It MUST Expand project Book
05
Q u e s t i o n n a i re s & I n t e r v i e w s
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
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Interim Exhibition 202
There is an interim exhibition in
or disagreed about each quote. The
February as part of the course, I decided to use this as an opportunity for research, choosing 8 quotes from different designers. Asked people to vote if they either didn’t know, agreed
results are displayed in an infographic, on the following page. The results are almost entirely from students at Grays School of Art.
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
The it clear that the majority of people agreed with the quotes, some of the questions had far more responses than others, but at first it seems that the results are reasonably conclusive. But I can’t help but feel that there’s more to these results. The three (top two and bottom right) quotes with the bigger responses agreeing could be considered the more straight forward statements. They each describe very direct responses, broadly explaining a simple problem or simple solution. The quotes that got fewer responses; I felt that those quotes were perhaps the more provocative unusual statements. For example the quote bottom left from Katherine McCoy: “Design education most often trains students to think of themselves as passive arbiters of the message between the client/sender and audience/receiver rather than as advocates for the message content or the audience.”
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This quote is questioning how design education functions, and accuses students of not thinking and just being passive in their work, and not analysing it’s effect. The responses to this are almost even but given the overwhelming majorities on the other quotes, this quote seems to have split responses. The other q uote that takes interest is the only one that the majority disagreed. The statement from Nancy Ber nard: “Design is at the bottom of the capitalist food chain. Audiences neither know nor care who we are. And the people who hire us think what we do is basically stupid, even though they have fun doing it with us... as if you didn’t know.” Obviously this is quite a provocative statement, it’s easy to understand why people would disagree with this. But I can’t help but think that there’s some truth in this, speaking from personal experience, dealings that I’ve had with various demographics in doing a piece of design for them. There has always
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had to be a preface describing what graphic design is and redefining the brief. W ithin the media and then neither graphic design or graphic designers are talked about or even really mentioned. The impact and influence of design is significant but what Nancy Ber nard is saying is that it’s not recognised as such, I would agree with this statement. The last quote to discuss is the top left by Delyth Morgan: “Who you’re working for, who you’re trying to communicate with, and how you choose to do that, what kind of tools you use – even the kind of paper you use is a statement and that’s before you even put anything on it.” This quote is the only one not to have any ‘don’t know’ answers, it also has the largest number of responses and the largest majority agreeing. So what makes this quote stand out? I think the most obvious difference is that this is the only quote to advocate being ‘green’ by mentioning paper.
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
No other quote advocates recycling or being green, they all discuss something about the impact of design on society. Is the reason as disappointing as people saw the word paper and agreed? I hope not. Compared to the others it doesn’t a particularly compelling argument, by a well known person, particularly concise or unique, it wasn’t even as simple as it was the first quote on the left of the poster therefore most people would see it, it was slap bang in the middle. So it does seem that it advocating paper choice is the main difference. Is that the problem with design as Anne Bush says (which, incidentally got a mixed response): “I’ve always felt a certain unease with the ways in which the design profession has framed notions of social responsibility. Frequently defined by pro-bono designs for nonprofit agencies or the use of recycled paper and soy based inks, the design profession, in many cases limits social responsibility to acts of benevolence or good will.”
1st Email Recipients
As part of my research I wanted to find out some opinions and try and gain some advice from other credible people and organisations.
I received two responses from these contacts, from
The first batch of emails were sent to the following people: MSPs for Aberdeen City: Richard Baker – Scottish labour Lewis Macdonald – Scottish labour Alison McInnes – Lim Dems Creative Scotland: Creative Scotland – general enquiries Amanda Catto – Portfolio Manager Helena Ward – Portfolio Manager Design Council: Design Council – general enquiries Rebecca May
Apologies for taking a while to get back to you. As it is coming to the end of the financial year, we have been rather busy!
They were contacted asking the following questions: – How do you think design ethics will progress and develop in the short and long term future in Scottish design practice? – Do you see any particular negative or positive points about the impact of design ethics on society?
