DIGITAL FUTURES - 5 - DISCUSSION

Future everything event, our digi futures outcome will be a part of this event. It coincides with the assessment.

Speculative design, speculating the future.

Feminising technology and the body scans as a starting point.

From the scan we have a visual and a set of data.

How we inhabit spaces 109.com using DNA to re-create faces from gum and ciggi buts. Heather Dewey.

When going to a party we have to take a cake or bottle,this is what collaborating is, you have to bring something to the party!

The assessment will be on a body of work and a narrative and what we have done on this impacts in practice 3. Make, write and articulate how it links to my practice.

27th - 28th march FE conference.

Go though the FE website and see what we like about it and come up with ideas together

noma53.com 29th - 30th March.

Fabrizzio wants outline of our project idea.

Siobhan Murphy Royal Academy

We need to ask Chris to put the Facebook into moodle

TUESDAY TALK - SIMON PATTERSON

 

 

Simon is a YBA in the 80's

If you can survive the first couple of years out of college as an artist then you can make it as an artist.

Simon placed his slides randomly into the projected to encourage him to talk differently about his work.

Public art works are problematic - temporary works are more enjoyable.

His smoke scenes, he made them a spectacle rather than an artwork (smoke grenades)

Spinal tap map with groupies shown at uni, the work was more for the staff as they would relate to it and the students would have to learn about it!

His work is currently in the Holden Gallery as part of the Diagrams exhibition. The chemical periodic table of elements.

Did some work on kites where he would create them to resemble particular artists work and then place their names on the wall around the kites.

Mythologising of the West. His girlfriend has a great interest in the West and she believe that all things have come from this, I.e. sci-fi, fiction etc etc.

Who is the work for? Simon talks to the people in the area he knows a piece will be installed.

Note for Patti, the speakers on the window which transmit different sounds to different areas of the glass pane.

He likes the artist who reads out the football results or games and then relates them to Pantone colours, synaesthesia.

QUE FOR ME - what systems are in use now, I.e. the Pantone book, versus the change in how we are taught to use things. Knitting machine, you would have someone come round to your house to demonstrate the workings of the machine or could buy an instruction video. These days we refer to YouTube for this. What else has technology changed in this way and how can this be adapted to our world now?

Simon designed The Great Bear, London Underground piece. He says it is strange for an artist to have an artwork that people recognise before they know who the artist is.

Que from the audience about art dealers. Simon says that most art dealers he has dealt with are weirder than artists, they were more than likely artists in the past themselves. He says they are domineering.

Simon thinks that it is not good to get caught up doing the same piece of artwork over and over because it works. You need to keep the mind moving. I.e. when he had produced the periodic table it worked and so he continued to create more but slightly varying. His girlfriend told him enough was enough and suggested he tried something new!

HOUSEKEEPING - 1

DIGITAL FUTURES - 4 - PAUL SCOTT

Paul Scott Lecture

• Cumbrian Blue
• Artist involved in research throughout all of his career
• Works mainly with ready made traditional ceramics
• Graphics, painting and drawing were his background
• Hot off the press book about how to print onto ceramics. Paul Scott & Terry Bennett
• Book is about how to print and then he had an exhibition which was about why (Exhibition “are you sitting comfortably”)
• Stoke on Trent Gladstone
• Phd funded by MIRIAD bursary
• Digital technology and how it can help artists
• a-n.co.uk as students we have full access to their website, knowledge bank and artists talking section
• Updates book ceramics and print, contemporary practice in ceramics
• Megumi Naiton - artists work in special collections, i-phone series
• Scott Rench - yosoh.com (studied at Edinburgh uni in USA)
• Scott curates, writes and works to commission
• Scott takes the historical and puts the contemporary in
• Foot & Mouth plate, Ai Wei Wei plate
• When we go on holiday we’d take photographs as souvenirs, back in the day people used to make paintings as souvenirs
• Magazines and books, disseminate paintings and images out to the population
• Ceramics copied by putting the images onto ceramic plates (images)
• Designed landscapes, rich people moved a village and planned the landscape so that they could have a nice painting of their house
• Blue & white ceramics goes East to West and vice versa
• English potters copied Eastern patterns
• His digital scan enabled him to re-visualise it at a larger scale
• Pixels in mosaic and on screen - ceramic wall in Hanei
• Putting ceramics back into nature to create full circle - ceramics tree
• ceramic.co.uk - ceramic research centre
• English style copper plates from Sweden
• Can print from metal plates as etching or do a relief print from the actual plate
• Laser engraved plates from digital artwork for when the engraves retires
• Image of mosaic was has motorcyclists driving past which Scott like and incorporated into his works.
• Ceramic engravers now usually make bank notes
• Interested in the different languages between prints enplanes, engraving and digital
• Digital technology allows us to access lots of information online and quickly. Interested in the way it is presented, instagram etc
• Scotts work appeals to people who don’t understand contemporary art as they relate to the ceramic plates.
• Look out for his talks on MIRIAD online

JOHN HYATT - THE TRANSFORMATIVE IMAGINATION

 

Mind mapping is a useful technique - Tony Buzan, book on mind mapping.

