The Void – Finding Value in Nothing

The Void Finding Value In Nothing

A Thesis Book by Lucy Knops

Leap Into the Void, Yves Klein photographed by Harry Shunk and Janos Kender 1960

Š Copyright 2015 by Lucy Knops All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission in writing from the author.

For inquiries, contact lucy@lucyknops.com lucyknopsthesis.tumblr.com School of Visual Arts MFA Products of Design 136 West 21st Street New York, NY 10011-3213 productsofdesign.sva.edu

Lucy Knops Author Designer Allan Chochinov Chair, MFA Products of Design at SVA Thesis I Instructor Andrew Schloss Thesis I Instructor Abby Covert Thesis II Instructor Peter Ambrosio Editor Whitney Campbell Editor

Contents 015

Introduction – Entering the Void

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Goals and Objectives – What Can Come of Nothing?

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Methodology – Working With Nothing

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Research – Exploring the Void

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Audience – A Little Nothing for Everyone

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Early Explorations – Testing the Void

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Developed Work – The Void in Action

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Conclusion – Nothing To Look Forward To

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References – The Source of Nothing

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Acknowledgements – Thanks for Nothing

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Introduction ENTERING THE VOID

On a sunny day in April of this year, I found myself slipping into an apartment on one of the busiest streets in Chelsea. Thirty years ago, this apartment had a sensory deprivation tank built inside of it. I was there to spend an hour inside of the tank. It cuts off all light and sound, and through the use of water with a higher level of salt than the Dead Sea’s it lets you float, thereby taking away all sense of your own weight. Having done extensive research on the history of sensory deprivation, I had expectations going into this experience. I understood the potential physical and mental benefits. Many accounts of first time “floats,” as they are referred to, describe blissful, mind-altering events. As someone who meditates regularly, I expected that I would easily slip into a quiet mental state and have an amazing peaceful float.

What happened was quite the opposite. The noise of my breath and pulse became startlingly loud. It was so dark that I had to inten-

tionally blink to register if my eyes were open or closed. I floated with no effort at all to the extent that it became difficult to tell where exactly my body was. With all external inputs removed, my focus shifted inward. I began thinking about my thoughts themselves and spent the entire hour analyzing the format of my actual thought process. It was an active and intense experience, a far cry from the quiet nothingness I had expected.

The void, defined as emptiness, or even an absence, was what I was searching for in that tank. It was a telling experience. Rather than containing nothing, the void is always filled with something. This is the compelling paradox when exploring the void. As a noun, void is ‘a completely empty space.’ What it means for a space to be completely empty has been contemplated and debated for thousands of years.

There is nuance to the use of ‘void’ in language, and its definition fluctuates depending

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Introduction Inside Galerie Iris Clert during Yves Klein’s Exhibition of the Void 1958

Score of John Cage’s 4’33” as published by C.F. Peters 1961

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on its content and context. As philosophy and history professor Dean Rickles describes this fluidity, “We can speak of ‘void’ as a subject or object: a property of an object or an object itself, one that has properties of its own.”1

1 Dean Rickles, “Void Ain’t What It Used to Be,” In Voids: A Retrospective (Zurich; Geneva; Paris: JRP|Ringier, 2009).

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Entering the Void

Design has traditionally been understood as a means of producing useful artifacts that fulfill specific needs. The landscape of design is changing and what falls under the umbrella of the field is expanding. It is no longer limited to consumer products with clear utility. This thesis Void can refer to something that should or explores the power of design as an activity of could be in a space but is not. It can also re- inquiry. This body of work does not attempt to fer to the space itself. In this sense, a void is present definitive solutions to specific needs. tied to emptiness, but it Rather, the work aims is an emptiness that can We can speak of to explore potential new be filled with potential. perspectives. By utiliz‘void’ as a subject or In researching this theing design as inquiry, sis, I explored the void object: a property of the family of offerings through artistic, scientific presented here create an object or an object opportunities for people and philosophical conceptions of the word. My to consider alternative itself, one that has main concern, though, ways to navigate their properties of its own. daily choices and achas been how the void can be applied to detions. The objects, servicsign. Ultimately, this is an inquiry into under- es, interventions and experiences of The Void standing the value of absence in our daily lives. materialize the abstract theories that inspire the work, in order to make these concepts tangible To speak of the void is a riddle. As soon as you and available for consideration. define ‘nothing,’ or create boundaries around ‘nothing,’ it becomes a something. It follows My personal interest in the concept of the void logically that attempting to design the void is is greatly inspired by the art world. I find myfutile. The work that was developed as part of self drawn to artists who have taken on the risk The Void, a thesis, does not create the void. It of presenting nothing rather than something. was inspired by the void as a starting point and In 1958, Yves Klein’s presentation of a gallery is motivated by the potential that the nothing- absent of any work was their first of its kind and ness inherent in the void holds to become a ushered in a series of interpretations to follow. valuable something. Despite a concept rooted John Cage’s silent composition 4’33 illustrated in absence being at direct odds with the notion the power of music without sound. Rauschenof design, this does not mean they cannot have berg’s Erased de Kooning Drawing is an illusa productive relationship. tration of the value that can exist in something that we can never see. These incredible artists Consider the sensory deprivation tank. The used absence as their material. The influence tank provides an opportunity to be completely of their pieces demonstrates that absence has alone with oneself and disengage. Even if we the ability to challenge established habits and have the intention, it can be very difficult to let cultural norms. The void is a provocation, a ourselves let go. The tank itself forces disen- jumping off point. This thesis explores absence gagement for a set period of time. In order to as a material in design, and it builds upon and achieve that level of disengagement, a structure has been informed by the inspiring work that of very high standards must be maintained. It has come before. Absence is a far cry from must be truly soundproof. All light must be kept nothingness. The Void explores what it means out. The water must have the proper salt level. to shift value to absence.

The chamber provides the structure and environment that makes the experience possible.

This void, like all voids, necessitates structure.

It needs a vessel and a context. In seeking out the void, we thus find ourselves bringing with us many disciplines of design.

Introduction Erased de Kooning Drawing, by Robert Rauschenberg 1953

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“We are surrounded by Nothing.

Everywhere we go, we have no idea what we’re not seeing. We don’t know what gravitation fields look like, what dark matter looks like, what quantum foam looks like, what de Kooning’s drawing looked like, but what the scientists and the artists are telling us, in their very best ways, is that if we lean in, and pay very close attention, sometimes what looks like Nothing is the best place to find the most interesting...somethings. ” – Robert Krulwich of RadioLab

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Goals and Objectives WHAT CAN COME OF NOTHING?

If design is to move forward, we must expand the range of ways in which it can improve our lives. There is a long history of artifacts that have been designed to enrich the aesthetic of human surroundings and to increase our efficiency. However, in an age of technological advancement, pervasive consumerism and an abundance of choice, it is worth considering design in less finite terms. Rather than focusing on object creation, The Void explores design as a way of being. In particular, how should one be? This can be an unwieldy and overwhelming question, but there is a specific line of thought that this thesis follows in answering it.

German philosopher Martin Heidegger in his seminal book Being and Time posited that we are disconnected from our place in the universe by the distractions of daily life. The ability to consider ourselves in this bigger context was characteristic of what Heidegger called our authentic self or, in German, ‘Eigentlichkeit.’ Conversely, he identified our preoccupation with the quotidian as part of our inauthentic self, or ‘Ineigentlichkeit.’ The Void accepts Heidegger’s notion of authenticity as a worthy goal. It is important to note that Heidegger claimed that the motivation behind the inauthentic self was a fear of death. In contrast, rather than a fear of death, it is the cultural attitude toward the void that lies at the root of this thesis.

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Goals and Objectives Diagram of Heidegger’s Authentic Self

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For the purposes of this work, the void as an activity is defined as doing nothing. Doing nothing has, by and large, a negative connotation in the present popular culture. It is equated with laziness. Maximizing productivity is now the central value brought to all activities, be they vocational or social. With events increasingly being commemorated through social media, #FOMO, the fear of missing out, has become a prevalent sentiment. Downtime, recreation and leisure are all associated with the presence of activities rather than the absence of them.

The ideas presented here propose an alternative view of doing nothing. They suggest that downtime, boredom and structured nothing should be embraced and fostered rather than kept at bay. In this sense, The Void aims to reevaluate our relationship to absence. While much of our current material culture seems to emancipate us from boredom, there is tremendous value in shifting our efforts and emancipating ourselves from distraction.

There is no doubt that choice can be a wonderful and liberating thing. New technology has broadened what is possible. However, we forget that we have the choice to opt out of what technology gives us. We also overestimate the power of some things to improve our lives and underestimate others. We are influenced and guided by social media, advertising, societal pressures and countless other external factors.

We are easily convinced that a new app or product can make a bigger difference in our lives than it really can. It is only by stepping back from this current of information and stimuli that we are able to improve our relationship with it.

More importantly, when we step back, we have the opportunity to consider life on a fundamental level — our relationships, our foundational values and our greater context — thereby

These potential voids exist in our daily lives, but we are quick to fill them with distractions.

The frequency of such diversions is inexhaustible, and they are becoming more sophisticated and difficult to distinguish. The lacunae in between these diversions urgently need our attention — not only for the direct physical and mental benefits, but also for abstract values, such as investing in our individual relationships to space and the environment. Small shifts in one’s attention can make a big difference in everyday living. If these shifts can lead to behavior change, they can impact one’s life on a larger scale. The process of shifting our attention toward the available internal voids, to the spaces in between, is how we can access playful contemplation, actively reflect and think broadly about the wider purposes of life. By exploring the voids that exist in daily life, we can become aware of what is currently filling them and devise structures and tools to reclaim and inject them with positive value.

The Void aims to progress toward a situation where we can manage the distractions, where we can decide when to dip in and out of the stream of constant stimulation. This very notion challenges existing cultural norms and explores alternative possibilities. It asks, how might we reframe absence as something to be valued? I believe that we can engage with the authentic self through moments of disengagement and that we can do so through the aid of design and structure. This thesis also explores the means to cultivate moments that shift away from distraction and move toward beneficial voids. In addition to the larger goals of affecting change in the lives of others and on a cultural scale, this thesis has been greatly influenced by my own personal goals.

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What Can Come of Nothing?

In doing this, the challenge we are faced with is to examine our lives so that we may distinguish meaning from distraction. It can be surprisingly difficult to determine what is actually fulfilling and what really makes us happy. Modernity has supplied us with means of efficiency and convenience that continue to progress at rapid rates each day. That convenience and efficiency is accompanied by an increase in choice and a culture that inundates us with new things vying for our attentions.

gaining access to our authentic selves. There is a paradox at work: creating space gives us fullness and disconnecting allows us to better connect. By removing things from our lives in a deliberate and meaningful way, we are adding to them. We can appreciate the contribution of other, often simple activities, like people watching, or taking a walk in the park and looking at the trees — without sharing them. Such moments are often overlooked but can significantly enhance the character of our lives. It is in these moments that we can turn our attention inward, where the perception of our spaces, internal and external, can be altered.

Goals and Objectives

At the mid-point of my first year of graduate school, like nearly every other graduate student, I was overwhelmed and stressed out. I was in an amazing new environment where I was learning new things every day. Although graduate school is largely a positive experience, I was swamped with the flood of information, practices, strategies, opinions, inspiration and pressure from every angle and at a rate I could not possibly digest. I had the sense that I was not taking full advantage of my environment because I did not have the mental space to reflect on all of the inputs. I was exhausted and anxious and it was taking a toll on my creativity. It felt like there were just not enough hours in the day. I knew the pace at which I was working was not sustainable.

absolutely no external resources, yet has remarkable, scientifically proven benefits. One of the key aspects is the elimination of visual input. By simply closing your eyes, you are subtracting a major source of sensory feedback.

Every sensory input, whether it is sight, sound, smell, taste or touch can be viewed as an entity vying for our attention. By subtracting just one of these, our sensitivity to the others becomes heightened and we are able to shift our attention with greater focus from one sense to the other. It is a designed behavior. It contains a structure consisting of a set of prescribed steps and elements. It is intended to be practiced at specific points in one’s day, for a specific length of time and with an assigned mantra.

