originality isn’t all its cracked up to be. For a start, it doesn’t really exist. The idea that something can be said to be truly original is laughable. There is no immaculate conception. Everything comes from somewhere else. Everything contains elements of something else. If we were ever to be confronted with an artefact or an idea that was genuinely original, we wouldn.t be able to see it or understand it. We wuoldn’t have any reference points with which to identify it. If originality is illusionary why then it is so highly prized – especially in the realm of commercial art and design? This is odd, because nearly all illustration, branding, advertising, typography, etc. is about communication, and if we want to communicate, we have to use recognizable symbols, words and visual tropes. Even when we want to shock or make statements that are mysterious or enigmatic, we do so by blending visual elements and language in unexpected ways – in other words, we appropriate – but in truth, we are really copying.

To be guilty of copying in the commercial realsms is about the most heinous crime a creative person can commit. Copying and plagiarism are generally regarded as bad, which in turn, forces designers to strive endlessy to be original. This is done with noble intentions. But it is futile and based on a flase understanding of originality and a flase understanding of originality as well as the role of copying.

research studies I Am a Plagiarist Micheal Bierut

Kurt Andersen, claimed that “Plagiarists almost never simply confess. There are always mitigating circumstances.” In response to that statement, Micheal Bierut claims: “I am a plagiarist.” He was asked by a longtime client, the Yale School of Architecture, to design a poster for a symposium they were organizing. His solution was very similar to something almost 30 years ago, a piece by a designer, Willi Kunz. There are differences, of course: Kunz’s type goes from small to big, and Bierut’s goes the other way around; Kunz’s horizontal lines change size, and Bierut do not; and, naturally, Kunz uses Akzidenz Grotesk, rather than a typeface that wouldn’t be invented until 2002. But still, the black on white, the change in typographic scale, the underscores: all these add up to two solutions that look more alike than different.

He didn’t realize this until a few weeks ago, when he was looking through the newly-published fourth edition of Phil Meggs’s History of Graphic Design. And there it was, on page 476, a reproduction of Willi Kunz’s abstract letterpress exploration from 1975. He recognized it immediately as something He had seen in my design school days. More recently, it was reproduced in Kunz’s Typography: Macro- and Microaesthetics, published just two years ago, a copy of which he own. In his excuse when being accused of plagiarism: He saw something, stored it in my memory, forgot where it came from, and pulled it out later — much later — when he needed it. Unlike some plagiarists, he didn’t make changes to cover my tracks. “I find all of this rather scary. I don’t claim to have a photographic memory, but my mind is stuffed full of graphic design, graphic design done by other people. How can I be sure that any idea that comes out of that same mind is absolutely my own?” The challenge is even more pronounced in design, where we manipulate more generalized visual forms rather than specific sequences of words. In the end, accusations of plagiarism are notoriously subjective, and some people who have seen his piece and Kunz’s side by side have said they’re quite different.

research studies Is Originality Necessary In Graphic Design Today? Attitude Design UK

Originality in a Visual Sense I think people get confused between art and design. Art is a personal expression of something and doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have to have a purpose at all - other than to express that personal view. Design on the other hand is purposeful. Ultimately we design for other people, not to express what we, ourselves feel. We design for these people so they can make money. We have to play the mediator between the client and their consumers, using our skills in the best possible way to communicate the messages that will help sell products or services. The point is this - if we are too original in our work a) our clients wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t buy it and b) if our clients did buy it their consumers wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t buy it. The end result is no money and no clients. However again if we simply copy styles then we will then be done for stealing - again the end result is not good. Mike Davidson has an interesting post on this written in 2005 called Originality in Logo Design. His article highlights the issues of attempting to be original in logo design and it seems to me, he eventually comes to the conclusion that it is virtually impossible to be completely original in a design. So my view on this is that as a designer you need to stay up to date with current trends. You need to understand what is generally acceptable and what has been done before. Within these boundaries (which you can push from time to time) you make a stab at a design. I always bear the end consumer in mind and have had to admit that sometimes radical designs do not always fit the brief. Everything should have a purpose behind it - we are designers not artists.