John is an artist/scientist.

Labels are helpful as they limit you.

John has theories which he then tests.

Knowledge is something until proven wrong.

Imagination is no larger than knowledge as it contains knowledge.

2010 cymatics research.

Johns mum passed away and so he decided to research the science of resonant wave forms whilst he had spare time at home.

Ernst Chladni (d.1827) - visualising sound.

Dr Hans Jenny (1967) - Cymetics book.

Everything in the universe is made of waves and so John tested this.

Vibrator on bed with sand. Sand acts like a liquid. Film - say hello to the sandman.

The sand when vibrated crates feedback loops, systems and synchronisation.

John was interested in how it works as a system, rather than the patterns it made.

The sand made patterns  or turbulence (it formed shapes that resembled nature like arms and toes) it produced chaos and anti-chaos, a biomimess.

The sand appeared chaotic but it has order. Harmonious laminate, organised variety, scripted individuality, life paths in space time.

The fast pieces would move about on the bottom (big pieces? - cant remember the sizes) then the middle would move at a medium pace and the top pieces would be slow.

Simplicity in big shapes, randomness in the smaller pieces.

Aesthetics, the golden section, beauty, Fibonacci sequence which is the structure by which plants grow. It is the law if nature.

As an artist John set himself in front of an empty canvas and emptied his mind and painted whatever came to the canvas. Spiral shapes appeared from which he used this as a grid or template to form his painting on. He looked at the shapes and then compiled a scene from them which would more than likely be landscapes with random context such as a frog playing a guitar.

Marxist.

Looking at a painting is like looking at the structure of the brain.

He also created digital visuals where he would draw circles in photoshop based on his experiments tank then apply a folding technique which you use in say folding dough and re-create an image from the circles. These images would then be transferred onto clothing designs for musicians from his paintings.  

John has an exhibition coming up on feb 2nd called second life.

Creative spiral encourages thinking in bendy ways, non-linear thinking.

John advocates not to think on your course!

j.hyatt@mmu.ac.uk

IAN ROBERTS (OBJECT & CONTEXT) MEETING

I discussed my current project with Ian and showed him the collection of music equipment that I have. Ian spoke a bit about some of the objects, what they do and perhaps why they are in the collection, which items may have samples saved onto them created by John.

He exclaimed that in choosing to do something, you’re not doing something else. So in essence, what you are choosing is what not to do. You have to be comfortable with your choice. It’s moor about the things you chose not to do, than what you chose to do.

With the collection being so large it is important to chose one piece to focus on. I had already discussed this with Jonathan Hitchen in a meeting last week and have since chosen to focus on the Tenori-on. Otherwise Ian said, with this amount of equipment, the possibilities are endless.

The process of pricing the equipment and selling it should not be taken lightly, this should be a very slow process that I should take my time in doing. Ian offered to help me with things when the time arises.

From meeting Ian, I’d say he reitrified what Hitch and I had discussed last week which proves I am on the right path. What he has perhaps pointed out more so is that it is important to take my time doing these things as it is a big job. This worries me a little, not in terms of whether I can do it or not, but whether this is the right time to be doing it. Have I chosen a project to emotionally involved for my Ma or will the structure of the Ma help me along this path?

NOTES FROM ONE TO ONE MEETING - 3 - 26.11.2013

• The objects are surrounded by narratives, write these down and use design to translate them. My relationship with the objects and their narratives.
• Excession - The equipment moves on, I part from that part of my life in a structured and very carefully planned way, My work translates music/knitting into media. I am making my own excssion for the equipment which allows me to take the next step.
• Translation and transposition. These may be good words to use when describing what it is I am doing.
• Ian Roberts - Object & Context tutor. He has an interest in historic guitars and our relationships with objects, worth getting in touch with him to chat about the project.
• Use the tenori-on to translate knitting punch cards into music and use the tenori-on templates to transfer back into knitted patterns.
• Constructive criticism to be aware of is that I can try to focus on too many things at once and so wont ever go into real depth in a project. If you I were to concentrate on too many projects then they would all accelerate at the same level. By leaving some projects behind I can come back to them later and with the things I have learnt from going ahead with just one, the projects will move forward a lot quicker and with more depth, meaning and understanding then if I went ahead straight away. Just note down any other ideas for future reference.
• Good idea to pull out one piece of equipment to translate everything through and to focus on. Why the tenor-on? After all it is the one piece of equipment that I brought to Manchester with me.
• Do I need to collate everything, i.e. music collection, bookmarks, shops equipment is bought from etc? Is this part of the story?
• My work almost has a nod to fine art but does lean towards design for it to work.
• Spoke about the set up of John’s equipment, it doesn’t take on the role of a recording studio but more an ad hoc kind of environment.
• Where the equipment goes onto next. Hitch and me discussed ebay but I’d like for the objects to remain within a close circuit of friends, or friends of friends. People around me who I haven’t known for very long, each want a piece of equipment to buy, they respect me for allowing them to use the equipment and respect the journey I am on and want to show their appreciation by owning one of the pieces, does the story make them want a piece more?

