Every machine is a spiritualization of an organism
The existing discourse in design is framed in the context of form vs. function, machine vs. natural aesthetic, bourgeoisie vs. cultural elite, modernism vs. primitivism, and the commercial vs. ethical. Often in western tradition, opposing dichotomies exist to help deconstruct highly nuanced categories. Thus, in the history of design we are often presented with these notions in tandem and often opposed to each other as though implying that design has been a struggle between opposing predominant trains of thought. However these rough demarcations often mask the dynamic nature of the discipline and its more frequent oscillations and the existence of design artifacts that simultaneously hold various opposing categories. While it is arguably naïve to opt for an overarching structure of design that encompasses all these definitions it is reasonable to postulate that good design can span these irreconcilable polar opposites and often embrace a previously unacceptable norm. Design finds rich and salient manifestations by a process of systematic integration with the patterns of human action. Design ultimately achieves this by mediating between vocabularies that have previously been obtuse or situated within a cultural, economic, technical, or artistic minority and cast them in a vocabulary that is at once accessible, multifaceted and ultimately human.
We see these binary and seemingly contradictory themes dictate the philosophies and design in the canonical figures of design history as well as in the design of objects and selection of culturally relevant artifacts. This is especially evident in the debate between Hermann Muthesius and Henry van de Velde and in the stark differences of points of view between Raymond Loewy’s capitalistic zeal for reinventing product identity and Henry Dreyfuss’s user centered “design is for people” approach, or with the move toward ornamentation with the arts and crafts movement in contradiction with the sparse rationality of the international style. During the Werkbund Conference of 1914, Van de Velde expresses a distrust of anything that might sterilize his actions and stifle his freedom of thought or a ‘universally valid form that he sees only as a mask that seeks to make a virtue out of incapacity (). In contrast, Muthesius had a faith in standardization as a means to creative a clear design language that will be distinctive of the Germans. He also believed in the simplicity of forms and in the creation of objects that embraced the new possibilities created by the industrial revolution rather than spurn them or rein them in with selective design. Muthesius and Van de Velde both sought an authenticity in design that expressed honesty and an unequivocal expression of a point of view. Muthesius, like the many functionalists and anti- ornamentalists that follow him ( eg. Le Corbusier, Loos, Bauhaus, The Ulm School) believed that purity of form was nothing more than a symbol for a purity of mind and therefore a more sincere expression of design. Van the Velde and the others who have design philosophies akin to his (Mcintosh, the Eames, the Memphis design movement) sought to have a more vital and artistic approach to design, to be able to express creative and individual expression into design. These divergent attitudes toward design fail to underscore its main goal, that is to create an effectively constructed and well communicated form that expresses clarity in its function, execution and ability to engage the user whether it is through engaging his different senses, enabling the user to perform a task or to appeal to his aesthetic or philosophical tastes. Design is a dangerously all-encompassing label with numerous categories in its orbit and opposing ideas in its history. It is often seen as a totality of various points of view whether technological, social, emotional, rational, ethical, aesthetic, and cultural. Thus we come to the realization that any conclusive definition of design is impossible. One could only guess as to the many permutations of design that exists. However one could argue that there is successful and unsuccessful design and therefore its various manifestations have been subject to a value judgment determined by present cultural norms and history. Successful design relies on a clarity and honesty of intent and execution that communicates a sense of utility and pleasure in its usage. While the polar opposite characterizations of design give insight into the concerns that go into these definitions, there are points of convergences where anomalous categories exist, things which transgress the binary divide and hold a particular interest for me because it points to a particularly strong and richer design point of view. These critical points exist in the different facets of design and I will outline clearly how they have been played out and resolved throughout design history.