Hello Iain,
To let you know a little about my background, I have a Masters in Design from DJCAD, Dundee. Having spoken to my managers, we agreed that the questions you are asking are rather complex, almost essay style questions. We advise that you break down the questions based on specific issues in design ethics, giving more context to the questions and considering the audience your designing for too. Is it just Graphic Designers your pack is for? Or the wider design community? As you are creating a resource pack for, I advise that you try to chat to as many practitioners as possible (freelance and working in organisations etc). Those
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
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involved in policy/research will have
uk/news_and_features/resources/
This response was somewhat helpful,
some answers around questions in this area, and will provide a solid base for your project, but you need to question who are you designing for, and what practical beneficial information do they require. In depth interviews may be a way of having a conversation around the questions you have asked, and will allow the opportunity to get a real perspective on working practice.
assets/features/alliance_fashion_ and_manufacturingbrtoolkit could help inform the format of your own resource pack/toolkit, such as ‘Code of Practice’.
but I realised from the response that I was possibly asking the wrong questions and people.
Coming from a service/social design background (although I studied my undergrad as a jeweller!) I find this book useful ‘This is Service Design Thinking’ http://thisisservicedesignthinking. com Although focused on service design, there may be design methods that could enhance the development of your project, particularly with tho se individuals you are designing for. From your project description, it seems you are in theory designing/providing a ‘service’ for designers with the output being the kit/pack! Looking at examples of other ‘Toolkits’ such as Nestas Fashion Design kithttp://www.nesta.org.
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Cultural Enterprise office also have advisors for those working in the Creative Industries, http://www. culturalenterpriseoffice.co.uk/website/ default.asp?menu=advice&page_ sel=advice&menu_2_sel=2&menu_3_ sel=0 but again I would recommend you breakdown the questions you are asking by being specific and giving context around each one. I hope this information and feedback is useful. I know what a daunting time your final year can be, so if you have any other questions feel free to get back in touch. Regards, Lisa Lisa Murphy | Development Officer Creative Scotland
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
Though there are a lot of helpful comments and links to look at other examples, Lisa Murphy rightly points out that I need to narrow my questions more, and get more specific. As well as targeting more specific people, like designers, organisations and companies that might be creating resources like this or that would prospective recipients of the final product. So the next stage was to contact professionals and organisations, with more specific questions. I contacted designers that I knew personally.
2nd Email Recipients
Individual designers:
The email sent contained these questions:
Asa Rodger – Graphic designer at Fifth Ring Design, Aberdeen Alex Baker – a photographer, designer, cartoonist and former architect, based in-house at a inter national mission agency. Martin Parker – Senior designer/studio manager at The Gatehouse - design & print consultancy, Aberdeen David Fleck – An architecture student, also an accomplished illustrator, on placement at Glasgow 2014 Architects. Malcolm Currie – Malky Currie is an established graphic designer, illustrator and all round visual communicator. Based in-house at a inter national mission agency.
– Who is your favourite designer and why? – What do you find the biggest challenge is as a designer? – What do you find is the most effective way to engage you on a topic you’re less familiar with? – What do you see as the positive and negative impacts of graphic design on culture and society? – Where would you draw the line on a project that you wouldn’t do due to ethical reasons? – What’s the most engaging piece of design you’ve seen recently?
Alexandra Lofthoue – Graphic designer at Fifteen Design, Nottingham Robin Ireland – Manager of Pepperfi sh Creative Design Studio.
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A l e x B a k er: 1. Who is your favourite designer and why? My favourite would be Shepard Fairey of Obey Giant. He started getting really well-known when I was in University so I’ve been a fan since before he became the global brand. I’m also a fan of David Carson (behind Ray Gun magazine) who was also seminal during my varsity days as was Vaughan Oliver, the man behind the look of the 4AD record label. I li ke them all for different reasons. Shepard because of his politics (socialist, leftleaning, counter-culture, protest) and strong soviet-era aesthetic (design as clear tool of mass communication). Carson bec ause of his typography he makes fonts and type become the design itself. Oliver because of his ability to evoke emotion and memorable moods - more an artist than a designer I suppose. 2. What do you find the biggest challenge is as a designer? Finding a beneficial symbiotic client/
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designer relationship with shared ideals
examples of graphic design (the ones
and aesthetics
they’ll keep for the museums) fulfil that requirement. In a nutshell: graphic design’s overuse and misuse has made it a negative force - we could do with fewer flyers and billboards (a la Sao Paulo). However, it’s core purpose is still very positive.