Originality in a Conceptual Sense The place where one can be completely original is in the concept behind the design. What I’m talking about here is the reasoning behind shooting ‘that image’ in ‘that way’. The reason behind using ‘that graphic’ or ‘this wording’. Basically the reason behind communicating the key messages visually and how to accomplish that. For example take a look at this for a concept from Yo Brands USA. The styling has been done before many times but the concept is what makes this site communicate its key selling points. It is original and effective. Also read this article The Rise of the Design Concept. The styling of the websites in the article is nothing new - but the concepts are. This area is, in my view, what makes a great designer. Communicating on a deep level with your audience. Keep the style simple but the concept clever and you’ll be a winner.

ideation process • Brainstorming of ideas from content • Answering the design brief for Mandatory 1 • Documentation of process

ideation process Objective: • Developing the design statement • To provide an introduction for the viewers on the topic, celebration of copying • Provide literature review based on the readings and research • Support with case studies about originality is a myth and how professionals practice copying

MANDATORY 1: DEFINING THE SCOPE An expansive coverage of the field of study. Deals with the ‘who, what, where, why and how’ of the investigation. It should include: • An in-depth research study of all aspects of the subject •It should provide the audience with content that discusses the ‘who, what, where, why and how’ of the subject matter.

ideation process CONTENT • How trend is affecting the act of copying that questions originality • How trends affects copying of an artwork • How the wrongful perception of copying is affecting originality that needs to be redefine • How companies using trends as a strategic edge to gain popularity • How copying is considered as a new art movement by adapting through trends • How trendspotting is a part of copying or is it an avenue to find new culture & objects? • Existing content used to make another content. Is this new content?

Selected:

• How the wrongful perception of copying is affecting originality that needs to be redefine

AIM • Change the perspective of negativity towards copying • Change the way of thinking from what they already know to see it from a different angle • Represent on behalf of designers who are in trends and adapting to their styles • Redefining originality

Selected:

• Change the perspective of negativity towards copying • Redefining originality

ideation process METHOD • Juxtoposition of current design trends • Juxtoposition of Famous art works • Deconstructing famous art works

Selected:

• Juxtoposition of Famous art works

APPROACH • • • •

Observation through experimentation Propaganda approach Provoke the behaviour of being taken for granted Celebrate the manifestation of copying screw originality

Selected:

• Propaganda approach • Celebrate the manifestation of copying screw originality

ideation process APPLICATION • Poster Illustration • Video Projection • Toolkit

Selected:

• Poster illustration

FINAL DESIGN STATEMENT In this modern day, nobody starts out original. We need copying to build the foundation of knowledge and understanding. This project aims to celebrate against the wrongful perception of copying and redefine originality in the field of graphic design through propaganda approach.

ideation process PROPAGANDA STYLE • Vibrant, bold, strong, vigor and visually arresting • Industrialization • Red, black, white, tan • Art History: Constructivism, Suprematism • Prominent Figures: Wassily Kadinsky, Alexander Rodchenko • 21st century influence: Shepard Faiery (Obey)

visual studies

ideation process IDENTITY OF PROJECT â&#x20AC;˘ A logo design is needed for this propaganda movement

ideation process IDENTITY OF PROJECT â&#x20AC;¢ Logo design to incorporate the word COPY

ideation process IDENTITY OF PROJECT â&#x20AC;¢ Icons design

Reason why I use lightning bolt is because being inspired by PAP. It demonstrates strong power and domination.

ideation process IDENTITY OF PROJECT â&#x20AC;¢ Icons design

Brushes to symbolize Art and creativity. Or by all means, a tool to copy.

ideation process IDENTITY OF PROJECT â&#x20AC;¢ Icons design

This is the crest of inspiration. The Copy Artist.

ideation process DELIVERABLES • A0 poster design for design statement with stand • A2 poster booklet with list of research materials • Square booklet for supporting case studies • A1 flip poster

17 x17

ideation process A0 POSTER â&#x20AC;¢ Visual references

ideation process A2 POSTER BOOKLET â&#x20AC;¢ Visual references

ideation process A2 POSTER BOOKLET â&#x20AC;¢ Development

This side up

This side up This front portion of the poster-booklet. The poster will fold up to A4 size.

ideation process SQUARE BOOKLET â&#x20AC;¢ visual reference

ideation process SQUARE BOOKLET â&#x20AC;¢ Development

175 x 175

The square booklet is binded by using plastic bolts and nuts in order to show propaganda style of industrialization.

ideation process A1 FLIP POSTER â&#x20AC;¢ Visual Reference

I need the poster to be able to flip so this is the best way tp present it.

ideation process A1 FLIP POSTER â&#x20AC;¢ Visual Reference

This is the method I am going to use to form my text with the flip poster.

ideation process A1 FLIP POSTER â&#x20AC;¢ Development

The paper is two layers. On top is a tracing paper and at the back is my actualy poster.

ideation process • Proving a stand why copying is good • Answering the design brief for Mandatory 2 • Documentation of process

MANDATORY 2: EXPRESSING RATIONALE An expression of the rationale on what’s worth celebrating about the subject. A concise arguement focuses on a more specific aspect of the subject. It should include: • A comparative look at the range of virtues you wish to celebrate about the subject. •Culminates in a decision to choose one specific aspect or arguement of several.