Technology (the logical and aesthetic language of design)
The triumph of the industrial revolution ushered in the first incarnation of the break down of what is arguably the most visible of these dichotomies (form vs. function). Since the separation of art and craft during the Renaissance, the practice of design (i.e. the process of planning and executing products that have functionality as its primary interest) has had a separation with the motivations of art for art’s sake. Thus the world was filled with artworks unsurpassed in their value as objects of ornament and cultural productions and objects that were highly mundane but functional. However, the advancement of engineering as a profession together with the advancement of mechanical and electrical technologies lead to a proliferation of structures and objects that whose beauty were a strange and unexpected side-effect of their mechanical efficiencies. It is especially notable that these devices were not intended to be objects of design, or designed to be objects of desire, or intended to be anything other than its explicit function deriving from its compliance with the laws of physics and scientific experimentation. Nothing could be farther from our conception of design as an integration of a completely rational and objective object into the sphere of well designed objects. Thus giant electric generating turbines, engines, and industrial artifacts became the inspirational driving force behind the Futurist movements, Le Corbusier’s reconception of life as a mechanical problem and ultimately to the Bauhaus principle of using the powers of industrial production in the service of beauty. So we see a constant oscillation between the different purposes of technology and its relationship with beauty, personal expression and design. Initially technology has, to quote Richard Buchanan in his essay, Declaration of Design: Rhetoric, Argument and Demonstration in Design Practice, provided the logos of the design argument. Design which Buchanan contends is a “rhetorical activity that relies on technology to be the backbone of a design argument […] In essence, the problem of technological reasoning in design is the way the designer manipulates materials and processes to solve practical problems of human activity”( Margolin, 98). This activity might sound rather banal and certainly technology has been initially viewed as the mere enabler of design thinking, the means through which ideas ould be executed to their full completion. The sudden break in this interpretation occurs at the onset of modernism where we shift from viewing technology as a means to execute design to the embodiment of good design. It is not the way to achieve design, it is good design. The engineering and scientific process is then cast as a valid design methodology one that when wedded with previously ‘artistic’ domain of design has produced stunning results. This movement evolved from genuine acceptance of the nature of technology, the celebration of the machine and an awareness of the present that was radically different from the past. It is even arguable that this respect for the objective and self effacing design methodologies of the engineer that address problems at their fundamental physical and compositional underpinnings has trickled into the prevailing value in art criticism. The art critic Choicy highlights the importance of form as the logical consequence of technique and the value of technique and construction in the creative process. The architect and designer is expected to make an educated appraisal of the problem before him after which the form of the building would logically follow from the technical means at his disposal. This casts design solutions and gives it a claim to ethos, a rightful place that is not merely a superficial indulgence. This paradigm in design thinking holds particularly true today with the technological revolution and the miniaturization of technologies and the silicon revolution. With Moore’s Law and a continuous packing of circuit elements increasing by a factor of 2^(1/2)every year it is hard to say what new paradigms of design thinking could be achieved as a result of this revolution. However, technology has served both as design inspiration and design enabler. It has inspired many an art movement, Futurism and Cubism to name a few. Thus it has been able to simultaneously hold these disparate categorizations gracefully. Today, technology at its rawest is hardly accessible to the general public. Design has taken equations, scientific formulae, and engineering diagrams to tangible entities that provide delight, utility and gain public acceptance.
Social
Products have an undeniable ability to change lives. A professor and I were having a conversation yesterday and my watch, like most digital Casios, has been set to beep every hour on the hour. “Is it seven already”, he inquired. I had informed him that I set my watch 4 minutes fast just to make sure that I get to my lectures on time. After hearing this he expressed regret that he had recently purchased a new cell phone with an automatic time set-up being fed from an atomic clock sent through a digital signal. He jokingly said that it felt like being trapped in a universe were time was set out in unchangeable increments. My Casio afforded me the ultimate power over my destiny – the time set-up button.