This structure helps transform the activity into a habitual behavior.

It was then that I encountered the paradox that the void presents. I found the extra space I Back in 2008, the infamous designer Philippe needed in my daily routine by the addition of a Starck declared in a moment of self-criticism, new activity. I began meditating. With medita- “In the future there will be no more designers. tion, I am able to create a void within my day. The designers of the future will be the personal For two, twenty-minute sessions a day, I sit with coach.”2 Though this comment was roundly my eyes closed and focus my attention inward criticized, and I do not think design in the trainstead of on external input. After a year of ditional sense is disappearing any time soon, it practice, I am able to tap into this void in al- did indicate a new direction of design thinking. most any environment: from the comfort of my Seven years later, what qualifies as design is apartment, to a bustling being questioned, and coffee shop, the couch In the future there will its boundaries are being at school or a crowded There is newly be no more designers. pushed. subway car. Meditation found room in design creates a space absent to shape people’s daily The designers of of many of my daily lives through experience the future will be the and behavior change, distractions. It is also a means of getting close to rather than through the personal coach. an internal void, a quiet addition of products. space within. The practice is a cultivation of Sometimes a product is not the central focus of this internal void, learning how to access and a design solution. At times there does not have stretch it. I am sure that this void is slightly dif- to be a product at all. ferent for everyone who practices meditation, but I quickly began to notice, feel and examine Meditation can be viewed as a designed expea multitude of positive effects from my daily ex- rience that succeeds without the need for prodperience meditating. It certainly has not erased uct. Despite its simplicity and relatively universtress from my life, but it helps to lessen my sal accessibility, a very slim portion of western anxieties and is often the source of a much society meditates. Although meditation has needed boost of energy in the late afternoon. been proven to increase brain function and creativity, address depression and other emotional From a design perspective, meditation is an imbalances and help lower blood pressure and impressive feat (here I am speaking specifically maintain cardiovascular health, among other of Vedic meditation, the method I practice and benefits, these go largely overlooked due to the am most familiar with).1 It involves no physical cultural discomfort of adopting such a practice. tools, no specificity of location and expends The reality of this situation raised several ques1 For more on meditation see Meditation and Its Practice by Swami Rama.

2 Philippe Starck in “Starck: Design Is Dead, Sorry,” PSFK, March 28, 2008.

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tions for me: When we spend countless hours on unfulfilling daily tasks, why is it so hard for us to carve out time for things that are ostensibly simple and beneficial? What is it about our culture that seems to inherently fear doing nothing? Are there other types of voids that could be more accessible and beneficial to a broader audience? With this in mind, I set out to push my design work in directions that intentionally disregard potential monetary or market values. Building upon the inspiration I took from my firsthand experience meditating, I used this thesis as an opportunity to utilize myself as a test subject. I set out to live my thesis. My uniform project, Nothing to Wear, started as an effort to bring absence into my daily life. Insights and discoveries from this experiment, which are addressed in detail later in this book, inspired and influenced much of the other work presented here.Â

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What Can Come of Nothing?

The Void explores opportunities for design interventions that cut through the distractions of everyday life. I believe that through structure, we can become our own agents of change.

The hope is that change on an individual scale will, in turn, influence those around to begin the process of shifting our culture toward a quieter, slower contemplation. This work has the ultimate potential of giving everyone access to the design of a healthier, more authentic self.

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Goals and Objectives

Thirty spokes join in one hub In its emptiness, there is the function of a vehicle Mix clay to create a container In its emptiness, there is the function of a container Cut open doors and windows to create a room In its emptiness, there is the function of a room Therefore, that which exists is used to create benefit That which is empty is used to create functionality – Passage from Tao Te Ching

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Methodology WORKING WITH NOTHING

The work of this thesis was driven forward through research, ideation and implementation.

However, these three factors did not comprise a linear process. From day one, making and conceptualizing ideas has been intertwined with research. This methodology includes both research-led design, and design-led research.

Allan Chochinov, the Chair of my program of study, the Masters of Fine Arts in Products of Design at the School of Visual Arts, defines the distinction between the two as a relation between means and ends.

Research-led design, the more conventional practice, can be considered as means leading to an end. A process of research, exploration and investigation takes place prior to the development of a design offering. With this approach, a need, problem or pain point is defined, and then a solution is developed and designed.

The converse, design-led research, is where ends lead to means. The product of design is part of the investigation of the territory.

The product itself, may it be a physical prototype, an advertisement, a speculative narrative, or something else, serves to drive un-

derstanding of the area of study. Design has the power to make abstract concepts tangible and available for consideration. By making and designing from the onset of the process, dialogue and insights that might not be discovered through research have the opportunity to reveal themselves.

Early on in the process, I thought research into deep space and physics would provide me with design inspiration. These subjects have long been fascinating to me, but my understanding of them has been always limited. I thought I could use my thesis as an opportunity to finally take the time to understand them and use them as a means of finding inspiration. However, while my design work could have been influenced by the formal or aesthetic qualities of physics- and astronomy-based investigations into the void, I quickly shifted away from this focus once I realized that I wanted to ground things in people’s daily lives. Increasingly, I found conceptual inspiration in the work of other artists. A common thread began to emerge across some of my favorites: Yves Klein, Robert Rauschenberg, James Turrell, Robert Irwin, Michael Heizer. They all challenge what can be considered art and use blank space, light

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Methodology Nothing to Wear

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and volume as their materials. Subsequently, the more ‘technical’ aspects of my research became rooted in behavioral economics and neurological responses to ‘doing nothing.’

Ultimately, the artistic and conceptual elements of my inspiration trace back to my personal experience exploring internal ‘voids’ with meditation.

My investigation into The Void includes explorations into the history of the territory, interviews with subject matter experts, observation and user testing. Getting out and testing with my audience was a driving force for my work.

Using myself as a test subject became central to my process of design research. As outlined in the Audience section of this book, I am very much a member of my target audience. I made the decision early on to immerse myself personally in The Void as much as possible.

Nothing to Wear was a means of designing absence into my life, by subtracting the daily decision of what to wear from my routine.

Through the elimination process, I was able to reevaluate what decisions hold true value in this area of my life and use the structure of the uniform to create a new space, a void, that could then be filled with more valuable choices.

By becoming my own test subject, by living with this project literally every day of my thesis, my observations and insights were able to develop over the course of a full eight months.

This method of design-led research was a catalyst for both further research and design work.

My uniform also served as an entry point for many conversations with experts. This in turn pointed me in new directions for research and ultimately influenced many of my design offerings — all while being a liberating personal experience. I return to this project and the projects that it influenced in the Developed Work section of this book (see page 171).

The work itself took shape through a series of lenses: speculative objects, interventions, rituals, branded objects, digital design, experience design, a speculative campaign, service design, business model development, and future narratives. Each lens surfaced new understanding of the territory and often led to a next iteration.

Intertwining research-led design and design-led research allowed me to work in a multitude of directions simultaneously. With the guidance of my advisors and the Products of Design department as a whole, I was able to trust in the process and not become consumed by the solutions. This led me down many divergent paths, allowing me to validate and push forward on a wide range of offerings. Coincidentally, several of my offerings encourage the user to do just that, focus on the process rather than the outcome.

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Working With Nothing

I started the project, titled Nothing to Wear, on the first day I presented The Void as my thesis topic on September 22, 2014. Whereas the flotation tank allowed me to explore a void for a set period of time, I wanted to bring the void into my daily life in a tangible way. I wanted to live my thesis throughout the year.

By paring down my personal wardrobe to a basic uniform, I was able to experience my work directly.

In addition to using myself as a test subject, I began engaging my audience early on. I used the unique environment of a graduate level design studio as a testing ground for my concepts and offerings. I implemented prototypes with my classmates and instructors. The broadbased theoretical implications of my thesis also led to happy accidents. When a tour of Etsy for a completely unrelated project included a guided meditation, it sparked a series of conversations that would prove to be central in the development of several ideas. Other research methodologies included facilitating a co-creating session with a selected user group, conducting month-long research studies with actual users, and interacting with the public, specifically engaging New York City subway passengers to user-test prototypes. The feedback and insights from users were invaluable in the development of my work.

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Research EXPLORING THE VOID

The concept of a void can be traced back to the beginnings of philosophy and science. It has been explored and its nature postulated by artists, musicians and writers.

Understanding this historical context was critical to the groundwork of beginning this thesis and preparing for the process of interviewing subject matter experts. Since Parmenides wrote about it in fifth-century BCE Greece, philosophers have argued about voids and the concept of nothing. In fact, whether voids and true nothingness can even exist in a physical sense is a debate that is both ancient and very much alive today. Aristotle argued that there is no such thing as a physical void and provided us with the axiom “nature abhors a vacuum.” Some of the greatest minds in physics — Decartes, Newton, Liebniz, Einstein, Hubble (to name a few) — have debated the potential and nature of the void. The vacuum is still central to these deliberations.

It is “at the core of the deepest problems facing physicists of both the very large (cosmology) and the very small (particle physics).1 Physicists now are getting closer to understanding the qualities of the void with the Higgs field. For them and for those interested in their advances, it is “our latest paintbrush for coloring the void.”2 1 Dean Rickles, “Void Ain’t What It Used to Be,” in Voids: A Retrospective (Zurich; Geneva; Paris: JRP|Ringier, 2009).

2 Amanda Gefter, “The Bridge From Nowhere - Issue 16: Nothingness,” Nautilus, August 7, 2014.

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Research

By far, the most quoted question I’ve come across in my research is the one that Heidegger considered to be at the origin of Western philosophy: “Why is there something rather than nothing?” It poses a difficult and often uncomfortable line of thinking, one that is tied to a curiosity about the origin of the universe. I believe this question can and should be applied to design as well. Designers operate within the paradoxical situation of being tasked with creating and producing new products that are put out into the world, while having a deep understanding of the consequences of this work at the same time. Re-framing the philosophical question of ‘why is there something rather than nothing’ into a design question has become critical to this thesis.

As there are a multitude of fields with which to approach the void, the research here covers many terrains and was driven and influenced by insights from a wide range of sources and experts. In the initial stage of my research, I set out to gain a general understanding of the scientific and philosophical qualities of the void, also looking at how cultural perceptions of voids and nothingness have changed over time. As I began to uncover opportunity areas, I shifted my focus away from the physical and scientific qualities of the void and toward an investigation into the ways that the void can be applied to human behavior.

Moving away from this focus proved to be quite interesting, as I was encouraged to identify authorities knowledgeable in the qualitative aspects of the void. Who are the experts on the void? I was searching for experts in nothing. Early on in my research I made a point to speak with everyone I encountered about my thesis topic. I found a broad range of individuals, experts in their own particular fields, who had both personal and professional relationships with the void. Each conversation brought a new perspective.

With the goal of reevaluating our relationship with absence in mind, the research, conversations and case studies presented here have been categorized into sections directly addressing this topic.

Silence Silence, in a literal sense, may be defined as the absence of noise. Musician John Cage showed us that silence can be shaped as a ma-

terial and that it can be a presence rather than an absence. It can be the negative space of music that allows the listener to ‘breath.’ Cage created music, a language out of silence. Cage’s composition 4’33’’, first performed by pianist David Tudor in 1952, thrilled some listeners and angered others. It consists of three movements, during which the performer plays nothing for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. It shifted attention from the performer to the audience and highlighted the ambient sounds of the space.

Cage demonstrated the surprises and value that silence can bring.