JONATHAN HITCHEN MEETING -1

Today I met with Jonathan Hitchen to discuss the personal music publication project.

• What’s the story?
• Guitars are bought due to the musician wanting a particular sound, one that they have heard another musician accomplishing
• Effects pedals are more for experimenting with and sometimes several of the same pedals are owned by the same person
• If it were just a catalogue the objects would just be seen as hardware, what were John’s arrangements with the hardware, how did he have the modulars set up?
• You can re-create a digital version of the modular synthesisers online (where?)
• The set up is like looking at an artists studio, you could perhaps link the colours on a paint palette to a particular painting, could you do this with the music equipment, what wires were in where to create what sound?
• WHat’s my story and reason for doing this?
• Ebay - part of the transaction could be that you ask for a story from them in return for them receiving a story from you. Does this add value?
• Attachments to the objects
• Map destination of where the object go
• Use the Tenori-on as an interface.
• Equipment - Tenori-on - what comes out from this side?
• Not so much about other peoples stories, more about the stories that John’s equipment has.
• Tenori-on stores it’s sounds almost like a miniature version of a punch card.

CLINTON CAHILL - ASSESSMENT - 26.11.13

1000 - 1500 written piece - 9th Dec

- Desktop, objects, mind maps, sketchbooks, bring all in to tell the story.

- You can just use text but also make it more persuasive by using illustrations to show things.

- Find a style of design to match the content.

- Design your words - persuasive through style.

- Reflective and analytical.

- Individuated - it’s not an argument or thesis.

- Thoughts, research - reflect on these things.

- Can include the practice intentions sheets.

Presentation assessment - 12th Dec

- Articulate your ideas clearly and the relationships of the course units to their own research or professional needs or practice.

- Convey a good sense of the intellectual and/or practical motivation and know why the areas in which they want to work are especially interesting or challenging.

- Are able to articulate how they will build and extend work they have already done, e.g. from you Ba or professional experience.

- Present a clearly focussed statement when using complex concepts or language, make them clear and concise.

- As you write you think, so to not write you are denying another level of thought.

- Doesn’t need to be a curated piece.

- Pieces are grouped or clustered for a reason.

- Arranged right and they could be used as a good visual aid.

- Mood board of other peoples work.

- Arrangement of mood board should reflect their style of work, very visual, write some text and quote them, by doing this it shows that you are understanding their work.

- Practice being a designer by arranging someone else’s work, absorb what’s important about them.

- Branding your own project. It has the info and identity.

- Influences, proposals, the branding of the work, show experiments in the workshops, conclusion? Bibliography (where is your info from?) books, websites, list of figures.

- Make a piece of work by writing about your project.

- Include things that are pictorial to your thinking, show how ideas led onto other things. Don’t need to pack everything in.

- Testing our ideas and experimenting

- Trying things that are unfamiliar

- Broadening research methods.

- Blogging is a method - might need advancing if we are comfortable with it.

- Ok to be lost! - Am I doing the right project

- Collaborative practice - what is your rolled? How are you managing problems?

- Show development of ideas, investigation, prototypes, initial reading/thinking, capturing system, sketchbooks, mind maps etc

- Apply teamwork and leadership skills, you taking decisions for your own practice. Manage your own developments reflectively.

Sketchbooks

- Allow you to: speculate, think wildly, develop your own exterior language to get ideas down and moving them around.

- Diaries, list making, bullet points, poems, feeling relaxed and not pressured.

- Personal space to empty your head and to show your thought process.

- Try out different ways of using a sketchbook - digital?

- Capture everything, smell, feel.

- Re-call and record everything, conversations, work from memory.

- Scraps of paper - Annie Shaw uses scraps of paper to note things on and then puts them together later so she can easily move things about, they are what they are, just clipped up - being honest.

See note book for references:

Sarah Howarth.

Nichola Wood & Harriet Rodgers.

Hillary Judd.

Ming Yi Weu.

Sara Cullen.

David Molloy.

Brent Hardy-Smith.

Alice Smith.

John Astbury.

Q&A (Example from previous student about his own practice)

- What is my project?

- Do you like what you have found?

- Is this proving difficult?

- How close is my practice to me?

- Do I hide behind my work?

- What are my real influences?

- Is it ok to copy?

- Do I feel comfortable using other peoples work in my own?

STRATEGIES OF THOUGHT - MEMORY & FORGETTING

The Eiffel Tower wasn’t a popular piece back in the day and was only meant to be up for the expo. People got used to it and quite attached and in the end didn’t want it knocked down. One fellow went to the Eiffel Tower every day to have his lunch, he hated it that much that he did this as he remarked that it was the only place he could have lunch and not have to look at the Eiffel Tower. It was used as a radio mast but it didn’t need to look like that and so took on a useless function. Symbolic power of something. What the Eiffel tower has become is a ritual, a ritual to go up to the top of it to see the views of Paris. Las Vegas, Paris, Venis + gambling, it’s what it generates and produces not the thing itself. Blackpool tower was modelled on the Eiffel Tower but it wraps buildings around it in the form of amusement arcades as it cannot exist on it’s own.