3. What do you find is the most effective way to engage you on a topic you’re less familiar with? Make it funny. Try to look for what would make you laugh or think it’s cool 4. What do you see as the positive and negative impacts of graphic design on culture and society? Overall, graphic design is largely a negative force in society. Before you think I’ve gone mad, here’s why. The vast, and I do mean vast, majority of graphic design is shallow, temporary, superficial, easily-forgotten and more often than not the slick packaging of poisonous adverts/marketing campaigns. However, I would make the argument that that’s like shooting the messenger for the message. Graphic design is just a tool for communication - change the message and suddenly it becomes a more positive force. The closer graphic design gets to art the more lasting its impact. The ‘great’
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
5. Where would you draw the line on a project that you wouldn’t do due to ethical reasons? The client. It’s all about the client. If they stand for evil things or doing things in an evil away then run. Run. Run. 6. What’s the most engaging piece of design you’ve seen recently? Gosh...recently? The T ideswell School of Food (from the weekend). The website’s okay but their visitor centre and logo branding meant you could immediately spot their products all over the town and you were always curious about what it all meant.
This response were very helpful Alex clearly a grees with the reasoning behind this project as he states in his reply to question 4. “Overall, graphic design is largely a negative force in society... graphic design is shallow, temporary, superfici al, easily-forgotten and more often than not the slick packaging of poisonous adverts/marketing campaigns.” Though he makes the overarching point that, “Graphic design is just a tool for communication - change the message and suddenly it becomes a more positive force.” This is the main point that graphic design is a tool, a powerful tool. It has been abused and misused by the media.
But also, often I’ll produce a piece of
Malcolm Currie: 1.Who is your favourite designer and why? I’m the epitome of a 21st century postmoder n designer I think. I don’t tend to pay attention to designers. I just trawl design blogs and think, oh that’s nice I’ll nick that for inspiration. Recently I came across a dude Tom Lane http://www.gingermonkeydesign. com/ Love his stuff. The attention to detail and doing everything from scratch often by hand is rare and impressive. I like Shepard Fairey, Milton Glaser and George Lois. I love designers that have a blatant agenda and actually care about affecting positive change thro ugh their work and influence. 2.What do you find the biggest challenge is as a designer? When clients a vision and my own clash. The worst is if they hate it and it tur ns out we have different objectives.
work and my bosses/ clients are happy with it but it might well be mediocre. It’s great to have my stuff liked but it’s even better when working with a great client/art director/ editor who is really into design and really wants to push for something really great. It’s sometimes easy to settle for something average otherwise. 3. What do you find is the most effective way to engage you on a topic you’re less familiar with? Give it to me in a medium I enjoy. If you put it in a funny/pretty poster. Or in a viral video that is worth watching cos it’s funny or beautifully done. Or maybe if everyone’s talking about it I’ll feel that I need to get informed. Or if people I respect or like think it’s important. 4. What do you see as the positive and negative impacts of graphic design on culture and society? Big question. At it’s best it makes beautiful art commercially viable. I guess within a capitalist system good
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work makes money for clients therefore
work for similar clients. My wife is an
good work will be out there and people will see it who would otherwise not engage with visual art (see becks vier music inspires art 2010 campaign, or Absolute vodka). Now those examples are ideal because what are the things that great design tells us is most important in life? Booze. Is that ok? In it’s self design makes the world a better place, a more beautiful, creative thought provoking place. I’m tempted to say there are little negative impacts of graphic design. However the negative impacts of advertising are HUGE and graphic design is a primary advertising tool. Advertising creates a culture in the west of depression, greed and insecurity through it’s harmful messages and manufacturing needs in people that their product claims to fulfil.