Cage challenged the preconceived boundaries of silence in music and caused a cultural shift in perception. In recent years, researchers and scientists have begun to discover some of the neurological benefits to silence. Just as I was beginning my research for this thesis, a piece on silence was published by online science magazine Nautilus. The author, Daniel A. Gross, points to recent research regarding “the peculiar power of silence to calm our bodies, turn up the volume on our inner thoughts, and attune our connection to the world.”3 At first, it was largely through researching the negative effects of noise that the benefits of silence have been uncovered. In using silence as a baseline to study noise, neurological responses to silence were unintentionally tracked only to reveal unexpected positive benefits. Specifically, when silence is experienced in contrast to noise, our brain’s auditory cortex remains active. It seems we fill in the lack of sound input with our imaginations. The listening part of our brain remains active and continues being dynamic even when not receiving sound input, though distinct changes occur.

“Freedom from noise and goal-directed tasks, it appears, unites the quiet without and within, allowing our conscious workspace to do its thing, to weave ourselves into the world, to discover where we fit in. That’s the power of silence.”4 When experiencing continued silence, the auditory cortex of the brain settles into a state of relative inactivity. This state of inactivity has been demonstrated to be a critical mental state.

For instance, silence has the ability to trigger 3 Daniel A. Gross, “This Is Your Brain on Silence - Issue 16: Nothingness,” Nautilus, August 21, 2014.

4 Daniel A. Gross, Nautilus.

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“There is no such thing as an empty space or an empty time. There is always something to see, something to hear. In fact, try as we may to make silence, we cannot.”

– John Cage Experimental Music

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Research Quiet Time, David Lynch Foundation

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the Default Mode Network of the brain, an area that has been to shown to also be affected by acupuncture and meditation.

moment of silence during our phone conversation. The silence immediately shifted the tone and pace of our conversation. I certainly felt its impact. This interaction would lead directly to several different ideas for projects including Minute of Silence and A Minute, both of which are detailed in later chapters.

5 Matt Stinchcomb, telephone interview, September 2014.

6 Birju Pandya, telephone interview, October 2014.

Meditation,” NBC News, January 1, 2015.

9 Kyle Gann, No Such Thing as Silence: John Cage’s 4’33” (New Haven Conn.: Yale University Press, 2011).

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Exploring The Void

My research pointed me in the direction of some individuals and organizations that place a high value on both the quantitative and qualitative benefits of silence. Matt Stinchcomb is the Vice President of Values and Impact at Etsy, Benefits of silence have been seen in case studthe online handmade marketplace. During an ies from broader applications. Quiet Time is a interview, Matt recounted how Etsy came to stress reduction strategy that has been spreadhave a designated quiet room in their Brook- ing throughout San Francisco-area schools lyn headquarters. The idea for a quiet space since it was first rolled out in 2007. Twice a within the Etsy headday, students and facquarters was conceived ulty sit in silence. The When silence is during an internal hackimpacts have been repracticed things a-thon, and Stinchcomb markable, “In the first advocated for and year of Quiet Time, the change very quickly: implemented the idea. number of suspensions The end result was the the conversation starts fell by 45 percent. WithBreathing Room, a place in four years, the suspento slow down, people sion rate was among of quiet open to all Etsy employees at all times take a breath before the lowest in the city. throughout the day. The Daily attendance rates they speak. fact that the Breathing climbed to 98 percent, Room has made the cut well above the citywide and is being designed into Etsy’s new Dumbo average. Grade point averages improved office space, where square footage comes at markedly. ”7 These are schools that prior to the a premium, is an indication of the value of program were rated as the most violent and the space. 5 with the lowest academic performance. Since implementation of Quiet Time, students report Etsy is known for their innovative, creative that they are more conscious of their actions, working environment. Matt graciously intro- calmer and less angry.8 duced me to an individual who has created space for silence in a much different working My entry point into silence as one facet of the environment, the financial sector. Birju Pandya void was John Cage. However, it is important is an investment consultant, who has years of to note that Cage himself pursued silence afexperience working in finance for companies ter experiencing a completely different kind such as McKinsey & Company. Birju has insert- of void. In Kyle Gann’s book tracing Cage’s ed a practice of silence and small acts of kind- influences, No Such Thing as Silence, Gann ness into his industry. He begins all of his pro- notes that Cage was inspired by Robert Rausfessional meetings with a moment of silence. cheberg’s all-white paintings, which were proHe has observed that silence “is a powerful duced at Black Mountain College, where Cage experience in a world when it doesn’t happen also lectured.9 Hence, Cage did not start with very often.” In his experience, “when silence is silence, but rather the desire to use the form of practiced things change very quickly: the con- his own art, music, as a vessel for emptiness, versation starts to slow down, people take a as Rauscheberg did for painting. Resonating breath before they speak, [he is] able to take with these exemplars, form, as well as strucpause, to iterate on what [he] is about to say.”6 Birju refers to this practice of silence as an intervention. Small interventions are very concrete 7 David L. Kirp, “Meditation Transforms Roughest San Francisco Schools,” SFGate, January 12, 2014. ways of shifting patterns. They disrupt the status 8 Cynthia McFadden, Tim Sandler, and Elisha Fieldstadt, quo, the pattern of the day. Birju and I shared a “San Francisco Schools Transformed by the Power of

ture, proved to be central parts of my inquiry into the void.

Research

Boredom In an effort to explore applications for The Void on a social scale, I spoke with Intel’s in-house cultural anthropologist Genevieve Bell. Genevieve has served as Director of User Experience Research for many years, working handin-hand with engineers and leading corporate strategy teams. Her job is to figure out what our relationships are with, through and around new technologies. Though a clear advocate for the advancement of technology, she has a lot to say about a need to create space away from our devices. Our conversation pointed me in an interesting direction: fostering boredom.

Genevieve considers boredom a critical aspect of our lives and of our creative capacity. As humans, we need time to do nothing, to be bored. Genevieve calls boredom “a highway to creativity.” In our conversation, she explained that Western tradition holds an anxiety around boredom. Protestant work ethic has led us to believe that it is something to ward off. She said, “We live in a society that doesn’t value unstructured time.” She also identified an opportunity to reframe this perception of boredom.10 In 2011, Genevieve gave a talk about boredom at TEDxSydney. Citing the history, she explains that the word ‘boredom’ doesn’t enter the English language until 1852, when its mentioned in Charles Dickens’ book Bleak House. This notion of boredom coincides with the Industrial Revolution, before which, one did not have the opportunity to be truly bored, only to be idle. Only when you have leisure time can you have boredom. Boredom quickly became something that people feared and tried to discourage. Genevieve makes an important distinction, “Boredom is a state of tedium, a repetitious set of activities, a moment of being disengaged by one’s surrounding. What is fascinating is that in that moment of disengagement your brain actually lights up…From both a psychological and physical perspective, being bored is actually a moment when your brain gets to reset itself, and where your consciousness gets to reset itself too.”11 10 Genevieve Bell, telephone interview, December 2014.

11 Genevieve Bell, “The Value of Boredom,” TEDxSydney video, filmed May 2011.

This reframing of boredom as a positive state has been gaining traction. Just one month after my conversation with Genevieve, a technology podcast of radio station WNYC, New Tech City, launched their biggest project to date — Bored and Brilliant: The Lost Art of Spacing Out. The project aimed to get people to rethink their relationship with technology (specifically smart phones for the purpose of their project) and tap into the creative potential of boredom.

They did this through a week of podcasts on the relationship between boredom and creativity and through daily challenges posed to their listeners, which around 20,000 people signed up to do. Manoush Zomorodi, the host of New Tech City, predicts that if 2014 was the year of mindfulness, 2015 is going to be the year of embracing boredom.12 The podcast points out that only in the last decade are researchers beginning to understand the links between mind wandering, boredom and creativity. One such study, published in May 2014 by psychologists Sandi Mann and Rebekah Cadman of the University of Central Lancashire, examines the relationship between boredom and creative potential. In their study, they had groups of participants engage in a boring activity, in one case, read names from a telephone directory, and in the second, copy names from the directory. They were then tasked with creative challenges, either coming up with uses for a pair of polystyrene cups or listing potential consequences to global narcolepsy. In both cases, the groups who performed the boring tasks came up with more ideas, and ideas that were judged to be more creative than those of the control group, who did not do either boring task. Moreover, the results point to an important distinction. There are different modes of boredom. The group that was passively engaged in the boring task, those reading the phonebook, performed better than those who were actively engaged, those copying names. In comparison to being actively bored, boredom plus daydreaming while one is passively bored fosters more creative thinking.13 In a culture of constant connectivity, boredom, arguably, is at risk of being lost. Rather than 12 Manoush Zomorodi, “Bored and Brilliant,” New Tech City WNYC, January 12, 2015.

13 Sandi Mann and Rebekah Cadman, “Does Being Bored Make Us More Creative?,” from Creativity Research Journal, Vol. 26 No. 2, May 6, 2014.

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“Boredom is a highway to creativity.”

– Genevieve Bell Anthropologist

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“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.

What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing.

A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days.

It is a scaffolding on which a worker can stand and labor with both hands at sections of time. – Annie Dillard The Writing Life

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be bored, we choose to be distracted, and, eventually, overloaded. In her talk, Genevieve warns “As someone who is in the technology business, one of the things I can tell you is that every one of those devices in your hands, in your backpacks, by your bedside, they work better when they are constantly connected.

Constantly connected to power, constantly connected to the network, constantly connected to content. But the thing about human beings, and that’s been true for thousands of years, human beings work better when we are intimately disconnected.”14 In our conversation, she pointed towards a hopeful shift, “We are beginning to see a significant pushback, where being disconnected is now becoming a privilege… Boredom is a delightful thing, potent and powerful.”15

It can be difficult to carve out space for downtime, but it is essential. Brian described these moments, when you intentionally do nothing, with the term ‘structured nothing.’17 Structured nothing can be taking a shower, staring out of the window or going for a run to clear your head. Referring to the moments of absence as ‘structured nothing’ reframed my understanding of how they can be accessed. In short, absence necessitates structure.

This structure relates back to an understanding of the void as being a receptacle for nothingness. Artist Andrea Zittel has even referred to her moments of ‘structured nothing’ as voids.

She writes, “I have my best ideas when doing nothing. My ideas seem to gestate in a void and when that void is filled I can’t access them.

In our consumption-driven society almost all voids are filled, blocking us from these fleeting moments of greater clarity and creativity. I call things that block voids, ‘avoids.’”18

During my interview with Brian we discussed Zittel then goes on to list voids: planes, trains, his personal relationship with absence. As a bathtub, bed and avoids: books, TV, social writer, Brian keeps a strict schedule, a com- events, movies, phone. For these writers and mon practice of many thinkers, rather than bewriters. He detailed to I have my best ideas ing nowhere, voids have me the routines and a real place in our lives. when doing nothing. habits he practices in order to optimize his The means with which My ideas seem to productivity throughout structured nothing could gestate in a void and influence the realm of dethe week. These include systemizing food and was brought to my when that void is filled sign clothing choices. attention in Subtraction, a book which highlights I can’t access them.

Brian recognizes the imexamples of subtraction portance of having downtime within a sched- in the world of design. In the introduction, deule. It is key to optimizing creativity. He would sign historian Mel Byars describes subtraction probably agree with the essayist and cartoonist as “a process, not an ism. Elegant solutions Tim Kreider, who expresses the importance of via subtraction must definitively answer, when absence poetically, “Idleness is not just a vacation, an indulgence or a vice; it is as indispensable to the brain as vitamin D is to the body, and deprived of it we suffer a mental affliction as disfiguring as rickets. The space and quiet 16 Tim Kreider, “A Lazy Manifesto,” in We Learn Nothing: that idleness provides is a necessary condition Essays, Reprint edition (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013).

14 Genevieve Bell, TEDxSydney.

15 Genevieve Bell, telephone interview, December 2014.

17 Brian David Johnson, telephone interview, September 2014.

18 Simona Vendrame and Andrea Zittel, Diary No. 1, 1st edition (Milano: Alberico Cetti Serbelloni, 2002).

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Exploring The Void

Structured Nothing An interesting shift occurred in my perception of The Void during a conversation with Brian David Johnson, a futurist at Intel and colleague of Genevieve Bell. Whereas Genevieve was advocating for more unstructured time, my conversation with Brian resulted in the insight that, paradoxically, structure might be the key to creating space for unstructured time.

for standing back from life and seeing it whole, for making unexpected connections, and waiting for the wild summer lightning strikes of inspiration — it is paradoxically, necessary for getting any work done.”16

subtraction occurs, what has been gained?”19 I too believe that the void can be utilized as a process, and in the same way, as a design tool.