Rodchenko’s tower design - overly literal, overly determined. Material, functional, symbolic. Important in sights of memory, embed memory - how these things come together, they have to co-exist at the same time. Memory and history interact, the creation of memory. Overdetermined because of this interaction.

Rachel Whiteread memorial - temporary and eternal at the same time. memorials preserving, immortalise death. What happens around that? One artist (annoyingly can’t remember who) created an art piece which was a blank memorial. This didn’t matter that it was blank as it was symbolic, people still attached memorials to it, it’s the symbolic language of things. Automatically geared to inscribed things onto the surface of things.

Events themselves are not as important in terms of memory, its what attached itself to the event, i.e. the memorial.

memory - sights

history - events

Barthes writing a biography, not an autobiography for himself. Biographine, made up of fragments, his choice for images was a treat to himself.

NOTES ABOUT ASSESSMENT

• What is it that you are doing?
• How do you go about it?
• and who cares?

Annie - You should write in the 3rd person, don’t write as in , me, my and I.

Clinton - It should be practiced based writing about how you feel about things. In first person

You need to keep asking questions and take a look at yourself doing it. Be yourself as much as possible, don’t adopt a turgid style of writing like for example from our strategies of though lectures or from the books we are reading.

Who is commenting on the subject now?

15 - 20 minute slot, you don’t have to talk during the whole slot, it should be more of a conversation.

9 - 11 am - set up time, 11 presentations.

You will be assessed by 2 members of staff

See guidelines online

Use Harvard system to reference things

Use turn it in to submit monograph - you can have a draft version until the deadline where it become your final turn in piece. It checks plagiarism.

Include a few quotes and references in the monograph.

DIGITAL FUTURES - 1 - INTRO

6 - 9th May = symposium...

of our work and how the digital has contributed, led etc. There will be a keynote speaker, a “poster” presentation or pecha kucha style perhaps, it can be whatever we want it to be.

12 + 19 Dec, 9 Jan, 3 + 10 March = Independent study days. Next week we will meet with Moodle Guru, Chris Meadows to help us maximise our use of moodle. We should set up a dig futures blog or space where we can all talk to one another.

DIGITAL IN DESIGN

Code Creatives (http://www.codecreatives.info/) project which is a part of MIRIAD. Projects are based around skills development. Year long project to look at how to use computer coding in creative projects.

Derek Trillo - http://www.insightimages.co.uk/

The flow of life: Architectural photography as populated spaces.

Produces pictures which are aesthetically pleasing.

Cross over of architecture and urban design.

Light trails photographed of people walking.

Justin Quinell bridge - long exposure, Terrence Chang 2010.

Derek combines several takes of the same space with people moving mourn the space and makes them into one images - Is it a true representation?

Oscar Ryalander (?) image made up of 52 negatives in 1857 - this is an old concept.

Digital constructions showing the flow of people challenges the notion of photography.

Sally Morfill - http://www.artdes.mmu.ac.uk/profile/smorfill

Cerebral

Interest in movement and space

“I’m wary” collaboration with Mary Maclean 2001

• Movement of the viewer in the space is what is important
• 2 viewpoints to move between to find the right and wrong way to view it.

Sally asked 2 people a question and they had to discuss this whilst they had motion sensors on which recorded the X and the Y axis. From the information gathered she creates a vector image and reproduces into vinyl. The motion monitored that Sally is interested in is the hand gestures people use whilst talking. The vinyl is displayed as the final piece with the text discussed next to the vinyl.

David Ogle - http://www.davidogle.co.uk/

The value of site and technology drive to abolish distance. Fundamental to his research is value. Artworks and buildings, the experiences of things. The telephone and aeroplane shrink distances and have conquered space. “ All distance in time and space are shrinking” Technology shrinks distances but does it bring value to the experience of something? To look at an image of the Sistene Chapel on your computer, what is the value compared to experiencing the real thing? Things which are scarce and hard to reach are the things we most value. What we struggle to conquer elevates the worth for instance climbing a mountain. Kittler 1999 german, “any medium can be translated into any other”. Site specific installations based around the idea of drawing - quite ephemeral. Walter Benjamin 1935 “In even the most perfect reproduction...”

Ben

Uses a non-visual way of communication data to a user. Arduino tongue - plate put onto mouth which sends data to your tongue and creates visuals in your head. Audio scanning - 3D environment, 1D sound - you can make anything into a button. He records a space using a ball which links up to the computer which the software remembers, then if anyone moves near this space it makes a sound - i.e. it is a button. the user knows through audio where the space is and so is being fed information through a non visual form. 3D sound - 3D world - is the current project he is working on using 2D dots as the visual. the blue dot is your ear and you move this around which changes what you would normally hear if you were in this virtual 3D environment.