independent musician so I do some work in that field too. I deliberately don’t go after big multi-national corporations who’s ethics I disagree with. I’d like to think I’d tur n down a huge deal with Coca-cola or Nestle but I’m yet to have the opportunity! I’d also be willing to tur n down stuff that’s promoting or condoning any kind of hatred or prejudiced. In fact I actively do the opposite through projects like The Nar nian Socialist Review. http:// nar niansocialist.com/
And this,
6. What’s the most engaging piece of design you’ve seen recently? This,
Malcolm Currie also makes some helpful points as well similar to Alex. I found the pieces pointed to in question 6, the most interesting.
5. Where would you draw the line on a project that you wouldn’t do due to ethical reasons?
I find the comic very effective it’s so simple, black and white, as soon as I saw it I was gripped that the speaker was going to fall. The power that the
Because I care about what I do then I pursue (end up in the right circles of) the kind of work I like. Working for a development charity I find myself doing
people have, it makes it feel so obvious that the leaders don’t have ultimate power.
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
A s a R odger: 1. Who is your favourite designer and why? I don’t really have one, I like elements of each style, but prefer how the problem was solved rather than who it was solved by.2. What do you find the biggest challenge is as a designer?
5. Where would you draw the line on a project that you wouldn’t do due to ethical reasons? If I wouldn’t support it by word, I wouldn’t support it by image. 6. What’s the most engaging piece of design you’ve seen recently? V iral campaign done well, clean design,
Inspired work under tight time lines. The creative process is hard and takes time.
Image.
Positive: Messaging delivery, the power to deliver messages with more impact through graphic design. Negative: trends
1. Who is your favourite designer and why? David Carson. A predictable choice perhaps, but he made a big impact in the 1980s and 90s (showing my age now!). I loved his use of bold typography and styles that broke free from the norm. I remember being wowed by his magazine designs and I still like them today. 2. What do you find the biggest challenge is as a designer?
3. What do you find is the most effective way to engage you on a topic you’re less familiar with?
4. What do you see as the positive and negative impacts of graphic design on culture and society?
R o b i n I re l a n d :
intelligent marketing and strong business model with USP, defining a new market. Asa gives very direct answers, but not a lot of info, he makes good and helpful points about the advert in question 6.
There are lots of challenges! Keeping up with current trends is one. Its so important but takes time. Its very easy to rely on tried and tested methods, especially when you’re busy and only have short time scales. 3. What do you find is the most effective way to engage you on a topic you’re less familiar with? I’m naturally a visual lear ner. So great imagery always draws me in rather than
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text. Although a good headline will get
design you’ve seen recently?
my attention too! 4. What do you see as the positive and negative impacts of graphic design on culture and society? Good design keeps things fresh and it inspires. The negatives for me are that design often looks to shock or disturb in its attempt to find something new. Or the other extreme is that it promotes a false reali ty where everyone should be beautiful and without imperfection (perhaps more media driven than design – but they work closely together).
Looking back at David Carson’s work again having mentioned him above! Love it :-) Robin makes the point from question 4 that a negative is design that seeks to shock or disturb that it shouldn’t do that.
5. Where would you draw the line on a project that you wouldn’t do due to ethical reasons? This is an interesting question. There are definite lines I would draw on por nography or hate literature. However, there are many grey areas too. I think if the design was to promote something I felt uncomfortable with, I would have to say no. 6. What’s the most engaging piece of
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Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
Summary: F ro m th e s e re s p o n s e s th e s e a re th e fol l ow i n g p o i n t s I ’ l l ta ke fo r wa rd ; – T h a t my th i n k i n g i s o n th e r i g h t t ra ck , th e y a g re e d w i th a p p roa ch e s I ’ m l e a n i n g towa rd s . – To e n g a g e i n a e a s y f r i e n d l y m a n n e r. – To re s e a rch th e d e s i g n e r s th e y m e n t i o n e d we re th e y ’ re i n f l u e n c e s a n d i n s p i ra t i o n s .
http://vimeo.com/38785342 http://tinyurl.com/6r5bpb7 http://www.dollarshaveclub.com/
3rd Email Recipients
The organisations I decided to contact
David Berman – Author (Do Good
were ones that I had researched already and referenced due to their aims and objectives. They were the following:
Design, expert speaker, designer, communications strategist, and consultant, his professional work has brought him to over 30 countries.