Research

Default Mode Network A diverse range of recent studies add scientific grounding to the sentiment many artists and writers know intuitively and have reported anecdotally. Our brains need nothing too. It turns out that when we give our brains a break to do nothing, rather than shutting down, our brains are surprisingly active.

It has long been assumed that important physiological and mental processes happen while we rest during sleep. New developments in technology have demonstrated that important mental processes also require downtime during our waking hours. Once the technology of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was developed in the early 1990s, researchers were able to track the activity of the circuits of the brain. It turns out certain regions of the brain that are inactive when focusing on an activity light up when one is resting.20 These complex circuits are now known at the Default Mode Network, the circuit in the brain that stirs to life when we daydream. It is one of at least five critical resting-state networks of the brain that have been discovered by researchers in the past five years.

When the DMN is activated, through either silence or boredom, for instance, a surprising number of benefits occur. Ferris Jabr, in a piece for Scientific American, summarizes the findings from recent research, “Downtime replenishes the brain’s stores of attention and motivation, encourages productivity and creativity, and is essential to both achieve our highest levels of performance and simply form stable memories in everyday life. A wandering mind unsticks us in time so that we can learn from the past and plan for the future. Moments of respite may even be necessary to keep one’s moral compass in working order and maintain a sense of self.“21 It also turns out that certain types of distractions help to activate the DMN, as well as our cre19 Mel Byars, “Subtraction is not an ism,” in Subtraction: Aspects of Essential Design (Crans-Près-Céligny; Hove; New York: Rotovision, 1999).

20 Ferris Jabr, “Why Your Brain Needs More Downtime,” Scientific American, October 15, 2013.

21 Ferris Jabr, Scientific American.

ativity. A study conducted in 2003 by psychologist Shelley H. Carson determined that being distracted by thoughts unrelated to the task at hand can serve as a brief mental break, giving the mind the opportunity to slow down and refocus. When problem solving, an interruption can provide a temporal incubation period for ideas. Carson explains, “A distraction may provide the break you need to disengage from a fixation on the ineffective solution.”22 This is why so many creative ideas happen in the shower, or perhaps when we engage in other activities of structured nothing.

Decision Fatigue When both our intuition and science tell us that we should give ourselves a break, leave some voids in our day, why do we do otherwise?

Why is it so difficult to make decisions that we know to be more healthy and productive? Why do we reach for our phones every few minutes or even seconds, even if we consciously don’t want to be “that person?”

It turns out that each and every decision we make throughout the day, whether as seemingly insignificant as what size coffee to order or as impactful as deciding to quit your job, affects our overall ability to make informed, optimal decisions. Researchers refer to this phenomenon as decision fatigue. It is similar to muscle fatigue, the more reps you do at the gym, the more fatigued your muscles become and the less weight you can lift. The difference is we are not consciously aware of being tired when decision fatigued.

A noteworthy experiment by social psychologist Roy F. Baumeister and Jean Twenge demonstrated that we have a limited cognitive capacity, and when it is depleted, we lose our ability to exert self-control. They presented a group of college students with a series of products, telling the students that they could keep one item at the end of the experiment. One group was required to make a series of choices regarding the products. They had to select a preference of one object over another, for example, a T-shirt over a candle. A control group made no decisions; they simply had to offer opinions without making any choices.

22 Jan Brogan, “When Being Distracted Is a Good Thing,” The Boston Globe, February 27, 2012.

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helpful in encouraging me to push my ideas to their limits. My research provided inspiration both for specific ideas and in a more general sense. It was one thing to appreciate Andrea Zittel and John Cage’s work but it was another to understand that it has a philosophical and scientific context. There was also the inherent satisfaction in finding concrete value in challenging cultural norms such as commonly held views on boredom and idleness.

We can make the decision to choose less often.

If we limit our choices, we free up cognitive capacity to make better decisions for those fewer choices. My uniform project Nothing to Wear is a means of limiting decision fatigue.

Rather than making the choice of what to wear on a daily basis, uniform allowed me to frontload the decision of what to wear for an entire eight-month period. The process of selecting my uniform took research and time, but I was able to really consider what I wanted each item to be. I did research and chose items that I knew would wear well over time because of their fiber content and construction. This front-loading allowed me to avoid the multiple impulse purchases I would have made of lower quality garments over the course of those months.

The context and inspiration that I gained for my work from the wide array of ideas I encountered during my research was invaluable in a way that I did not quite appreciate at the time it was happening. This is often the case when we are focused on a task at hand. I would not have been able to conceive of the work I produced without allowing myself to explore seemingly entirely unrelated avenues of inquiry. The multitude of connections and revelations gained from the less practical element of my work played a key role in defining it.

Conclusion My research provided me with a roadmap for all the different directions I took my thesis. This was especially crucial because of the heavily theoretical slant of my initial idea. The primary and secondary research spanned the entirety of my two semesters of study. As it developed hand-in-hand with my design work, both directions of exploration influenced the trajectory of the thesis as a whole. With each new layer of exploration, the void developed a new dimension.

The most rewarding part of researching The Void was the opportunity to speak with so many professionals who have embraced the idea of absence in their working lives. This provided key insight into how voids could be translated into a practical setting. The scientific element of my research was essentially inverted because I was seeking out research for a scientific basis for what many people already know intuitively. However, the challenge in tethering my thesis in a sound scientific context proved 23 John Tierney, “Do You Suffer From Decision Fatigue?,” The New York Times, August 17, 2011.

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Exploring The Void

Both groups of students were then given a test of self-control. They were asked to hold their hand in ice water for as long as bearable. The group that had been required to make lots of decisions gave up faster, twice as fast, then the non-deciders. Their self-discipline had been depleted. Subsequent studies have resulted in the same findings: the more decisions we make, the less willpower we have to exert self-control and make optimal decisions23

“I just run. I run in a void.

Or maybe I should put it the other way. I run in order to acquire a void.”

– Haruki Murakami What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

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Exploring The Void

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Audience A LITTLE NOTHING FOR EVERYONE

Through the implementation of tools, structures and rituals, The Void provides opportunities for people to create the space for positive voids within their busy daily lives. This thesis is targeted at individuals who need help breaking away, even if only for a moment, from an environment of constant distraction.

There are countless forms of distraction in our lives. The following discussion focuses on two main sources of distraction: consumerism and digital communication. From the broadest perspective, this study of The Void is directed at an audience living in developed countries fueled by consumer culture and navigated through digital communication. This audience is considered to be between 18 and 40 years of age, and is inclusive of all genders, races and ethnicities.

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Consumerism Narrowing in, The Void targets urban dwellers — people who live and work in cities and metropolitan centers. The urban population has to navigate a landscape where they are ceaselessly bombarded with media, both overtly and covertly, pressuring them to consume.

Audience

The urban environment is tiled with longstanding modes of advertising in the physical world.

These ads take shape as billboards, taxi roof signs and wheat-pasted posters, and even now show up on New York City MetroCards, the payment cards subway commuters carry with them daily. Digitally, this bombardment is taking on increasingly nuanced forms in addition to traditional static advertisements. Product placement in television shows and movies as well as pop-up ads and banners online have become the norm. Emerging strategies continue to evolve, such as the surreptitious growing trend of Instagrammers being paid as brand ambassadors. At the same time, developments in platforms and devices make it increasingly easier to purchase from anywhere, anytime with a simple click.

This is an environment where inhabitants are constantly presented with more stuff to consume and more stuff to manage.

Digital Communication It is impossible to discuss daily lives, and especially the distractions within them, without mentioning the increasing role that technology plays in their current landscape. Our society now lives in a hyper-connected world. Technology and portable devices have reconfigured the structure of modern lives, both in how we interact with each other and how we spend time when we are physically by ourselves. It is important to specify the meaning of being physically by oneself, because these days we are rarely ever truly alone. Our devices keep us in constant contact with friends, family, loved ones, co-workers, people we follow on social media and our followers, no matter where we, and they, physically are in the world.

We have an endless source of amazing stimulation constantly at our fingertips. However, as our fingertips are preoccupied with digital devices, other worlds, inevitably, are unattended and untouched.

Audience Segments The audience of The Void is made up of a diverse group of individuals who share some specific qualities in common. These are people who currently spend a great deal of time in front of screens, from laptops to smartphones, and an increasing number of other smart devices. They reside in places saturated with advertising and publicity. They rely on technology in both their personal and professional lives.

Although they value the benefits of these tools, they feel taxed by never being able to log off.

They are also active consumers and devote a considerable amount of time and money towards purchasing new clothing, tech accessories and other material possessions. They recognize, to varying degrees, that the demand and pace of their current routines are not ideal or sustainable. They see the need for something, whether big or small, to shift. They feel a desire to create space, both mental and physical, in their lives.

These individuals fall within an age range of 18 to 40 years, and they have varying histories with and relationships to their use of technology. To delineate their experiences, this large audience can be broken down into two segments: the Straddle Generation and the Digital Natives.

Straddle Generation In 2001, Marc Prensky coined the terms Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives to differentiate the parts of our population who were born before and after the Internet age, when digital technologies were widely adopted. These are useful distinctions that have become widely referenced since they were first introduced.

Digital Immigrants are those who were born roughly before 1985 and who have adopted the use of technology into their daily lives. For Prensky, Digital Immigrants have lived in two cultures, both the pre-digital and the digital.1 In this case, it is a time period and a mode of life, rather than a location, where the transition has taken place. This provides a unique perspective that comes with the experience of resettling and understanding the differences and nuances of two cultures.

1 Marc Prensky, “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants,” from On the Horizon, MCB University Press, Vol. 9 No. 5, October 2001.

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With this loss of lack, there is a nostalgia for absence.

Digital Natives Harris, among others, expresses concern for the future of the generations growing up 2 Michael Harris, The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection (New York: Current, 2014).

3 Michael Harris, The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection.

Despite their respective backgrounds and upbringings, Digital Natives share a desire for absence with those of the Straddle Generation.

The offerings from this thesis are aimed at this common need to break through the distractions of daily life in order to create space for our authentic selves.

4 Hana Glasser, “The Lack,” Slate, August 7, 2014.

5 Hana Glasser, Slate.

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A Little Nothing For Everyone

In his book, The End of Absence, Michael Har- entirely in the digital age, without a reference ris uses the term the Straddle Generation for this point to life without the abundance of technoldemographic, pointing out that they may not ogy. These individuals are the Digital Natives, want to completely eschew aspects of life from who were born roughly after 1985 and have the pre-digital days, but “may prefer to keep a only known a digital landscape. pied-à-terre in the homeland of our youth.”2 As a member of this segment of my target audi- Hana Glasser a young writer and self-deence, I prefer the use of Straddle Generation scribed Digital Native, describes her experito Digital Immigrant to classify this group. The ence as such: term immigrant suggests a permanent move from The daydreaming “On a recent Saturday, I one situation to another. sent 112 text messages. silences in our Those of us in the StradI refreshed my Facebook dle Generation have feed 40 times, Instagram lives are filled; the traveled without Google 15, Twitter 26. I checked burning solitudes are my email 37 times and Maps, made plans to meet up with friends streamed five episodes extinguished. without texting and have of The Good Wife on fond childhood memories of having nothing to Amazon Prime. I placed a dinner reservation do, of being truly bored. We grew up without using OpenTable, perused the Slate mobile streaming television and smart devices. We app, and disinterestedly swiped through Tinder. know what life is like both with the Internet and I used Google Maps to navigate to the grocery without, and find value in both. store, to dinner, and back home. Before falling asleep, I set my iPhone to vibrate, plugged it In relation to the work of this thesis, the most into the outlet alongside my bed, and placed it interesting characteristic of this audience seg- gingerly beside my pillow. I nuzzled up close ment is that they have nostalgia for something to the smartphone—my most intimate companthat can’t quite be pinned down. There is a ion—and drifted asleep, only to reach for him faint sense of loss of something, but what ex- longingly the next morning.”4 actly that thing is, and what the value of it is, is not completely apparent. The Straddle Genera- Constantly immersed in media and social tion already understands the value of absence, communication, Glasser has never known a but are in need of help creating the space for it different reality. in our current landscape. For Harris: Yet, responding to concerns that Digital Natives “We have in this brief historical moment… a are incapable of conceptualizing the inherent very rare opportunity… These are the few days value of absence, she points to a trend that sugwhen we can still notice the difference between gests exactly the opposite. “What many people Before and After… There’s a single difference don’t understand about millennials is that our that we feel most keenly; and it’s also the differ- intense connectedness causes us to place an ence that future generations will find hardest to even greater premium on solitude…[we] expegrasp. That is the end of absence – the loss of rience true absence so seldom that it becomes lack. The daydreaming silences in our lives are exoticized, even fashionable, and turning off filled; the burning solitudes are extinguished.”3 the smartphone is the ultimate indulgence.”5

Audience

Competitive Landscape This push-back against constant connectivity can be seen popping up in numerous trends such as the recent reemergence of flip phones and the social trends to have phone- or photofree gatherings. The very technologies that are the source of our distractions are being used as tools arguably for absence. At the time of this writing, a search for ‘meditation’ in the Apple App Store brings up 3,306 results. Apps, such as Moment, track how many times a user checks his or her phone a day and the total minutes spent on the phone, also allowing users to set usage limits. Browser plug-ins, such as StayFocusd and Strict Workflow, block access to distracting websites while you are trying to concentrate on work.