Genevive Say - http://genevievesay.com/

The stream project wired - dancer and choreographer. Interested in exposing the inner workings of the body and brain through dance and performance. Neuro feedback - brainwave data, heart rate and respiratory volume. This info is fed back to the user so they can respond to it and help. i.e. reduce anxiety etc. Footballers use it to get into the zone before a game. Initial experiments proved not to have good relationships between the art and the science, the equipment was restricting for the dancer, the sounds weren’t very nice to respond to and there was probably too much data. They introduced a new technology, the mind wave headset.

Brain - Mind wave - wifi - laptop - midi interface - lighting desk

So the computer controlled the lighting desk with the signals given from the dancers brain. Various lights were used in the performance, fairy lights, light bulbs, theatrical lights etc. When the dancer went into a meditative state it was an alternative focus so the lights would change accordingly. To control the cognitive states the dancer was given certain tasks to perform like reading a newspaper, doing some mathematics etc. which in turn would change the lighting in the performance.

Ralph Mills - http://theantimuseum.wordpress.com/about/

Field archeologist and writer. The anti-museum. The land of lost content in Shropshire has lots of everyday things. The museum has no labels so the viewers can make their own experiences up. The problem is we don’t capture the stories the viewers think/make up when they see these things. We are all curates. Ralph has done his phd research into things/objects. Museums how things in glass cases what value do these objects have. They all have meaning to the people who put them there but what do they mean? Everyday narratives - Crookshanks. Ralph has begun to create a virtual museum in which he records objects so that they can be viewed in 360 degrees (he did this with his iphone!). He is looking into producing photo kiosks which you can go to use to record your own objects to be stored in the museums and galleries. Trying to capture the personal values in objects. In the Q&A it was brought up about Oxfam, where people would write narratives about the objects they donated to the shop.

Anthony Rowe - http://www.squidsoup.org/blog/about/

Founder of squidsoup.org His particular interest lies in mixed reality immersive experience. He has looked into combining the digital world into a physical space. A programme he has developed which people can interact with brings digital animals to life, if you stick your arm into the projection they walk up it. If projected into sand, the software can detect of people have made a high barrier that the animals can’t walk over and so have to walk around. If two bugs meet they would magic up a bigger bug. The software was used at Glastonbury, one of the animals was invincible, kids get quite physical with the interactions, young adults too. In the Infestation project where a room was full of digital bugs and real bean bags, kids would try to demolish the creatures whereas older people would have a more calming effect from being in the room. squidsoup.org/infestation No one really went in and looked out for the projector, all people would instantly start to interact with the projections.

Ocean of light - Uses light, volumetric, it has volume in the space. The piece is an environment that you can walk into. the creation was influenced by a modular system found at the Zurich Train Station. They were able to lend the prototype to experiment with to inspire their creation. However people saw the object rather than the context as it was beautiful and intriguing. their invention became more organic and allowed you to interact by walking into the piece. Ephemeral space can be created and destroyed there and then. Submergence

JONATHAN BARNBROOK - 11.11.13

 

I’m a big fan of Barnbrook’s and I am lucky enough to say this is the second time I have heard him give a lecture.

- Hasn’t had a job as thinks design studios produce shit work.

- You can do what you want if you stick to it and make sacrifices.

- Where is Graphic Design in society?

- Economics and digital have forced us to blur the boundaries between skills, graphic designers are expected to be good at a few things.

- He was once told “You are a citizen first and a graphic designer secondly”

 

Political Work - Occupy London

Barnbrook was asked to re-design the Occupy London logo, although it had to be put forward to a democratic vote against 5 other. Barnbrook’s logo was chosen! the other logos contained images of people marching and clenched fists which is something we need to move away from. Barnbrook chose to use simple graphics to translate a clear and concise point, through using a circle and an arrow in red and black. The newspaper for Occupy London uses one of Barnbrook’s fonts called bastard. It is a blackletter typeface designed in 1990. which was intended to be used by corporate fascists.

Olympukes

If Barnbrook doesn’t reference other designers, why does he think it is important for students to have practicing guest lecturers like himself do lectures? Barnbrook said that he doesn’t do any work for the likes of coca cola as it would be hypocritical for himself and towards students. In the past he has worked a lot with Damien Hirst and most recently with Bowie. Barnbrook commented that record covers don’t get discussed anymore like they used to, people just tend to say whether the design is good or not. The album cover he designed for Bowie’s The Next Day album took 2 months to arrive at a final design after going through various ideas. The project had to be kept a secret until it’s release and so Barnbrook had to use the codeword table whenever talking about the album cover design. Several attempts later on the design and things still weren’t working, Bowie suggested turning the image he had chosen to use from a few years back upside down. They decided to settle on using the album cover from the Heroes album which represented Bowie in his youth looking forward. Inside the album cover, Barnbrook intentionally chose the colours to clash with regards to the lyrics as he said you can get all of that kind of information online these days, and so the print inside was just a nod to them. Some of the lyrics were chosen to stand out (and the next day, and the next, and another day) which Bowie had referenced from Shakespeare’s play Macbeth (tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow). It’s the why not the how that is important. The vinyl label is a white square and as there’s no right way to hold a record up the text is printed all around the square. The white square was very important in the design as it was translated into all of the advertising for the album release and was applicable to any format, fast food, perfume, consumer desirables, luxury hotels poster, it was anti advertising.