Adbusters – Primarily a magazine but they describe themselves as, a global network of artists, activists, writers, pranksters, students, educators and entrepreneurs who want to advance the new social activists movement of the information age.
Design Can Change – Works on the belief that our industry can make positive change by working together. Use this resource as a starting point to help bring our community together to encourage sustainable practices.
GOOD – GOOD is a collaboration of individuals, businesses, and nonprofits pushing the world forward. Since 2006 we’ve been making a magazine, videos, and events for people who give a damn.
MYOO – Formed from the heart of “community” [kuh-MYOO-ni-tee], MYOO is about bringing people together to protect the planet while, believe it or not, having fun.
Provokateur – An ethical communications agency that believes creativity and design can be powerful catalysts for change.
I only got one reply out of these contacts but it was a significant one, Adbusters replied saying that my email was passed onto the editors for their comments.
The Designers Accord – A global coalition of designers, educators, and business leaders, working together to create positive environmental and social impact.
I got a reply saying that I could phone Kalle Lasn, the co-founder of Adbusters the full interview is continued on the following page.
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
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Kalle Lasn Interview 14
Kalle Lasn (bor n March 24, 1942) is an
of vandalism was his first (quite literal)
Estonian Canadian film maker, author, magazine editor and activist. Near the end of World War II his family fled Estonia and Lasn spent some time in a German refugee camp. At age seven he was resettled in Australia with his family, where he grew up and remained until the late 1960s, attending school in Canberra. In the late 1960s, he founded a market research company in Tokyo, and in 1970, moved to Vancouver, Canada. For twenty years, he produced documentaries for PBS and Canada’s National Film Board. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.
“culture jam” – defined as an act designed to subvert mainstream society.
He is the co-founder of Adbusters magazine and author of the books Culture Jam and Design Anarchy and is the co-founder of the Adbusters Media Foundation, which owns the magazine. He reportedly started Adbusters after an epiphany that there was something profoundly wrong with consumerism. It happened in a supermarket parking lot. Frustrated that he had to insert a quarter to use a shopping cart, he jammed a bent coin in so that the machine became inoperable. This act
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
In his first book Culture Jam, he argues that consumerism is the fundamental evil of the moder n era. He calls for a “meme war”: a battle of ideas to shift Wester n society away from consumer capitalism. His second book, Design Anarchy, calls on graphic designers, illustrators and others to tur n from working in service to corporate and political pollution of both the planet and “the mental environment”, and embrace a radical new aesthetic devoted to social and environmental responsibility. I had the privilege of conducting a telephone interview with Kalle Lasn, the transcript follows on the next page.
What do you think is the most effective
can take a whole fresh look from a
I think the most important thing is given
way to e ngage people on a topic they’re less familiar with?
psycho design perspective at everything in the global market place right now. If we can just come up with a new aesthetic that goes deeper than this old aesthetic of just buying more or just encouraging people to impulsively b uy more products.
the fact that we’ve had fifty years if this aesthetic – a kind of glitzy thing – that we’ve infused throughout every nook and cranny of our culture. I think the most important psychological factor in our culture now is cognitive dissonance. I think that the job of design now is to wake people up, to give them a way to look at a hot water tap in a new way. To give them a new way of hoping into their car, to give them a different kind of experience of driving where they are constantly being reminded at a fundamental level. Instead of having some kind of eco carbon emitting meter that constantly reminds you about what your doing to the climate change.