Daily Grinders – These are individuals who are aware of and unsatisfied with their consumer habits or constant state of distraction, but qualify these states as unavoidable consequences of their current lifestyle, occupation or general situation in life. This group may be seeking out solutions that they believe are benefitting them, but these may be only adding to the challenge. Multi-tasking apps are an example of such solutions.

Indifferent Bystander – This segment operates mostly unaware that they are constantly distracted and that there is a need for structured nothing within their daily lives. The possibility of stumbling upon an intervention that brings them awareness of their situation is especially beneficial to this group.

Trends pointing to the increasing value of pairing down and simplifying are also appearing These distinctions refer more to temporary states in the consumption landscape. Recent years of mind, rather than permanent characteristics. have seen major campaigns for boycotting Individuals move throughout these roles deBlack Friday, the bigpending on differing We experience true gest shopping day of situations. Decisions the year. Other moveand actions absence so seldom that it made ments encouraging taken are greatly influpeople to pare down becomes exoticized, even enced by which mode their material possesan individual is operfashionable, and turning ating in at a particular sions, such as David Michael Bruno’s 100 off the smartphone is the moment. These three Things Challenge and profiles serve as referultimate indulgence.

Marie Kondo’s The ence points to better Life-Changing Magic understand the nuancof Tidying Up have gained large followings. es between the particular needs of the target Absence is becoming a luxury and its value audience. Considering the specific attitudes of is rising. There is an opportunity to address these user profiles positively affects the impact this need and to encourage a shift away from of this thesis work. distraction. The work of this thesis aims to cultivate an appreciation for absence in these Intervention audience members.

Several of the offerings from The Void are tailored to residents of New York City, as it is the User Profiles location from which the research and developCutting across these demographics, it is also ment of this thesis took place. My process as possible to classify individuals by their aware- a designer relies heavily on prototyping and ness of their needs. These can be divided into testing within my immediate environment and three categories, or user profiles, that reflect on myself as a test subject, as is explained in varying audience attitudes toward absence: more detail in the Methodology section of this book. The particular pace of daily life in the Relief Seekers – Those who are aware of and environment of major metropolitan centers confrustrated with the consequences of excessive tributes to the situation and need that this thesis consumerism and constant distraction. They are is addressing. New York City is filled with memactively searching out opportunities for relief. bers of The Void’s target audience, though the These individuals are already making efforts to offerings I developed here pertain to a much break through daily noise by perhaps seeking wider audience. out meditation training and trying to limit their habits of consumption in some manner.

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The work of this thesis strives to meet the needs of the audiences outlined here by fostering awareness and by incrementally changing behaviors, attitudes and values. Members of this audience experience excessive consumerism and constant distraction in their daily lives, and have distinct relationships to the ubiquitousness of technology. But they are missing something, whether they realize it or not.

The Void acknowledges that simply needing or wanting to create change in one’s life does not mean that the desire can easily be translated into action. It aims to provide the tools and structure to help the target audience close this gap.

A Little Nothing For Everyone

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Early Explorations TESTING THE VOID

At the outset of my efforts to design using the void, I went in several different directions to generate ideas, and my initial efforts to evoke the void took many shapes. The materials I used played with different modes of perception, ranging from the auditory to the tactile, and from visual to performative. These ideas served as catalysts for the more fully developed work that would eventually define my thesis and my understanding of the usefulness of the void. The intrinsic value of these products should be viewed as secondary to their role as the foundation of my efforts to apply the void in the practical realm.

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Early Explorations

Platonic Solids This set of cement spheres was my first attempt to physicalize the void. They return to the challenging philosophical question posed by Heidegger: “Why is there something rather than nothing?� (see Research page 40). People have varying degrees of comfort with nothingness, and these spheres play upon that discomfort. Each sphere in this set contains a void. In particular, they each contain the negative space of a platonic solid.

Platonic Solids materialize the philosophical struggle with the concept of unknown nothingness. They force the user to trust the existence of something that can never been seen without destroying the thing itself. Paradoxically, if one feels the need to see the void, they can smash the sphere open, destroying it and the void inside.

Geometric platonic solids were chosen as the shapes for the voids because Plato had imparted meaning on each of these forms. In his dialogue, Timaeus, he associated the hexahedron with earth, the octahedron with air, the tetrahedron with fire, the icosahedron with water, and the dodecahedron with the universe. When you present people with a void, there is a tendency to want to fill it. By presenting a void in an unknowable shape, you are presenting an opportunity to fill it with whatever one deems valuable.

Hexahedron -EARTH

Tetrahedron -FIRE

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Octahedron -AIR

Testing the Void

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Early Explorations

Placebo Placebo is another early exploration into the injection of value into the void. They are a set of pills that are known by the user to be placebos. This speculative object explores how people can share nothing. One imparts a use or a purpose onto the pills and then prescribes them to a friend. The recipient is then reminded of the prescribed intention every time she or he takes a pill. One might prescribe CONFIDENCE for example. This intention is then literally digested.

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Testing the Void

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Early Explorations

Confetti Bow This offering builds upon the concept of gifting absence.

A wrapping bow is the quintessential symbol of gift giving, yet it is typically discarded immediately after a gift has been received. This stainless steel paperweight embodies the form of the bow in all its graceful beauty.

Confetti Bow posits that the absence of a traditional gift can hold more value than the presence of that gift. Often wrapping paper and trimmings are what distinguish a simple exchange from a gift. One can bring back a cookie for a friend from a coffee run, but if it is topped with a bow the transaction has been transformed. The action of gifting is often distorted from its original intention — a gesture of emotions, celebration and tradition. Confetti Bow preserves the symbol and the gesture of gifting itself.

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Early Explorations

Framing the Void This concept is both a speculative object and an intervention. It explores what happens when you frame a void in a specific location, with a specific audience in mind. In this case the object, a pink line, is a reference to the graphic identity of one of my classmates who left the program after the first year. I framed a void on one of the empty desks in the studio to see what effect it would have on my classmates, an audience who would easily recognize the pink line and identify it with our former colleague. Classmates reported being emotionally moved by a deeper sense of the absence of our former classmate.

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Early Explorations

Minute of Silence Taking into consideration findings from my research on the benefits of practiced silence and my own personal experience with meditation, I sought a means to share absence with my immediate community, my classmates. I implemented a minute of silence at the beginning of each of our class periods. Over the course of the year, the Minute of Silence was adopted as a daily ritual that my classmates began to initiate on their own. One week when I was away from school, I returned to reports that the Minute of Silence took place in my absence. Over 100 minutes were shared as a group in silence over the course of this thesis.

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Testing the Void

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Early Explorations

Testing the Void

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Early Explorations

Instabored Instabored is a public intervention with the goal of inducing beneficial boredom. It aims to bring boredom back to the toilet. It is a printed poster of the entire Instagram User Agreement. In 2012, 75% of Americans reported using their phones while in the bathroom.1 Rather than distracting ourselves by being on our phones, Instabored provides an opportunity to rediscover boredom.

The design of Instabored was based on research on the benefits of passive activities, which foster boredom (see Research page 44). Activities that are considered boring can be either passive or active. Reading tedious material is considered a passive activity, while writing out and copying the same tedious material is an active boring task. Passive boring tasks foster more creative thinking. Active boring tasks, including scrolling through social media feeds, transport our attention to dozens of places and other peoples’ activities, keeping us engaged just enough to divert boredom.

We eat, sleep, commute and even go to the bathroom with our phones. The average mobile user checks their phone 150 times a day. Much of this time, especially time spent waiting in line, standing on the subway or sitting on the toilet, used to be spent letting one’s mind wander. Instabored aims to take back our time on the toilet, filling it with creative boredom instead of distraction.

1 Manoush Zomorodi, “Bored and Brilliant,” New Tech City WNYC, January 12, 2015.

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Early Explorations

Surrogate Prototype An initial iteration returned to the methodology of utilizing my classmates as test subjects. I created surrogate phones out of foam core, to the dimensions of each classmate’s make and model of smartphone. Each phone was wrapped as a gift and labeled with their names. The gift of the surrogate phone was presented as an exchange for setting their actual devices aside for the duration of one class period.

This exercise sought to test the effectiveness of the addition of a prop to achieve an experience of absence. The goal was to temporarily remove the distraction of one’s phone during a time, a class period, when one’s attention should be on the events taking place in person. Providing the physical surrogate served as a comfort to alleviate some of the anxiety of being separated from one’s device.

Classmates reported enjoying the forced break from their devices and appreciated having the surrogate as a stand-in to keep in their pockets.

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Early Explorations

Testing the Void

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Early Explorations

Moment Moment looks at The Void through the lens of branded objects: Signal, Timer and Token. By creating a visual and verbal language for the brand Moment, I was able to hone in on key elements of the thesis at large. Branding tools such as a brand pyramid and a mood board serve to concisely convey essential goals of the brand. The pyramid consists of a base of building blocks: the purpose, the promise and the positing of the brand, and finally the brand’s essence. A mood board communicates the mindset and possible interactions the brand strives to evoke. At its essence, Moment is minimal, and it seeks to reveal and reframe hidden opportunities.

I developed a series of objects under the imprint of Moment. Cement is the main material used in this series. When constructing with cement, one is literally creating and filling voids through the process of making a mold and then pouring the cement. Moment’s logo is a graphic representation of a minute. Taking into consideration ideas from behavioral science, a minute here is treated as an actionable amount of time that can lead to longer lasting rituals.

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Minimal

Essence

Purpose

Essential

Promise

Economy

Positioning

Building Blocks

To Reframe

Provide a tabula rasa Reveal hidden opportunities

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Early Explorations

The first object in the series, Signal, serves as a signpost for the Minute of Silence intervention I implemented with my instructors and classmates in the school studio. Signal has two faces that can be flipped to indicate that a moment of silence is in session. Conceived as a sign for silence practiced in a group setting, Signal can also be utilized in other settings, such as an office, where one can flip the piece to indicate that they do not want to be disturbed. Signal literally sets the intention of Moment as a brand in stone.

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Early Explorations

Timer is designed around the concept of Structured Nothing, where one purposefully engages in mindless activity (as described in more detail in the Research section of this book). One goal of Structured Nothing is to fuel creativity.

