Design Writing

Design Writing Ladybug Anxiety West Lake: Enchanting place in mind Kenya Hara My Experience At Met Breuer 50 Things That Make Me Feel Anxious!

Pratt Institute MFA Commnications Design Tongtong Li

Content Ladybug Anxiety

West Lake: Enchanting place in mind

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7~12

Kenya Hara

13~16

My Experience At Met Breuer

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50 Things That Made Me Feel Anxious

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Ladybug Anxiety

“Worrying is carrying tomorrow's load with today's strength- carrying two days at once. It is moving into tomorrow ahead of time. Worrying doesn't empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.�

-Corrie ten Boom

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“After all, what is happiness? Love, they tell me. But love doesn't bring and never has brought happiness. On the contrary, it's a constant state of anxiety, a battlefield; it's sleepless nights, asking ourselves all the time if we're doing the right thing. Real love is composed of ecstasy and agony.�

-Paulo Coelho, The Witch Of Portobello

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mong numerous items that once appeared along our path of growth, there must be at least one or two things that really strikes our nerves and bring anxieties and fears to our minds. Normally, we would immediately abandon the stuff that makes us feel anxious and nauseated at the first glance. However, as far as I am concerned, there is one particular thing that I have both love and hatred towards it and the different types of anxieties it brought me during different time periods was something that’s enormously impressive in my memory.

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couldn’t remember since when in my childhood, catching insects had become one of my major recreations. Mantis, cicada, beetles, whatever I could keep in my little hand made transparent box, however, nothing could be more exciting than a small, round tiny little ladybug pop into my view, from my perspective, what makes it different from other tiny insects is probably the cute dots on its back and the smooth, shining body.

Every time it invaded my “capture range”, I had to make it one of the “residents” of my hand made box. As a little kid, I was so easily to be satisfied, I regarded it as my little friend and could be fully entertained simply by watching it. But, anxiety come along with this entertainment, the motionless body of the ladybug that I saw the other day was definitely a nightmare to hurt my young heart and made me burst into tears. In this stage of my life, the anxiety that the ladybugs brought me was undoubtedly the worry of a tiny little creature’s death.

conquer the

live in the

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everal years passed after that childhood experience, my family moved into a big new house after I graduated from my elementary school. This time, they used the wood floor instead of the tiled floor. Since I’ve grown up into a teenager, it was my responsibility to help the family with the daily chores such as sweeping the floor, washing the dishes, doing some laundries and so on. I could never have imagined the terrible feeling that my little old childhood “friend” would bring me this time. While I was mopping the wood floor of the study in a sunny afternoon, I couldn’t help screaming out loudly when three ladybugs appeared on the wood floor in one side of the corner. I completely lost my mind at that moment and threw these “sanitary destroyers” into the dustbin without hesitation. The scene of three ladybugs lying on the clean wood floor really made me a little nauseated and the biggest anxiety that those ladybugs brought me that time was probably the fear that the sanitation and cleanness being polluted.

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y love and hatred towards ladybugs never seems to come to an end, what’s more, it’s really beyond my expectation that my former experience with this creature could form an influence in my major during my undergraduate study. As an undergraduate student in Visual Communication Design Department,

we have bunch of artists and designers that we should know and comprehend. As for me, one artist whose work has fierce impact towards me is Yayoi Kusama, a Japanese artist who is most famous for her polka dots art. Some one may feel a little uncomfortable to her works because of the psychedelic color and patterns. For me, however, what made me react to her works so strongly was I consciously linked those polka dots with the ladybug from the beginning, and her work with polka dots is like the magnified version of the ladybugs. Ever since then, the appearance of a ladybug reminds me of the huge impact and discomfort that Yayoi Kusama’s works bring to me and at that moment my anxiety towards the ladybugs could be translated into my anxiety towards those densely populated dots in an artwork.

e anxiety of life,

N ment,

umerous things passed instantaneously through my life, and it is so interesting that this tiny little creature, the ladybug could bring me so much unforgettable experiences, even if

much of those experiences are relevant to “anxieties.”

live in the

breath.”

-Amit Ray, Om Chanting and Meditation

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West Lake: Enchanting place in mind

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'Spring Theme: Above the Lake' 'Chun ti hushang' Bo Juyi Now spring is here the lake seems a painted picture, Unruly peaks all round the edge, the water spread out flat.

Pines in ranks on the face of the hills, a thousand layers of green: The moon centred on the heart of the waves, just one pearl.