I agree with you, I’ve also been thinking for many years now about what I call ‘psycho design’ about the psychological factors that swirl around graphic design as well as product design. My own thinking about it is that for the last few generations probably since the 2nd world war, we’ve been going for the glitz. Our clients have paid us for these products that have this nuclear glow around them in the shelves and in the advertisements. We’ve (graphic designer s) have been guilty of creating this false aesthetic that basically just sells more product. Now this birth of psycho design is all about communicating different things to people. Some of the examples I’ve used in the past, a hot water tap that’s designed right from the start to be used less just by adding certain features to it. You can design product package s that remind people what’s really involved in creating that product in terms of the ecological factors. You
So I think there’s something incredibly fascinating here about this concept of psycho design. When it comes to it, every product is different if you’re designing a new automobile there’s a certain approach you can use which is either a door handle that has it’s own approach or if you’re designing a landscape it has got it’s own approach. You know, I don’t know how to answer that question about what are the actual factors that we have to build in. But I do know graphic designers are at the early stage of [defining] a whole new aesthetic. In terms of the design of my project do think it is better to take a more provocative approach or a more empathetic one, to inspire or influence subversively?
So I think that the most important factor is for designers to create cognitive dissonance to put surprises into their products, into their designs and to continually play this kind of cat and mouse game with the people who are using the product. It tur ns the whole experience into something much more interesting. It also has a way of getting people to slowly start changing their mind about how they live and
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how they consume, how they basically
the past we’ve thought we use alchemy
manipulating all these little things,
treat design. To me the biggest thing is to create a new aesthetic. At the moment we have this kind of corpor ate slick aesthetic. We have to change that into a slick subversive aesthetic tha t is producing cognitive dissonance and narrating a cultural change.
to produce gold out of lead. The most recent example of that is that we thought we could imaginatively package derivatives and mortgages in a risk free way.
moving things around. You think that somehow if you move things around enough and tweak all the little factors that somehow you can come up with the magical design that does what you want it to do. I think there’s something fundamentally wrong with that logical way of thinking.
What do you see as the dominant ideology in wester n society? … Oh gee! I think … I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about that all my life! I’ve come to the conclusion right now, as I’m writing a book about economics, and I’m looking at the sort of economic system that we in the west have created. We’ve created a kind of neo-classical economics that is so mathematical! So logical! We in the west are the people who in the early days – the Greek days – came up with laws of logic. And for thousands of years we ’ve been thinking that we can, we’ve always thought we can figure things out by using the laws of logic. In medieval times we even thought we could prove the existence of God by using the laws of logic! In
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All along we’ve basically created logical systems that have created a lot of mayhem – a lot of disaster! Now finally with humanity hitting the wall – this human experiment of ours on planet earth is finally hitting the wall. And we’ve suddenly got these climate change tipping points hovering on the horizon, and fiscally, financially it looks like we could be in a 1929 scenario at any moment! We’re suddenly hitting the wall, to that question you asked me, we have to say – what got us into this mess?! How come we’re suddenly in this apocalyptic scenario? I think it’s got something to do with this logic freakiness of wester n culture – that we in the west are logic freaks! I think that even a lot of designers, if you really look at the way you design, sitting there in front of your computer with your hand on the mouse and your
Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
I can feel now that input from Brazil, which is a much more playful and spontaneous kind of culture. And some Islamic ways of thinking about economics that are saying wild things like ‘let’s get rid of interest rates’. It’s like all of a sudden there’s a counter intuitive non-logical weirdo kind of an emotional approach. These things that are coming to the fore, and my feeling is that for designers to start doing the right thing, they have to become much more intuitive, much more emotional and less logic freaky for us to solve these larger problems of how to create a sane sustainable future. You know the whole global culture will have to move away from this logic freakiness into a much more human emotional kind of a resonance.
Something that I see – I’m speak ing
lot of power. You basically just have to
billion of us live in. Then all of a sudden
particularly about designers and the consumerist culture created around them – as a significant ideology is possibly one of apathy, that people have fallen asleep in a sense, settling into an easy way. Would you agree with that?
do what the client wants – what your corporate paymasters tell you to do, that you’re not always that big or that important. That you can be a successful designer just by coming up with a nice new door handle for a car, or a nice new brochure for some company or some nice sign or come up with some fancy dancy book or something.
we will become much more empowered and we will realise that we are some of the most critical people who have the power to change the world!