“Tomorrow belongs to those who can hear it coming”

Online the campaign continued for the album where by the public were invited to create their own versions of the album cover.

Why design a new typeface?

1. Expression of language. Double think - George Orwell 1984. Anthony burgess - Fuck it!
2. To improve society. Modernist utopia.
3. Using our past to create something new.
4. To create beauty. Mason 1992 (Originally Manson after the serial killer) letterforms taken from architecture

PART 2!

You shouldn’t work for who you think you should work for but with who you want to work with, if you don’t ask you don’t get.

Barnbrook was on the curating team for the V&A show “Bowie is...” He said it is difficult to show music in an exhibition without it looking like all other exhibitions about music. The level of design that needs to be used, needs to show that you care about the people who like Bowie. Not everyone will get the design but it’s important to those who will. A phrase was printed onto all of the exhibition tickets which changed every three hours, the V&A didn’t understand why you would need to do this but it was important to make the show become something different. The exhibition was designed by theatre set designers who also worked on the opening of the olympics

If you work in another language you have to understand how to play with it. Hirst books 1997 - Barnbrook explained flicking through it like flicking through the tv channels, there’s no right part of the book to start with and that every page was like it’s own record cover, each had it’s own design.

People tend to commission what they can see, so you have to show them what you can imagine. The Barnbrook studio tend to work on about 70% commission work and 30% their own personal work.

Vernacular design - use the things around you to create design.

First Things First Manifesto 2000 Various authors This manifesto was first published in 1999 in Emigre 51.   We, the undersigned, are graphic designers, art directors and visual communicators who have been raised in a world in which the techniques and apparatus of advertising have persistently been presented to us as the most lucrative, effective and desirable use of our talents. Many design teachers and mentors promote this belief; the market rewards it; a tide of books and publications reinforces it. Encouraged in this direction, designers then apply their skill and imagination to sell dog biscuits, designer coffee, diamonds, detergents, hair gel, cigarettes, credit cards, sneakers, butt toners, light beer and heavy-duty recreational vehicles. Commercial work has always paid the bills, but many graphic designers have now let it become, in large measure, what graphic designers do. This, in turn, is how the world perceives design. The profession's time and energy is used up manufacturing demand for things that are inessential at best. Many of us have grown increasingly uncomfortable with this view of design. Designers who devote their efforts primarily to advertising, marketing and brand development are supporting, and implicitly endorsing, a mental environment so saturated with commercial messages that it is changing the very way citizen-consumers speak, think, feel, respond and interact. To some extent we are all helping draft a reductive and immeasurably harmful code of public discourse. There are pursuits more worthy of our problem-solving skills. Unprecedented environmental, social and cultural crises demand our attention. Many cultural interventions, social marketing campaigns, books, magazines, exhibitions, educational tools, television programs, films, charitable causes and other information design projects urgently require our expertise and help. We propose a reversal of priorities in favor of more useful, lasting and democratic forms of communication - a mindshift away from product marketing and toward the exploration and production of a new kind of meaning. The scope of debate is shrinking; it must expand. Consumerism is running uncontested; it must be challenged by other perspectives expressed, in part, through the visual languages and resources of design. In 1964, 22 visual communicators signed the original call for our skills to be put to worthwhile use. With the explosive growth of global commercial culture, their message has only grown more urgent. Today, we renew their manifesto in expectation that no more decades will pass before it is taken to heart. Jonathan Barnbrook Nick Bell Andrew Blauvelt Hans Bockting Irma Boom Sheila Levrant de Bretteville Max Bruinsma Sian Cook Linda van Deursen Chris Dixon William Drenttel Gert Dumbar Simon Esterson Vince Frost Ken Garland Milton Glaser Jessica Helfand Steven Heller Andrew Howard Tibor Kalman Jeffery Keedy Zuzana Licko Ellen Lupton Katherine McCoy Armand Mevis J. Abbott Miller Rick Poynor Lucienne Roberts Erik Spiekermann Jan van Toorn Teal Triggs Rudy VanderLans Bob Wilkinson

NOTES FROM ONE TO ONE MEETING - 2 - 12.11.2013

- MFA structure after Ma year, MFA is about allowing you project to have an impact, to share it either by having it published or organising events.

- At end of Ma, slot some time into planned timeline to review work done so far and to allow for any changes. If no review is needed then use this time as practice time.

- Get in touch with Lewis Sykes with regards to MacJournal - Code Creative - http://www.codecreatives.info/

- Use the inductions had to put some elements of my projects through a process i.e. knitting, embroidery etc. This may lead to other ideas within my practice.

- You can’t access the digital without an object.