ideation process Objective: • • Redefining originality and opening up the negativity towards copying • Convince viewers to join the revolution. • Highlighting the problems with originality. • Showing good side and benefits of copying

ideation process DELIVERABLES • 4 A3 Posters stating statement • 2 A4 brochure stating cause and effect

ideation process A3 POSTERS â&#x20AC;¢ visual reference

ideation process A3 POSTERS â&#x20AC;¢ developments

The papers are arrange in a linear series with repetative style to show propagada.

ideation process A4 BROCHURE â&#x20AC;¢ visual references

ideation process A4 BROCHURE â&#x20AC;¢ developments

The brochure can be folded up to A3 size.

ideation process • Introducing the proper methods of copying • Answering the design brief for Mandatory 3 • Documentation of process

MANDATORY 3: METHOD OF CELEBRATION An expression of the rationale on what’s worth celebrating about the subject. A concise arguement focuses on a more specific aspect of the subject. It should include: • A comparative look at the range of virtues you wish to celebrate about the subject. •Culminates in a decision to choose one specific aspect or arguement of several.

ideation process DELIVERABLES â&#x20AC;¢ A3 poster booklet

References

• Boon, M., 2013. In Praise of Copying. First Harvard University Press ed. United States of America: Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data. • Craig, W., 2014. Why Creativity Isn’t All About Originality? Forbes. [Online] Available at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ eshachhabra/2015/10/30/this-small-business-is-paying-itsemployees-twice-the-minimum-wage-or-a-poverty-wage/ [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Cullinane, K., 2013. The Original Paradox: Or the value of creating new designs vs. being original. The Designer Observer Grop. [Online] Available at: http://designobserver.com/feature/the-originalparadox/37733 [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Dunn, A., 2011. Question Everything: Shepard Fairey on His Influences, His Legal Battle with AP, and Being a Sellout. Huffington Post. [Online] Available at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/adriana-dunn/ question-everything-shepa_b_284265.html [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Ho, H., 2015. Word By Word We Build Ourselves: 55 Commonly Used Words In The Design Office Of H55. 1st ed. Singapore: s.n. • Hood, B., 2012. The Self Illusion: How the Social Brain Creates Identity. Reprint edition ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. • Karjaluoto, E., 2006. Is originality superfluous? Ideas on Ideas. [Online] Available at: http://www.ideasonideas.com/2006/03/is_ originality_superfluous/ [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Kennedy, R., 2012. Arts Beat: The Culture at Large. Shepard Fairey Is Fined and Sentenced to Probation in ‘Hope’ Poster Case [Online] Available at: http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/ shephard-fairey-is-fined-and-sentenced-to-probation-inhope-poster-case/?_r=2 [Accessed 17 September 2015].

• Kleon, A, 2012. Steal like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative. 1st ed. New York: Workman Publishing Company, Inc. • Kleon, A., 2012. Steal Like An Artist: Austin Kleon at TEDxKC.. [Online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oww7oB9rjgw [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Lamme, L. L., 1994. Copy?...Real Artists Don’t Copy!” but Maybe Children Should. Art Education, 47(6), pp. 46-51. • Lillie, B., 2012. Are all new things a mash-up of what came before? A Q&A with Kirby Ferguson, TED Blog. [Online] Available at: http://blog.ted.com/are-all-new-things-a-mash-up-ofwhat-came-before-a-qa-with-kirby-ferguson/ [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Naiise. 2015. Why Support Local Is The Way To Go. [ONLINE] Available at:http://naiise.com/blogs/blog/45870597-why-issupporting-local-the-way-to-go. [Accessed 17 September 15]. • OECD., 1997. The Oslo Manual: Proposed Guidelines for Collecting and Interpreting Technological Innovation Data (p.28). Paris, OECD. • Rock, M., 2013. Graphic authorship is taken for granted by many design theorists and it is gaining ground within practice, too. But the idea has received little sustained examination. What does it mean and what is really possible? Eye Magazine. [Online] Available at: http://www.eyemagazine.com/feature/article/thedesigner-as-author [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Rock, M. P. R. W. M. S. S. S. G., 2013. Multiple Signatures: On Designers, Authors, Readers and Users. New York: Rizzoli . • Shaughnessy, A., 2013. The Myth of Originality and the Joy of Copying. In: A. Shaughnessy, ed. Scratching the Surface. Harvard: Unit Editions, pp. 205 - 208. • Sherwin, B., 2011. The Origins of Original Art. The Origins of Original Art: The stepping stone of originality in art. [Online] Available at: http://faso.com/fineartviews/33317/the-origins-oforiginal-art-the-stepping-stone-of-originality-in-art [Accessed 17 September 2015]. • Wilson, B. W. M., 1997. An iconoclastic view of the imagery sources of the drawing of young people. Art Education, 30(1), pp. 5-11. • Wolf, G., 2004. Steve Jobs: The Next Insanely Great Thing [Interview] 2004.