Um …yeah! I would agree with that. I think that if you were facing these kind of ecological, psychological, political apocalyptic factors swirling around us right now then it’s very easy just to switch off. To keep sipping your latte and ignore the fact that, as I said before this whole human experiment of ours on planet earth could suddenly hit the wall, and then we could have a 500 year dark age that we’re suddenly thrown into. But the bigger thing I think about, especially designers, there’s one thing that I always want to argue with them about. Most of the designers I’ve met – with a few exceptions – are mil d people. Yeah, they have a certain kind of apathy, but there is a feeling among designer s that you don’t really have a
But I think there are a few designers now that are waking up to the fact that designers are actually some of the most powerful people in the world! We are the people who create the ambiances; we are the people who create the code of the media. We are the people who create the feeling of interacting with the Inter net; we are actually the people who create the aesthetic that we all live in! If we start thinking of ourselves as some of the most powerful people in the world – who are actually manipulating these ‘under the radar’ tones and feelings and ambiences of global culture. If we see ourselves as the people who actually in some significant way create this global culture that all 7
Analysis: There are many points to take from the interview, from the first question Kalle Lasn talks a lot about what he calls psycho design. He explains that psycho design is design that aims to subvert and contradict, to design things fro the very beginning, from their conception to aim to do good. To aim for the psyche and change the way we design. Becuase, he explains that since WWII designers have been going for the ‘glitz’, designing to just look good and not paying attention to it’s effect. He uses the example of a hot water tap that’s designed right from the start to be used less just by adding certain features to it. Kalle Lasn’s response to the second question builds on the points made from the first question. He continues to explain another phrase, cognitive
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dissonance, similarly he explains that in
three and four run together, as we
order to push back against the media. We need to intelligently disrupt, not for anarchy’s sake but to wake people up, to cause people to re-think. He continues to say that a new aesthetic a new style and approach needs to be created.
discussed what the dominant ideology was in society. He started by using the phrase ‘logic freaks’, explaining that the west largely influenced by the enlightenment and is obsessed with logic and visual rhetoric. Thinking that for a given piece of design there is a perfect solution, and if the form, colour and layout sit in the right formula, it will be a successful piece of design. In response to this we need to be intuitive and emotional designers.
He continues to explain that a corporate aesthetic has been created, due to the dominance to capitalism and therefore businesses. Graphic design has in a way become a slave to businesses. He explains that in order to challenge this we need to get under the skin. To subvert it designers need to design within that corporate aesthetic, but within it challenge it and contradict it, to create a ‘slick subversive aesthetic’. This is the most encouraging point from the interview because that is exactly what I’m doing, the style of the project is a clean c orporate one, but the content is to challenge every designer to think about what they create.
Kalle Lasn agreed with my sentiment that some designers have become apathetic, but he thought that it’s maybe ore that people are too mild. That designers just do what the client wants, and don’t think for themselves. He concludes by saying that designers are powerful people, that we need to realise that we are the people that create the aesthetic of society. That we create the code and enable the media to communicate. If only designers would realise the power they have, that designers can change the world.
Kalle Lasn’s responses to question
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Book 5, It Must Expand Project – Questionnaires & Interviews
Summary: F ro m a l l o f th e s e e m a i l s , c o n ta c t s a n d th e i n te r v i e w ; – T h a t f ro m th e e m a i l s , i t wa s c o n f i r m e d th a t th e re i s a m a rke t fo r th i s p ro j e c t . – That in making it an easily a p p roa ch e d a n d s i m pl e d e s i g n i s th e m o s t e f fe c t ive . – T h a t K a l l e L a s n a g re e d th a t th e cl e a n c o r p o ra te s ty l e o f th e p ro j e c t i s th e m o s t e f fe c t ive ; a s i t c o n n e c t s w i th w h a t p e o pl e k n ow b e s t b u t s u bve r t s i t a n d o f fe r s a n a l te r n a t ive way o f a p p roa ch i n g d e s i g n .