- Metaphors - They can be cheesy but it is what allows other people to understand your ideas clearly. Clinton sees my projects as small cupboards which I keep dipping in and out of the different doors. Each are linked but are their own project in their own right also.

- Mind mapping - Great start but don’t get too focussed on doing this, keep going back to it but move onto next thing now.

OPTION CHOICES

My choice is between Object & Context and Digital Futures.

Unit ends, 6-9th of May, the aim is to create and event to draw students and staff in to see what you have researched/practiced.

Object & Context.

3 projects throughout the option. The tutor, Ian has in the past designed objects for other people. He says it is all about the context. Objects don’t exist without context. Ian designed a compass for children which rather than having specific measurements on it it would just draw small, medium and large circles. Kids are more interested in drawing any sized circle rather than a specific sized circle. You have to design the experience you want the person to have. Freedom ought to make you more creative but limitations/constraints are in fact the things that make you more creative.

Ian is a collector. You have to shift the context to have a new perspective - clay cup = plastic cup. In India, some guy collected light bulbs as he liked the object for it’s aesthetic quality, yet he didn’t have electricity to use the bulb for it’s designed purpose. Ian’s father was one of the illustrators of the eye spy books.

Emotional response is the prime motivation, the value of things is hidden. (Get Your Bits Out - maybe the exhibition is about the stories rather than the objects - see Peter liversidge)

Reading objects - urban semiotics constructing narratives.

Scenario modelling - design user experience / close observation / after dance

Incorporation - modify / practice / feasibility

1 - Photographing things. What is the difference between an artist and a designer doing these things?

2 - In house out of house difference

3 - 3-4 weeks propose a feasibility study

Digital Futures.

Collaborative or individual, but at the end of the option you have to share your work in a digital symposium at the architecture shed which will open in february and will have between 60 to 100 creative business’ in.

• Sustainability is important, cities, communication, craft, development, exploration, narratives etc
• Scaleless, seamless, edgeless
• Staff research, hacking knitting machines
• Preparing you for jobs that don’t exist

Diginmmu - education, business, research.

Alex Russel - Textile Designer.

repeatless.blogspot.com

Printed textiles and surface pattern. Generative practice exploiting randomness using actions in photoshop and illustrator. Repeatless project - coding in processing cloth of gold being generated as we speak.

CLINTON CAHILL - MIND MAPPING - 05.11.13

Things to think about around my work

• Research metaphors
• Body of investigation leading to your proposal, experiments etc
• In assessment show all research and experiments
• Persuasive graphics around my design intention
• Visual treatment for my work to hap others imagine how it will work
• Design project proposal

• Research Metaphor
• Working Words
• Working the form
• Testing arrangements
• Visualising Possibilities
• Mapping as outcome
• Organising research as practice
• Presenting research as practice

Metaphor - Figure of speech in which a word or phrase is used of something to which it does not literally apply. “Trying to describe something by describing something else” Engaging your imagination, almost telling a lie. In greek metaphor means to transfer meaning. Pick a metaphor for your research, planning an expeditions, or just starting out, method = am i drifting or not, do I want to drift or not?

Research metaphors

Mapping, surveying, overview, plan, scoping, terrain, territory, field area, patch.

Journey, adventure, quest - planning, progress, tracing, backtracking, detection, browsing.

Route, pathway, meandering, going round in cirlces

Positioning, isolating, practice

Archaeology, digging, layers, strata, constructing, deconstructing, structures

Fabric, threads, strands, seed, cross fertilisation, nourishment, enrichment

Positioning is important in a phd. Are you really a graphic designer? The word text come from textiles as when writing words it reminds you of textiles. In a labyrinth, when you get lost, your notebook/journal etc become the threads so you can find your way back.

Book - Information is beautiful. Types of visual info, flowchart, fan spiral etc. Use mapping to design the layout of a book. If you do this for all of your projects and then outside links can cross over. Gant chart is a timeline/schedule for projects. Info graphics like Chris Ware book covers. Comic strips. Meta images.

Drawing of content of a book, using the pencil to write what happens in the book

Ian Noble, the research process. research methodology, watt does this mean?

If you were researching along the lines of a Chipshop - to visually represent this idea you would use items found in a choppy, i.e. newspaper, day glo stars, drawing on the window etc

Alison Barnes project - Map shows people living in those areas, the most important thing here are the people.

book about thinking made for people who buy paper, it’s more about the process rather than the paper sample.

“Method in the madness - learning through making” working the words. Mind mapping isn’t about having to do all of the bits in the mind map, it is about just getting your thoughts about your projects onto paper. Keith Tyson - The 7 wonders. Graphic Communication of ideas and thinking. Graphics doesn’t have to be finished for it to be a thing. Malcolm Garrett - Understanding hyper media. Matt Cook - project chart, keywords and phrases and diagram of how it will work. Stages, you can’t do the next without doing the last stage.

What else works rather than just showing your work as a portfolio or on a wall?