Timer is, yes a timer, but one that doesn’t track, allot or measure any specific passage of time. You turn it on, it ticks, you turn it off. In Vedic meditation, sessions last for twenty minutes, but while training, you are encouraged not to use an alarm to time your sessions. As my teacher, Charlie Knoles, explained to me, “You wouldn’t want spend your first 18 minutes cycling through thoughts and then finally slip into transcendence at minute 19 and have your alarm go off.”

In the same vein, if someone asks for a minute of your time, you wouldn’t want to actually time that minute and stifle the potential of that interaction. Timer’s tick indicates that time is passing, but in a fluid, unmeasured manner.

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Early Explorations

Token is the third offering of Moment. It brings the brand into a wearable object. It asks, how can we carry these moments of pause with us throughout the day? Token can be offered as a gift, a reminder to take these small moments.

It serves as a close, personal and consistent reminder to actively seek out Moment.

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Developed Work THE VOID IN ACTION

The work presented in the next section is organized under the umbrellas of three project areas: Experiencing Absence, Addition Through Subtraction and Fostering Absence. The process of iteration and prototyping for each project was not linear, as all three project areas were developed simultaneously, therefore not independently. Discoveries, findings and insights from one project nearly always bled across and influenced the development of the others. In all cases, learnings from my early explorations were taken into consideration, and evidence of early concepts carrying through to the developed work can be seen.

This focus on process and iteration was integral for each of the following project areas.

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EXPERIENCING ABSENCE Many of my early explorations centered around experiential elements, whether shared experiences or ones intended to be experienced alone. I spent ten weeks developing and designing an experience around absence. The intention was to design an event that would engage participants in absence. The subtraction of just one element from a situation can heighten our senses and shift our attention to other elements. With the goal of designing an experience, the process led me to develop not only concepts for a one-time event, but also a physical product and mobile offering.

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Surrogate

Experiencing Absence

The quick foam core surrogate prototype served as the structure users needed to tap into the void (see page 84). You can’t just tell someone to do nothing, you need to provide them with something, in this case a tool. Behavioral science suggests that to break one habit, we need to replace it with a new one. Surrogate aims to do just that.

Surrogate is a cement replica of one’s phone.

It is intended to be swapped out and carried as one carries their actual phone. Testing with Surrogate showed that yes, we live in a world where a fake phone has value. One user kept the surrogate on him during an interview when he didn’t want to be stressed about having his phone ring, but also didn’t want the anxiety of feeling that his phone was missing. Another reported that the surrogate drew awareness to the countless times he unconsciously reaches for his phone throughout the day. Surrogate urged both of them to start using their devices less.

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Surrogate

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Experiencing Absence

Yes, we live in a world where a fake phone has value.

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A Minute Prototype

Experiencing Absence

Returning to and building upon the successful adoption of the Minute of Silence in class, I conducted a prototype to validate the impact of sharing absence with someone remotely.

Through text message, I asked a few friends for a minute of their time, and then requested that they sit in silence until I texted back sixty seconds later. One participant, Sam, was pleasantly surprised once he realized nothing was being asked of him.

“I thought you were going to ask me for something.

It was such a nice surprise when I realized you were giving me something just for me.”

– Sam prototype participant

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A Minute Text Prototype

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A Minute

Experiencing Absence

Taking the findings from the text prototype, I developed the concept into a mobile application where the experience can be repeated and shared across a broader audience.

The device is an important element in this experience. It is impossible to talk about distraction and lack of absence in our lives without talking about the role of technology. As anthropologist and head of user experience research at Intel, Genevieve Bell, explained to me in an interview, “Smartphones were sold to us as a promise to be connected, but have become less and less about being connected. They are a promise that you’ll never be by yourself again. You will never be bored.”1 A Minute recognizes that our phones are the source of much of our distraction, but aims to utilize the device as an ally, the necessary structure, for tapping into the void. The app simply allows friends to send and receive minutes to sit back and enjoy doing nothing.

The navigation is straightforward, with only two main options. Users can either send a minute or use a minute that has been sent to them. The minutes are ephemeral and only last an hour. They slip away after that period. When one initiates a minute, the phone is automatically put into sleep mode. After a quick animation indicating that the minute has started, the screen clears and is blank for the remainder of the time. Quick encouragement pops up at the end of each minute, changing each time.

Understanding the importance of accountability, A Minute lets the sender know that you have taken the time to enjoy the minute they gifted you, encouraging the receiver to actually utilize the minute before it slips away.

1 Genevieve Bell, telephone interview, December 2014.

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Experiencing Absence

“Smartphones are a promise that you’ll never be by yourself again.

You will never be bored.”

– Genevieve Bell Anthropologist

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Experiencing Absence

A Minute

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Experiencing Absence

A Minute

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A Minute

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Experiencing Absence

Structured Nothing

While Surrogate fosters a personal experience of absence, A Minute allows for absence to be shared among friends and family. The public, as a collection of passersby, are the audience for Structured Nothing, a designed intervention of absence.

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Structured Nothing

Considering how absence could be shared with a public audience, I designed a series of collages to illustrate the intended mood of a user journey through an experience of absence. In the urban setting of this experience, there is a constant bombardment of input and distraction. A simple intervention has the potential to break through this bombardment, even if only for a brief moment. The user journey maps out the goal of creating an opportunity for participants to cut through distractions and reveal spaces for their authentic selves.

Experiencing Absence 1. In our daily lives, there are a million things vying for our attention, and we are surrounded by distraction.

Structured Nothing User Journey

Experiencing Absence 2. Hidden beneath these distractions are our authentic selves.

Structured Nothing User Journey

Experiencing Absence 3. An intervention or happening clears the distraction.

Structured Nothing User Journey

Experiencing Absence 4. A momentary breakthrough occurs.

Structured Nothing User Journey

Experiencing Absence 5. An opportunity for self-reflection transpires.

Structured Nothing User Journey

As potential settings, moments of transition are prime opportunities for experiencing absence. Transitions can be voids in themselves. They are interstitial moments in our day, where our focus is often on where we just were or where we are going. Creating an intervention to take place during people’s daily commutes, whether at a bus stop, on a subway platform or inside of a subway car, became a goal of this experience.

Experiencing Absence

This pamphlet is a prototype of an invitation to busy passersby, inviting them to intentionally focus on doing nothing for a brief moment. In this iteration, a facilitator guides passersby through an activity that is intentionally absent of focused engagement. These are activities of structured nothing (see Research, page 49).

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Structured Nothing Experience Prototypes

Two possible activities of structured nothing were prototyped. Both were designed to take approximately one minute to complete. The first is a standardized test without any questions that allows the participant to simply fill in answer bubbles. The second returns to my early prototype and uses low fidelity foam core surrogate phones. Participants are provided with a surrogate phone backed with bubble wrap.

The popping of the bubble wrap gives the participants a mindless activity to occupy their hands for one minute while their mind wanders.

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Experiencing Absence

The final experience of Structured Nothing took place on a Wednesday evening in March inside a Brooklyn-bound L subway car. The design of the experience consists of an attraction, an engagement and a conclusion. The attraction includes a facilitator (in this case myself), who is easily spotted and dressed in all white with branded tote bags.1 The engagement involves the facilitator handing out tools for structured nothing to passengers on the train.

The form of this tool clearly references a smartphone, calling participants attention to the device that is a main source of distraction for many people. Each tool for structured nothing contains a brief invitation on the back.

1  This was the one occasion over the course of eight months when I did not dress in my uniform.

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Structured Nothing Experience Prototypes

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The affordance of bubble wrap allows passengers to know what to do with the tool without any instruction. As more tools are handed out, the sound of the popping bubbles travels down the car, serving as another indication of what one is expected to do with the object. The conclusion is a call to action. Passengers were invited to share their experience on social media via the hashtag #structurednothing and also contributed their personal ideas of other forms of structured nothing on the website structurednothing.com.

On the one subway trip in March, I handed out 136 bubble wrapped surrogates. In response to the event, I received thank you emails recounting interactions amongst strangers, and I saw evidence on social media that the experience broke through people’s daily routine. One gentleman, Danny, couldn’t resist the opportunity of reaching out to thank me for nothing.

The goal of Structured Nothing is to encourage people to shift their attention, even if for a brief moment. It is in these moments that we have the space to consider our identity, our dreams, our hopes, our fears and our intuition.

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In these moments we have the space to consider our identity, our dreams, our hopes, our fears and our intuition.

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“I have never seen a car full of strangers get so enthralled, smiling, laughing, and dare I say, getting it!

Thank you so much for nothing. – Danny Structured Nothing participant email

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ADDITION THROUGH SUBTRACTION The idea that the void could be used to add something to our lives was a paradox I was eager to explore. This concern ended up becoming the most personal and consuming area of my work. However, the result of my efforts can easily be applied more broadly. What started as a personal project soon became social and ultimately formed the blueprint for a full-scale business model.

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Nothing to Wear

Nothing to Wear centers around the idea that there was something to be gained from removing my daily wardrobe decision from my life.

After examining my personal daily routine, I selected the daily decision of getting dressed, with all of the externalities, as a prime opportunity area for intervention. I carefully curated a personal uniform. It consists of the following: 4 t-shirts, 2 pairs of jeans, 1 sweater,2 bras, 7 pairs of underwear, 7 pairs of socks and 1 pair of sneakers. I then emptied my closets of all other garments. I wore my uniform every single day for the full duration of my thesis year. In total, I wore these exact garments for 228 days, culminating on the day I presented my final thesis offerings.1 In terms of concrete results, subtraction added specific value to my life through this endeavor. There are many quantitative benefits to uniform. I spent 38% less on clothes over the eight-month period of this project than I did during the same eight-month period the year before. I saw a 55% savings from the year prior, when I wasn’t living on a student budget. I saved approximately 47 hours, nearly two full days, getting dressed. I cannot even calculate the number of hours I saved by not window shopping or browsing shopping sites on the internet.

My uniform has resulted in new rituals as well. With a limited number of garments to rotate through, I routinely hand washed my items once a week. This process has taught me to consciously care for my clothing, taking more care to properly wash and line dry each item as to increase their longevity. It has eliminated stress and time from packing for travel.

With my uniform, I simply pack the uniform items.

I would go as far as to say that my uniform has changed my identity. The experience of Nothing to Wear altered my personal outlook by illuminating for me how much value I place on what I wear. My peers, friends and family now identify me with my uniform, alleviating any social pressure about clothing choices. I have gone to engagement parties, holiday parties, interviews and business meetings all in my uniform. I should also share my observation that most of us think others pay attention to our clothing choices more than they actually do. It took several months for some people, who I saw at least five days a week in my school studio, to realize that I was even wearing the same thing every day.

This project has been documented on a photography blog: thevoid-nothingtowear.tumblr.com.

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My uniform quickly integrated into my life in a way that I stopped thinking about it on a regular basis. Its value revealed itself in small moments.

One such occasion was when I had to purchase replacement boots for my bartending job I maintained throughout my thesis. It wasn’t until I walked into a store with the intention to browse, try on and purchase a new pair of shoes that I realized how successfully I had removed myself from this one facet of consumerism. I had wondered into clothing stores over the course of the eight months, but without the intention of purchasing anything. Returning to this consumer mindset felt like a tremendous burden.

4 2 1 1 7 2 7

T-shirts $60 Bras $136 Sweater $373 Pair Sneakers $59 Pair Underwear $42 Pair Jeans $278 Pairs Socks $32

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$980 2013 - 2014 2012 - 2013

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$1593 $2168

38% 55%

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My uniform has changed my identity.

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User Testing

Addition Through Subtraction

Having tested the concept of uniform on myself, I then moved to testing with other users in order to develop uniform as a service offering that can be shared with others. Over the course of a month, I conducted research with three users.

After spending a week creating a baseline and examining their existing dressing habits, I guided them through selecting and wearing a uniform for the remainder of the month.

Two of the users successfully made it through the month in uniform: Caroline, a copywriter at a large New York marketing and advertising firm, and Andres, one of my classmates (who insisted on participating after observing my own experience in uniform). The third, Max, a fashion student, was never able to make it past the initial commitment of choosing the specific garments. Rather than this being a failure, her experience yielded important insights that carried through to the final service offering. As a case study, Max illustrated that with implementing change, the more structure you can offer, the easier it is to process it.