Design has a way of coordinating lives and lifestyles. It integrates objects into social activities. A successful design is a conflation of the technological or artistic devices that enable it, the current social conditions that choose to accept a certain design point of view. It is a process of bestowing things with added value. Design links the economic to the cultural. It is a way of restoring meaning to an array of simulacra, combating the presence of meaningless objects. This goal is at odds with the present phase of the capitalist development where market conditions are dictated by the desire and buying patterns of consumers. Thus more theoretical modernist design tenets are at odds with the anonymous developments in technique industrial production and consumerism. Our society has created an infrastructure where the designer has massive reach and influence because of the power of mass production. This is at odds with the design of high culture which often seeks to be a cultural minority. The task of the designer is a difficult one for he or she must create meaningful products in a world where millions of people could potentially be using their products. The power of multiples and the masses has an ability to bring design to its lowest common denominator as evinced by the questionable products on the shelves of Walmart today. The designer caters to a market with certain tastes dictated by psychological, social and historical patterns. We often see designers foisting their visions upon a seemingly unknowing public and while it might be an act of bestowing normative value onto objects more mechanisms are at play here.Design is architectonic and has the ability to coordinate various modes of production giving it order and purpose. Design provides the methodology behind the thought of idea it organizes all levels of production and coordinates human production and activity at various levels.
Culture
“As long as a universal high level of taste has not been achieved, we cannot count on German arts and crafts making their influence effectively felt abroad.”—Hermann Muthesius (Gorman, 89)
The development of products that gain the appreciation of a universally valid, unfailing good taste has been a goal of most designers. This was one of the motivations for Muthesius to call for standardization and the acceptance of industrial production to aid in the creation of objects. However, the process of achieving a convincing stylistic expression has often been overused by some designers to gain competitive advantage by superficial means. Guy Julien, in his book, Material Culture argues that “the fundamental problem is the seemingly inexorable tendency of the excellence of material culture toward attenuation, superficiality and even disappearance.” The problem of creating products that maintain a sense of integrity in the face of powerful shaping material culture resurfaces again. Cultural capital which is the ability to distinguish between the cultivated and the vague seems to be one of the things most designers keep in mind during the design process. Higher cultural capital often suggested a more cultivated or civilized background and this is why certain designer objects are cast as expensive almost extravagant useless things saved only by their claim to high cultural capital. Thus well designed objects of today are often turning objects into highly desirable elitist artifacts. Ettore Sottsass sought to break this tradition of elitism turning to the creation of more well rounded objects rather than creating indulgent and esoteric high culture designs.
Another example of the appearance of self-indulgent designer’s products is the Juicy Salif created by the designer Philippe Starck. Earlier there was a natural evolution of functional products whose main design vocabulary is that of their ability for utility, how did a completely useless object like the juicy salif come into being and much notoriety in the world of design objects? Starck himself has been known to have said “this is not a very good lemon squeezer: but that’s its not its only function. I had this idea that when a couple gets married it’s the sort of thing they would get as a wedding present” ( Julier, 68) This sheds light on the value of cultural capital; the designer himself has explicitly said that the lemon squeezer has problems with its functionality, but it is viewed almost as an art product, a completely useless artifact that gains public interest because of the intangible.
Despite all these divergent and convergent distinctions in design, we realize that it is nothing but the process of clear articulation and conception of a device that fulfills its objective whether it is to function as an object of utility or pleasure. Mechanical, formal compositional, social and cultural ramifications of objects all filter into the design and help give it its multi-faceted identity. This process of selection and creation with the end user ultimately in mind helps clarify previously distorted, obscure or esoteric knowledge and disciplines into a language that can be understood by everyone. Design is no longer concerned with just the object but with the totality of different infrastructures that surround and contain it. Like a well versed argument well designed objects not only achiever their goals as tangible entities in the world but have far more long lasting ramifications into our social lives, histories and identities for they reflect our rational, ethical and emotional desires. Design is therefore never a compromise between opposite dichotomies but rather a dynamic and pluralistic reflection of our own multifaceted humanity.
Works Cited:
Buchanan, Richard, Margolin, Victor ed. (1986) Declaration by Design: Rhetoric, Argument, and Demonstration in Design Practice Design Discourse, University of Ilinois Press
Julier, Guy (2000) The Culture of Design, Sage Publications London
Muthesius, Hermann, Van de Velde, Henry Gorman, Carma ed. (2003) Statements from the Werkbund Conference of 1914. The Industrial Design Reader, Allworth Press