 

CLINTON CAHILL - IMAGE AND TEXT - 29.10.13

Image & Text, back to basics with visual literacy. Going back to routes of practice drawing letterforms and photography

• Re visit key elements of VL from a graphic design perspective.
• In order to recognise and explore the complexity and mystery of an image and text in graphic communication.
• So that we can exploit a better understanding of graphic composition.

Formal Considerations

All of the bits that make a piece need to be considered, the empty space and the page, balance, symmetry, dynamic equilibrium, contrast, visual weight + recognition (psychology), reading image and text, point and line, Harmony and contradiction, positioning the viewer.

Why?

Fundamentally important to a range of design practices. Page layout, illustration, book design, advertising, film & motion graphics, new media, packaging etc.

Empty Space

Meaning and inherent dynamics.

Image above represents the page or window. Represents potential, the immanent, the void, ‘notional’ or imaginary space, ground (figure/ground), the field, ‘window’ onto other/extended space. Writers blank page represents space of artists imagination. Virtual space to invite audience. How big is it?

Ground = Paper surface

Figure = Goes onto the ground

Field = Paper for the mind map (Paper represents field of knowledge)

‘Window” = Canvas is window into bigger space. Looking through it into artists imagination.

Choosing kind of space to best express idea. ‘A reader on reading - Alberto Manguel’ Page 124 “Terrifying whiteness of the page”

• Use empty space to work with to perhaps to intimidate.
• The golden section, fibonacci sequence - paper sizes
• A-sizes created according to what Westerners believe to be aesthetically beautiful, mathematical and standardised.
• To create unconventional sizes you must change the conventional size of “the book” for instance.
• Paper stock is important, shape and size.

The audience don’t like things close to the edge, it makes us feel uncomfy, our eyes are constantly moving all over the image, from left to right. Bottom right diagram above takes the viewer off the page, whatever is missing we can imagine the rest. Entertain the viewer. These are vital for page layout. Rhythm of the grid, the structure underneath the content is made by understanding page layout.

Once paper is chosen the space is changed/defined by the mark, activated, defined, deformed, disrupted, punctured, polluted, enhanced etc.

BALANCE

Symmetry can be stable but this is potentially boring.

Dynamic equilibrium - the eyes enjoy suspense. Symmetry in faces, we enjoy this initially but after a while it becomes a bit weird. Scales in diagram above right are predictable and give a sense of balance. Scales in bottom right give us a sense of moving as if it were to tip over which makes the composition more interesting to look at.

Compositions above become more interesting as you go down due to composition and colours.

V&A poster - Vince Frost. Symmetrical but there are other twists to make it interesting.

Images we recognise all of the time don’t need to be big on the page unless this is important as we easily recognise even when quite small that the image is of a face for instance.

Barnbrook’s type spec sheets rely on you recognising the symbols from elsewhere (example above wasn’t the one shown in lecture - can’t seem to find that one, it was cyan and magenta and had the symbol of a cross on it!)

Why is the red dot in the above design? makes you feel like you’re putting your tongue to an iron. Hiding or revealing, which is most effective?

Balance - Bauhaus posters stripped down of their layout, i.e. cut all of the elements of a poster up and re-arrange them by hand in front of you as apposed to on screen, it’s more immediate this way and happens at the speed of your thought. How a small piece of text on a page layout can hold the whole composition together, if it’s taken away, the whole composition feels like it might fall down.

The human eye recognises and relishes contrast

We stop seeing familiar things that don’t or haven’t changed. But we can also enjoy the boring as it is denying you change. In portfolios, most people use black text to annotate, why? Why not use 80% black so the work can stand out more. Rembrandt’s painting are mostly blurry, he only used absolute black next to white on the eyes as it anchors us in psychologically to the piece and pulls you in to dwell on a creation part of the piece.

Smaller can be stronger if done well with contrast. Artists exhibition catalogues/books need the work to stand out over the design that the designer is using to put the piece together with.

If the below are identical - > These can change

Shape + Colour - > Size is effected

Shape + Size - > Colour

Colour + Colour - > Shape

How does your graphic information relate to the edge of the page? (See diagram above) The left composition feels stable, 2nd feels like it is nervous, moving, irritated, and 3rd is on it’s way down, it has movement.

Designer Paul Smith’s catalogue breaks the rules as it’s audience are savvy enough to understand that it’s not correct but it is witty with the heads being cropped out of the image frame. The photography doesn’t look like a product shot, it’s almost not real information. Marion Deuchars book covers, again examples of images cropped in “the wrong places”. Upsetting the rules by deliberate odd cropping/clumsiness. Guilty faces, icons (Statue of liberty, coca cola) easily recognised and so are powerful and so they can be decided upon carefully where to be placed.

. Point = static fixed, terminated

----- line = time, duration, direction, movement

However, where is the word? You can imply word through image, when you are directly given the word, you have nothing to do or think about. If someone says refrigerator, you all start to think of a refrigerator, where is the image? In your head, is it the same image you all have in your head?

Sagmeister’s Lou Reed album - The grid is the face. Making the audience engage physically through showing breathing etc, you’ve hooked the audience as it makes the feel it physically.