Both Andres and Caroline were surprised that the majority of people around them did not notice that they were wearing the same thing every day. Caroline reported her biggest surprise being, “How little people noticed that I was wearing a uniform and how big of a difference small changes made. One day, about two weeks in, I wore bright red lipstick and everyone commented on how nice I looked. They didn’t even realize that literally the only thing I had changed was the lipstick.” Also, “One change was my routine at the end of the day. Since I was wearing just a few pieces over and over again, I took the time to hang everything up at the end of the day, rather than my usual habit of piles on the floor.”

Andres found motivation in tracking his progress with a photo journal. He made the request of having access to other people’s blogs so that the experience could be shared.

From this user testing, I learned two key findings. Recording and sharing progress are key to motivation, and the less variety and choice, the more successful the uniform.

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Caroline Base Week

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H&M Uniform Campaign

With all of the personal benefits I have experienced with my own uniform, I speculated what effect uniform could have on a larger scale.

What if personal uniform grew into a fashion trend that had an impact on the way companies did business? I chose an image, created a tag line and wrote a press release for a speculative campaign for fast fashion company H&M. There are environmental and human costs to western culture’s extreme consumer demands.

The collapse of a garment factory in Bangladesh in 2013, where over 1,100 people died, was just one illustration of the global impact of this relentless demand.1 Here I postulated what it would look like if the uniform eclipsed the fast fashion trend that pushes businesses to constantly keep up with ever changing trends.

1 Rupert Neate, “Bangladesh Factory Collapse: Big Brands Urged to Pay into Help Fund,” The Guardian, February 24, 2014.

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Normcore Eclipsed by the Uniform – H&M Launches Uniform Collection FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE February 24, 2015 New York Fashion Week always ushers in a wave of new trends. This time, the most shocking style was seen on the streets and front rows of the shows, rather than on the runways. Fashionistas and ‘it’ kids who usually can be seen wearing dozens of different outfits throughout the course of the week showed up instead in the same outfit, over and over again.

Fashion blogger Susie Bubble wore a strict uniform throughout fashion week. “By not being distracted by myself each day, I’m better able to focus on what I am really here for, to see and write about the work being presented.”

Fiona Duncan, the writer for New York Magazine who brought the term ‘normcore’ into the mainstream says, “If 2014 was the year of normcore, 2015 is the year of the uniform. What’s more liberating than deciding to dress like a ‘normal person’ every day? Not having to decide at all.”

The campaign slogan, “Buy less, buy better,” is a drastic departure for the company built on fast fashion. The growing trend of uniform is forcing large corporations to rethink their status quos and the ways they do business.

Lucy Knops, the designer of H&M’s uniform collection, began to wear a personalized uniform back in 2014. She explains, “by choosing outfits on a six-month rather than daily calendar, the role of the consumer and the responsibility of the designer is shifted.

For the collection, we carefully chose materials that wear well over time, that you can keep in your closet for years rather than months.” It is a small step she says, but one in the right direction. From the consumer’s point of view, she explains, the collection isn’t about becoming a uniformed mass. It is rather a way for people to thoughtfully craft their individuality over a prolonged timeline. Since there is more of a commitment, it makes a larger statement.

Fast fashion has been participating in an unsustainable race to the bottom of offering increasingly cheaper products at a more rapid rate. Forever 21recently launched F21 Red, a brand with starting price points of $1.80 for camisoles and $7.80 for denim.

One can’t help but think of the factory collapse in Bangladesh and wonder what the true costs of these extreme low prices actually are. H&M’s “Buy less, buy better” campaign not only falls in line with their recent pledge to improve factory conditions, but also forefronts the issue for both the well-heeled and the bargain shopper.

The Uniform Collection is available in stores and online.

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H&M clearly saw this trend coming and today announced the launch of a new uniform collection. The collection consists of a line of quality pieces constructed out of materials chosen for longevity, rather than fast trends and short wear. Items are meant to be bought in sets that can be worn day after day.

Uniformd

Uniformd is a branded service offering, resulting from eight months of user testing, research and iteration. Its aim is to challenge the fact that we spend too much time, resources and cognitive energy on producing, advertising, buying and choosing what to wear.

Addition Through Subtraction

Through the service, Uniformd agents provide members with guidance and an allotment of quality garments that are selected to wear well over time. By incorporating like-minded brands into the business structure of Uniformd, the service can launch quickly without having to produce its own line of clothing. This direction also takes into consideration that the same company that makes the ideal, high-quality sweater that can be worn daily for months at a time may not have the sourcing and production channels to create the ideal uniform pant or blouse. Curation across brands is a key aspect to the offering.

Community, and the ability for members to share their experience, is also central to Uniformd. Members are each provided with a personalized page to track their progress, which they can make public on the Uniformd site. The Uniformd blog is critical to the brand identity. Members who have hit certain time milestones are celebrated and featured on the blog. In contrast to the plethora of daily fashion blogs currently on the market, which focus on people’s clothing and product choices, the Uniformd blog highlights thoughts and experiences of its members. When members are wearing the same outfit day after day, the focus shifts to where they are and what they are doing, rather than what they are wearing.

Additional features include the possibility of partnering with a pick-up laundering service and/or a donation service, where members can donate unwanted, pre-Uniformd garments via shipment packaging.

Uniformd aims to offer a viable alternative to the growing trends of fast, disposable fashion and to improve people’s daily lives in the process. The goal is to empower people on an individual scale, while bringing them together as a community to cause an effect on a large scale.

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UNIFORMD

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FOSTERING ABSENCE

The following explorations into means of fostering absence were developed through a process of creating speculative narratives.

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Fostering Absence

Co-Creating the Future

This process began with a co-creating session facilitated with members of my target audience, both members of the Straddle Generation and Digital Natives (see Audience page 58).

Twelve participants were asked to speculate how a cultural shift toward valuing absence could potentially shape their daily lives in the future. They were asked to create advertisements for tools or services that either limit consumption in a consumer-driven future, or promote activities of structured nothing in a future that values absence. Through the roll of a set of dice they each selected a future date, persona and city. Specific details were provided regarding the path of development for each city’s future.

One concept in particular, Le Champ Immortel, stood out and proved to have a direct influence on my work to follow. The collage advertises a service where users tend to a virtual field, to no end. They may mow the field, weed the field, water the field or prune the trees. However, no task is ever completed. Through this practice, users are able to “harvest the bounty of boredom.” This beautiful idea — cultivating one’s practice of an endless activity — directly influenced my final offering. Le Champ Immortel was created by the incredible Joan Tick and Caleb Lindskoog.

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Provided with print media, such as catalogues, magazines and newspapers, participants created advertisements in the form of collage.

The session resulted in advertisements for nine innovative concepts, from simple services that assist users in taking a different route home each day to some pretty wild tools for limiting consumption.

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Co-Creating the Future

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Co-Creating the Future

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Created by Joan Tick and Caleb Lindskoog

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Le Champ Immortel Live a more productive and creative life with Le Champ Immortel active boredom centers. Take on the “ache” of boredom as your mind learns to find meditation, realization and awe. For whichever amount of time you choose, we provide an environment free of any social distractions where you will enter, from the convenience of Paris, the most distant, digitized rural sprawl where therein lives the immortal field of which you will tend, to no end. Choosing one task, you may mow the field, weed the field, water the field, prune the trees, but make no mistake, the boredom will ensue, as there is no end, and no “completion” of any one task.

When differentiating boredom from meditation, one encounters a fundamental overlap. We focus on that overlap by offering a five-sense total immersion landscaping experience. Through your experience at our centers, cultivate the tools to achieving mindfulness in your own endless tedious moments of life outside our centers. Begin the process of exalting yourself from the banality of bourgeois, consumer and, oftentimes, soul-stomping culture by learning to stay a bit longer each time in your field. Our skilled staff can offer you training before and after your session on ways to harvest the bounty of boredom.

The ad is an abstract green field background and a foreground image of a mowed lawn. The foreground is portioned into five sections, each with a respective block of sky above. The sections resemble five figures with the blocks of sky being their heads. This symbolizes the clearing of the mind and rejuvenation of the body through the use of our service.

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Speculative Narratives

Fostering Absence

Another main takeaway from the co-creating session with my target audience was the potential for a cultural shift toward productivity in the future. I mapped out potential outcomes for productivity in a shifting cultural landscape.

This matrix diagrams four potential scenarios.

On one axis are two settings, Urban and Suburban. On the other are general cultural attitudes, either Works to Live or Lives to Work.

To illustrate aspects of these speculative scenarios, I wrote four narratives, one for each quadrant. Each scenario takes place in the year 2035 and shares a commonality of the protagonist being in a moment of transition.

These speculative narratives allowed me to consider use cases and design offerings that may not seem necessarily practical in our current landscape, but could be of value in the near future at a time when cultural values have shifted.

Urban

Works to Live

Productivity

Suburban

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Urban – Lives to WORK Iris – Global CEO between meetings

Urban – Works to LIVE Cora – Creative on a subway ride from work to book club Cora sends off her last piece of output for the day. She smiles to herself knowing that her boss will be happy with the project. She has put in a solid four hours of work today. She tidies up her desk and sets her computer terminal to sleep. As she walks out of the office she shifts her personal device from work mode back to standard. She walks to the subway scanning through the personal messages that came in while she was on work mode. She dictates a quick message in reply to her mother and spritzes through some last minute notes from Dune who is leading this afternoon’s book club. She sends a location ping to Dune so that he knows she is on her way to the cafe. Most of the other book club members will only be there virtually, but she and Dune always make a point to show up in person. Cora walks down into the subway and makes her way to the end of the platform. She is looking forward to the subway ride. She likes to take the travel time to zone out. It helps her recap what she has done at work, set clear goals for the next day and transition back into the rest of her day. The train arrives and the doors open. As she passes through the doors, she hears her device automatically go to sleep. Her smart lenses shift to night vision so she is able to find a seat.

As soon as she sits down, her night vision switches to a light-blocking mask, leaving her in complete darkness. The only sound is the breath from the other passengers. She relaxes into the void, knowing that her device will notify her when she reaches her stop for the cafe.

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Speculative Narratives

Iris takes a deep breath, causing her stomach to rise and shifting her position in the water. She hadn’t realized that she was still stiff, and the shift allows her to fully relax into the floatation. Her thoughts are fast and scattered as she settles into the session. She is familiar with the pattern and doesn’t try to fight it. The sound of her pulse strikes her as louder than usual. The company always provides the finest, and this flotation tank is much nicer than her one at home. Even though she’s had the soundproofing redone twice, she still can’t completely block out the rumble of the subway beneath her apartment. Slowly, she becomes unaware of how much time has passed, her thoughts begin to clear and she can focus at the task at hand. Today is the most critical day of the year for the company. The top twelve CEOs from around the globe are here at the New York headquarters for the annual state of the company meeting. Each executive now floats in his or her own tank preparing for the meeting.

Iris’ focus becomes sharp. Discussions from every past annual meeting start to align in her mind. They become one fluid conversation. They are so fresh and vivid it’s as if it all happened over coffee this morning. She begins to analyze the events of the past year that she will report to the team. The many complex impacts on the company start to cluster and organize in front of her. She is able to see the year in complete clarity.

Her eyes blink drawing her attention to the fact that they were open in the first place. In the complete darkness, there is no differentiation. She feels clear and energized. She reaches out to her side and instinctively finds the button to end the session. A soft light begins to glow and the top of the tank automatically rises. Iris steps out of the tank and dresses for the meeting, ready to address her colleagues.

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Suburban – Works to LIVE Minnow – Consultant before submitting a deliverable Minnow trims one last branch and steps back to look at her work. She has pruned more than an acre of trees this morning. The slow, tedious task prepares her for the rest of her day. She lays her shears in their place amongst the rest of her gardening tools. She removes her gloves and touches the rim of her glasses, ending her session. The field of trees in front of her slips away and she finds herself back in the interior courtyard of her home. She prefers to tend to her field while in the courtyard so that she has privacy from her nosey neighbors and yet still feel the sun on her face. She checks the time and decides that she can send off one report before she heads out to meet the ladies for tennis and lunch.