Threadends of an emerald-green rug, the extruding paddy-shoots: Sash of a blue damask skirt, the expanse of new reeds.

If I cannot bring myself yet to put Hangzhou behind me, Half of what holds me here is on this lake.

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peaking of the word “lake� in China, nothing can be more impressive and influential than West Lake, a freshwater lake, which is located in Hangzhou, a famous ancient city and the

capital of Zhejiang province in eastern China. In 2011, West Lake was made a UNESCO heritage and described as the influenced garden design in the rest of China as well as Japan and Korea over the centuries and bears an exceptional testimony to the cultural tradition of improving landscapes to create a series of vistas reflecting an idealized fusion between humans and nature. The reputation and popularity of West Lake have been last from ancient times to present. Today, millions of people come to visit West Lake during each holiday with enormous enthusiasm and expectations.

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or most tourists, West Lake is a scenic spot, a well-known place to pay a visit. For me, it is far more than just a tourist spot, my personal affection towards this charming lake is simply more

than words can describe, during my four undergraduate years in Hangzhou city, West Lake is the place that I went to sketch and paint most frequently, the inspiration I can draw from its beauty is endless and fascinating, just like the ancient poets and artists of literature and writing in China, for them, West lake is a continuous poem, a natural picture, an attractive story, a beautiful dream from which they never want to wake up. “Ripping water shimmering on a sunny day, Misty mountains shrouded by the rain; Plainly or gaily decked out like Xizi; West Lake is always alluring.�

These are the words composed by the famous Song Dynasty poet Su Dongpo. In this poem, he compared the West Lake to Xi Zi, one of the four beauties in ancient China. These poetic sentiments depict the charm of the lake, since then, West Lake has become the incarnation of beauty and kept its enchantment throughout the long history of China.

Beyond the hills blue hills, beyond the mansions m a n s i o n s - To s o n g a n d dance on the West lake when will there be an end?

Idlers fuddled on the fumes of the warm breeze will turn Hangzhou that rises into Kaifeng that fell.

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side from its natural beauty, the romantic legend, and intoxicating artificial scenic spots also contribute to its reputation. Of all the legends, the most touching one is the love story between Bai Suzhen and Xu Xian, which is one of the four

folk love stories in ancient China, Because of the moving story, the lake also becomes an ideal dating place for lovers. Apart from the touching legend, another testimony of the significance of West Lake is that its scenery has appeared various times on Chinese currency. Among these, The picture of “Three Ponds Mirroring the Moon”, which is an artificial scenic spot of “ten scenes in West Lake” was printed on the backs of both the foreign exchange certificate one yuan bill issued by the government in 1979 and the fifth version of RMB one yuan bill issued in 2004.

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ll in all, every scenery of West Lake is so influential and everyone has his or her special and unique fascination with this enchanting lake, from my perspective, the picture of West Lake in my eyes is never the same, from every season, from every

location, the picture that I depicted on my sketch paper is totally different. In a word, West Lake belongs to nature, its beauty, its charm should be appreciated by everyone, that’s why I strongly oppose the idea that the West Lake scenic area should charge for visit in order to reduce the flow of people, It is not only the charm of the nature that attracts us, what really makes us fall in love with the nature, with the West Lake, are their all-embracing minds and undistinguished features. We should learn to appreciate and comprehend this beauty and convey it to more and more audiences.

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e all have a beautiful place in our mind, for me, the most enchanting place in my mind is this amazing lake. No matter where I am, I will always remember there is such a peaceful and unforgettable place where I can indulge in her

beauty.

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“Colors do not exist separately and independently within nature; they are constantly shifting in response to subtle gradations of light.

It is language that, magnificently, gives them clear shape.�

-Kenya Hara, White 13

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enya Hara can be described as my favorite graphic designer at all time, and he is definitely the leader in graphic design field in nowadays Japan. Being the art director of MUJI has made him

most famous and two of his thought provoking publications, White and Designing Design enable people to have a profound understanding of his design ideas and also conveyed to people what he is trying to do to change the traditional form of graphic design.

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ara has been the art director of MUJI since 2001. He published Designing design, in which he elaborates on the importance of “emptiness” in both visual and philosophical traditions of

Japan, and its application to graphic design. From his perspective, “emptiness” is a deep and significant word, on the one hand, it means nothing, on the other hand, it shows the potential of everything, and this profound idea eventually developed into the fundamental concept of MUJI, which is “no band”, however, the “no brand” concept is the exact reason why MUJI products are so appealing to me and other audiences.

While viewing the MUJI products, you are not only viewing it but also feeling it, the MUJI products are so close to nature, so close to human’s lives, the unadorned and plain exterior looks can not hide their inner delicacy. Every time you walk inside a MUJI retailing store, you feel like you are breathing the pure and fresh air of the nature.

“Because occasion it being than - Kenya Ha

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irst thing that attracted me while I was reading Hara’s publication, the Designing Design, was the five senses concept that he put forward, he boldly brought forth the conclusion that

human being’s mind exists everywhere in the body, not only in the brain, we can receive information through our five senses, sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. Later, he applied this idea to one of his design

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projects, a signage system of a local hospital. In this project, he used

the material of a the clean, white, soft cloth to put the signage on in order to make patients recognize the sanitary condition of the hospital and feel the care that the hospital provides for them are kind and meticulous just

like the softness of the white cloth. This is just one example that Hara is considering unusual ways to communicate certain information to people and let them fully comprehend it as detailed as possible.

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ndeed, Kenya Hara is one of the leaders of graphic design in the

world, he has brought so many amazing design works to us, but most importantly, he changed our traditional ways of appreciating

and judging a piece of graphic design work simply by viewing its design

elements like colors, patterns, structures and so on. Another significant inspiration that we can get from Hara is that the form of communication within graphic design is various, even numerous, we designers should never stop the footstep of discovering and exploring the innovative and creative ways of conveying the ideas of design works accurately and comprehensibly to people.

nonbeing longs for being, on t creates a stronger sense of n being itself.� ara, White

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Experience

My

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Met Breuer

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oday I went to The Met Breuer museum, which is in the subtle refurbishment of the former Whitney Museum, and is also the temporary home for the contemporary and modern art collection of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. iewing from the outside, the landmark and concrete and granite building is like an up side down staircase and inside, when I walked into it, first things that popped into my eyes are those disk shaped lights covered the ceiling of the first floor which

makes the interspace much broader and brighter. Currently the museum is presenting two inaugural exhibitions: works by Nasreen Mohamedi, the late Indian artist known for her linebased drawings, and Unfinished: Thoughts Left Visible, which features a range of unresolved pieces by a bunch of famous artists in the world.

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climbed the stairs to the second floor and took a several minutes view of Indian artist’s paintings, then I took the spacious elevator to the third floor and focused on this special art exhibition Unfinished: Thoughts left Visible. This was my first time watching an

exhibition that put all the incomplete pieces on display. Among all these paintings, some are in a rough outline state and only has a basic color harmony, that are quite easy for people to discover they are unfinished. However, for some other oil paintings, we can’t even notice that they incomplete without reading the introduction aside.

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here are two pieces that made me feel most excited to view, these are two sketches drawn two Italian artists, Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. What Michelangelo painted was a female figure and the sketches include juxtapositions of finished and

unfinished in the movement between the sculpture effects and lustrous highlights of some of the anatomical fragments and other areas that are less carefully worked out. In this painting, Michelangelo has paid enormous attention to certain aspects of the figure but still left the full composition in an incomplete state. In da Vinci’s work, he portrayed a young woman with disheveled hair by using the brushing drawing with some pigments, of which the treatment is similar to other of his incomplete works. First time I saw these two famous unfinished painting was the time I began learning drawing sketches in my high school. I copied these two pieces several time and learned a lot painting techniques from them without even knowing that they are incomplete works. Today, this exhibition reinforced my belief that an incomplete work can convey the same information to us as a complete one do.

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fter an hour, I walked on to the third floor to continue viewing this exhibition, the third floor displays some unfinished paintings and artworks including the well known Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. The most interesting work to me is an artwork

called Repository done by an American artist George Brecht, the reason that this is still an unfinished work is quite different from those art paintings. Actually this cabinet is merely just an artwork, the artist has turned this object into events by inviting visitors engagement.

Repository’s power relies on the strong stimulative nature of the items and it could be never finished because the viewer and the event were always changing.

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n general, the exhibition Unfinished: Thoughts left visible are very thought provoking to me and what also made me impressive is the museum, the building itself, which has intimate spaces and bold style, executed with great integrity, which allows we visitors to

have a best review of both the exhibitions and the building.

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50 Things That Made Me Feel

Anxious!

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