Minnow is the top paid strategist for BEL. She works a few hours a week, sending all of her visions from home. Minnow’s work is highly valued for its originality and every project she consults on has excellent success rates. She can charge a premium for her ideas. To her, it never feels like work. She has perfected her digital field over the years and knows how to optimize tending to the task that she is currently tackling for BEL. She quickly wraps up yet another brilliant report and sends it. She grabs her tennis racket and heads out to the club.

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Suburban – Lives to WORK Kyle – Engineer getting ready in the morning Kyle hears the faint sound of his alarm gently pulling him awake. He checks the time, 6:37. Every morning it’s slightly different. His alarm is programmed to wake him at the optimal moment in his sleep cycle, but also to vary the numbers of cycles he gets from night to night, so as to never slip into a steady pattern. He gets out of bed and walks to the bathroom. His shower allotment appears on the glass door, 4 minutes and 35 seconds today. He steps in and a song he has never heard before begins to play. He focuses closely on the lyrics while he showers. He heads to his wardrobe to select his attire for the day. He cycles through several options until the system lets out a clear chime, signifying that he landed on a new combination. After dressing, Kyle heads down to his kitchen. A fresh, completely original breakfast awaits him. There is no coffee this morning. The system has clearly pushed his coffee slot back to either his commute or arrival at the office. Kyle eats his breakfast while scrolling through the morning reports. He heads out to the car and checks the system for his route. Each day his commute is programmed to be slightly different so as to always be engaging. The company uses the most sophisticated programming available to ensure that Kyle never falls into even the slightest routine. His mind must remain constantly stimulated to ensure that it doesn’t wander away from his task at hand.

Fostering Absence

Third Eye Goggles

This early iteration corresponds to the quadrant on the matrix in which society continues on its current trajectory, a reality where work and professional performance is valued over one’s personal life. However, practiced absence is still valued in the scenario and is utilized as a means for tapping into deeper professional productivity. These eye protectors are an experimental branded accessory for corporate sensory floatation tanks. In this speculative scenario, further scientific study into the physical and mental benefits of sensory deprivation tanks results in a shift from deprivation tanks being used only by fringe audiences, to a service that large corporations invest in for use by their top executives. Eye protection from the extremely salty water is just one potential accessory that could be branded and used by these corporations.

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Absent Advertising

Taking a premise from the other end of the spectrum, in which work is managed in a way that diverts a minimal amount of energy from one’s personal pursuits, I speculated what it would look like if absence was a valued commodity.

Absent Advertising imagines situations where distraction is removed rather than added to transitional moments throughout the day. How would the experience of riding in a subway car cleared of advertising change one’s commute?

Would a company ever pay to sponsor 30 seconds of silence instead of an advertisement on YouTube? These platforms for advertising can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. What shifts would have to take place for absence to be valued at this level?

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Penelope

Penelope is the final product offering for fostering absence. Penelope speculates a future where our cultural attitudes toward absence have shifted, and it is valued as a critical mental state.

Fostering Absence

Penelope is an endless weaving loom. The process takes precedent over the output of one’s work. As one weaves, the circular rotation of the loom continuously undoes the weaving progress. With this loom, users craft their practice of doing nothing, tapping into its full cognitive and creative benefits.

In the Odyssey, Queen Penelope secretly tended to her love for Odysseus by weaving all day and unraveling her work by night, in order to keep unwanted suitors at bay. With Penelope the loom, one privately tends to his or her practice of absence.

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Conclusion NOTHING TO LOOK FORWARD TO

The goal of design has always been fundamentally about improving the lives of others. As I have investigated and experimented with the idea of the void in this year-long journey, I have seen that it can be a remarkable tool to achieve that goal. This thesis has been an attempt to distill that journey into a few coherent pages.

What is missing from these pages are the doubts, the sleepless nights and the overwhelming frustration that can accompany such an endeavor. It is my hope that if you found any value in what I have done, or the ideas I have presented, you will remember that they are the products of failure and struggle as much as they are of inspiration and achievement.

More than anything, this process has taught me the value of paying attention. In design, just as in every other field, one of the most powerful tools at our disposal is what we see in our own lives. What is true for you will be true for someone else. It is trusting that instinct that enabled me to follow through on an idea that was seemingly easy to dismiss. In my own life, it was the benefit I found in shutting my eyes and experiencing nothing for 20 minutes twice a day that set me on the path that has taken me here. It was from that core idea that I was able to find an entry point into a diverse group of disciplines and ideas, making connections from art to philosophy to science.

As I have laid out in these pages, I lived my work. I also brought my experience to others.

I collaborated with people in many different areas of expertise. The holistic nature of this enterprise was central to what I produced.

Everything I have done is the product of a commitment to a central idea. I find it ironic that having such a strict adherence to a single concept could lead to such a vast array of experiences.

A similar irony is present in the usefulness of the void. From nothing we can get something, by subtracting we can add, emptiness can be fulfilling. The inherent tension in that juxtaposition was the fuel for most of what I have done.

There is a twofold benefit to utilizing the void, the internal and the external. Our interior lives are subject to a nonstop barrage of distraction. This is not a wholly unwelcome situation.

Technological progress has had an amazing impact that we are only beginning to see come to fruition. However, navigating this vast new landscape is best done with the ability to recognize the distractions for what they are. Our authentic selves can co-exist in a world inundated with technology and growth. We have a choice. We can choose to design the void into our lives. This thesis is aimed to illustrate that choosing absence in turn leads to spaces for us to make better choices in general. Individual choices can lead to habits, habits can lead to behaviors.

Externally, behaviors can inspire those around us. Change at the community level holds the potential to initiate change on a larger cultural scale. Design by nature is intended to be scaled. We can choose to scale a sense of value in nothing, rather than a sense of value in distracting ‘somethings.’ It is this elastic notion of design that indicates a way forward for it in a world where mass production and consumerism become increasingly unsustainable.

Just as the void contains multitudes, subtraction may be the best way for us to keep anything worth having.

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Nothing To Look Forward To

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References THE SOURCE OF NOTHING

Bibliography Bell, Genevieve. “The Value of Boredom.” TEDxSydney video, filmed May 2011.

Brogan, Jan. “When Being Distracted Is a Good Thing.” The Boston Globe.

February 27, 2012.

Cage, John. Silence: Lectures and Writings. 1st edition. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan, 1961.

Castillo, Michelle. “Survey: 75 Percent of Americans Admit to Using Phone While in Bathroom.” CBS News. February 2, 2012.

Copeland, Matthieu, Clive Phillpot, John Armleder, and Mai-Thu Perret, eds. Voids: A Retrospective. Zurich; Geneva; Paris: JRP|Ringier, 2009.

Dillard, Annie. The Writing Life. New York, NY: Harper Perennial, 2013.

Fawkes, Piers. “Starck: Design Is Dead, Sorry.” PSFK, March 28, 2008.

Gann, Kyle. No Such Thing as Silence: John Cage’s 4’33”. New Haven Conn.: Yale University Press, 2011.

Gefter, Amanda. “The Bridge From Nowhere - Issue 16: Nothingness.” Nautilus.

August 7, 2014.

Gelman, Alexander. Subtraction: Aspects of Essential Design. Crans-Près-Céligny; Hove; New York: Rotovision, 1999.

Glasser, Hana. “The Lack.” Slate. August 7, 2014.

Gross, Daniel A. “This Is Your Brain on Silence - Issue 16: Nothingness.” Nautilus.

August 21, 2014.

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References

Harris, Michael. The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection. New York: Current, 2014.

Heidegger, Martin. Being and Time. Reprint edition. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2008.

Jabr, Ferris. “Why Your Brain Needs More Downtime.” Scientific American.

October 15, 2013.

Kirp, David L. “Meditation Transforms Roughest San Francisco Schools.” SFGate.

January 12, 2014.

Kreider, Tim. We Learn Nothing: Essays. Reprint edition. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013.

Krulwich, Robert. “Two Ways To Think About Nothing.” NPR.org. March 13, 2012.

Mann, Sandi, and Rebekah Cadman. “Does Being Bored Make Us More Creative?” Creativity Research Journal. Vol. 26 No. 2, May 6, 2014.

Murakami, Haruki. What I Talk About When I Talk About Running. Reprint edition.

New York: Vintage, 2009.

Neate, Rupert. “Bangladesh Factory Collapse: Big Brands Urged to Pay into Help Fund.” The Guardian. February 24, 2014.

Prensky, Marc. “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants.” On the Horizon. MCB University Press: Vol. 9 No. 5, October 2001.

Rama, Swami. Meditation and Its Practice. Reprint edition. Honsdale, Pa.: Himalayan Institute Press, 2007.

Tierney, John. “Do You Suffer From Decision Fatigue?” The New York Times, August 17, 2011.

Tzu, Lao, Derek Lin, and Lama Surya Das. Tao Te Ching: Annotated & Explained. 1 edition. Woodstock, Vt: SkyLight Paths, 2006.

Vendrame, Simona, and Andrea Zittel. Diary No. 1. 1st edition. Milano: Alberico Cetti Serbelloni, 2002.

Zomorodi, Manoush. “Bored and Brilliant.” New Tech City WNYC, January 12, 2015.

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McFadden, Cynthia, Tim Sandler, and Elisha Fieldstadt. “San Francisco Schools Transformed by the Power of Meditation.” NBC News. January 1, 2015.

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References

Suggested Reading Bruno, Dave. The 100 Thing Challenge: How I Got Rid of Almost Everything, Remade My Life, and Regained My Soul. Original edition. New York: William Morrow Paperbacks, 2010.

Close, Frank. Nothing: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Govan, Michael, Christine Y. Kim, Florian Holzherr, Alison de Lima Greene, and E. C. Krupp. James Turrell: A Retrospective. 1st edition. Los Angeles : Munich ; New York: Prestel USA, 2013.

Holt, Jim. Why Does the World Exist?: An Existential Detective Story. 1 edition.

New York: Liveright, 2013.

Kondo, Marie. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 2014.

Rushkoff, Douglas. Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now. Reprint edition.

Current Trade, 2014.

Whittlesea, Ian. Ian Whittlesea: Becoming Invisible. London: The Everyday Press, 2014.

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Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro. Manual of Zen Buddhism. S. l.: Forgotten Books, 2007.

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Acknowledgements THANKS FOR NOTHING

I am truly grateful to all of the people who contributed to and supported me through this leap into The Void. Thank you for nothing and for everything.

Brian David Johnson Genevieve Bell Charlie Knoles Alexander Casertano John Maeda John Thackara Paul Miller Matt Stinchcomb Birju Pandaya Allan Chochinov Gabrielle Kellner Alisha Wessler Marko Manriquez Peter Ambrosio Whitney Campbell Joan Tick Caleb Lindskoog John Elliot Caroline Monday Maxandra Short Kramer Oliver Kramer Brian Jacobs Sam Schneider Steven Jewett Jessica Ludwicki Benjamin Lavely Sarah Falcon Rodrigo Camarena Rachel Greenwald Rob Walker Benjamin Critton Abby Covert Jason Severs Andrew Schloss Elliott P. Montgomery

Brent Arnold Emilie Baltz Steven Dean Janna Gilbert Sinclair Scott Smith The rest of the PoD Faculty Boris Klompus Tak Cheung John Heida Julia Plevin Andres Iglesias Lusha Huang Heath Wagoner Eliz Ayaydin Berk Ilhan Elisa Werbler Lance Green Miguel Olivares May Sun George Crichlow Vidhi Goel Brandon Washington Steve Hamilton Natsuki Hayashi Louise-Anne Van’t Riet Isioma Iyamah Eden Lew Jonathan Lung The Firsts – Class of 2014 My mom, brother, sister and the rest of my family Raymond Park

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