the evidence of intimacy

PB— I

E V I D E N C E

THE

OF

I N T I

M A C Y

II— III

E V I D E N C E

THE

OF

I N T I

M A C Y

CONTENTS

FORWARD VIIINTERCON-

NECTED 03TECHNO BOD-

IES 19EFFECTS ON

INTIMACY 031

IV— V

BENEFIT OF DISCONNECT

35SEAMLESS

CONNECTION 43

WORKING WITHIN

THE CONSUMP-TION 49

T H E E V I D E N C E O F I N T I

M A C Y

VI— VII

As I sit and ref lect on my existence as a social being, it is difficult to ignore the shift that has defined our current generation. This shift being the development of an intercon-nected environment that has become a platform of constant information and production. Inside this environment, it seems as if today's users are living two separate lives parallel to each other. The user's physical social interac-tions’ importance, has become less necessary than those created online. Those living in this split persona are becoming completely enveloped within both the physical

FORWARD


M A C Y

and technologically social interac-tive environment, and the importance of creating and finding oneself within these realms

The advancement in global intercon-nectivity, social connections, and the internet’s unbelievable social gizmos have generated another dimension of human interaction. This new dimension—full of social architecture that ranges from the early dwellings of E-Mail to today's modern(-ist) advances in social media and community based for-mats—is becoming (that is if it has not already become) the most grati-fying venue for social interaction and development. This new venue has taught those who have difficulty in the physical social sphere, what it means to understand one's “true-self ” with dyadic relationships, the anonymous,•that anonymity allows

•Often reffered to as Trolls, for their unfiltered presence.

VIII— IX

an unprecedented personal vocal reach, and an uncanny amount of data collection allowing every and all to understand almost everything about anyone and everything. This realm that we now all develop within has created a mental shift, one that requires immediate valida-tion from products and interactions. If what it is that we are using takes a long enough time, the mind will discard it and move on to the next object of consumption.••

In parallel with the advance of this interconnected environment, the physical environment (specifically speaking to art and design) has reached a place where the creative process has to push boundaries unlike ever before due to the imme-diacy presented by the interconnection. Today's artists and

••Now, I know that these are sweeping generalizations on my

part but, from my point of view, this extreme view is my reality.


M A C Y

designers have to create work that grabs the viewer by the neck and wrangles them into the content. This is the only way for designers to convince the viewer that what it is that they are consuming is worth their time.• This constant connec-tion to visual media today allows for styles and movements to f lourish with ease, it is also the reason behind their even quicker demise. This should come with no surprise when anyone can type a title into a popular search engine and find the result of that digital manifestation in under 0.39 of a second.••

The immediacy of access to any-thing today has built a framework in which designers and artists must think about the way in which work will be received, as well as how long it will be relevant. I believe that no

•A majority of the time it really isn’t worth anyone’s time, it's

just a consumer product.

X — XI

••Google search of a Google search acquired in under .39 of

a second


M A C Y

matter how much these individuals are driven to create through pas-sion, in the back of their head the viewer response and relevancy is inevitably looming.

Due to this constant visual con-sumption and the immediacy of access, the interest in viewing art as platform for personal self discovery has diminished. "To an ever greater degree the work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed for reproducibility. From a photo-graphic negative for example one can make any numbered prints; to ask for the authentic prints made makes no sense. But the instant the criterion of authenticity ceases to be applicable to artistic production, the total function of art is reversed. Instead of being based on ritual, it is based on another practice-politics."1

1Marquard, Smith, Visual Culture: Experiences in Visual

Culture (Abingdon: Taylor & Francis, 2006), 119.

XII—

XIII


M A C Y

XIV— XV

•From here on out I will refer to design fragmentors as DFs

••DFs are the origin of design, they are what created the field

and what will be the field for as long as our society needs to buy and consume objects.

Fine art has become another source of replicable visual consumption much like what publicly accessible design always has been. This visual consumption is where my argu-ments about design as practice and design as art, opens. The Design Fragmentors welcome the shift of the interconnected environment; this constant public consumption is what keeps the food on their table.•

The viewer today prefers to con-sume work like a Google search or a meme—quick and easy. DFs have been in the background creating these experiences since the begin-ning.•• As society moves forward in this generation of social immediacy, the constant need for consumption is effervescent. It is forcing the DFs to think on their feet and push


M A C Y

boundaries faster and with more efficacy. This is an incredible time for DFs to make a living, it's like taking candy from millions of babies all at one time.

Design Artists, on the other hand, have a different path in this inter-connected consumer world.••• In the words of Stuart Bailey who has an interesting opinion on this point, ‘In cultures where the engaged, involved, responsible end of graphic design has been more or less obliter-ated by the dictates and confines of marketing and PR, an enlarging pool of intellectually-inclined gradu-ate level designers end up, quite logically, creating their own work’.2 The DAs aren’t rejecting the interconnected environment, quite the opposite. These artists are

••• Design Artists will be referred to by the first letters of

themselves; DA

2Stuart, Bailey, Wonder Years, ed. Lisette Smits

( Amsterdam: Roma Publications and ArtEZ Press, 2008.)

XVI—

XVII

working within design’s fundamen-tals to create work that forces the public to ask questions and think about the content they are consum-ing. They work in the sphere of social context because it is here that they know best. So like the design fragmentors, the Design Artists are utilizing similar frameworks to create work that connects the public to their consumption. This connec-tion is mainly the attempt at waking the public up to the information that is being force fed to them by the DFs. Forcing information is not the goal, creating thought provoking designed matter, is. So while work-ing with the understanding that they themselves are the consumers, DAs move forward with a desire to make something worth consuming.

I believe that within this information age there is a need to use the mental-ity of the current interconnected


M A C Y

mindset, to reformat the consump-tion of fine art and design. Does this idea of global interconnectivity form a new process of creative thinking? Is there a need to slow down the mentality or embrace it? My inten-tion is—through the viewpoint of a graphic designer— to evoke thought and questions for the consumers and designers who have developed within the age of the internet. To attempt to answer the questions I have pro-posed—and navigate this realm of the interconnected mind—I will break down what it means to be living in an age of digitally social environments. Along with the effects the internet has on us as social beings, I will explain how these developments have been shaped by graphic design, and how graphic designers have been shaped as well.

XVIII—

XIX


M A C Y

XX— 01

INTERCON-NECTED

As it stands today, there is a genera-tion that can’t remember what it was like before the internet. I happen to be at the tail end of that generation, meaning that I have a very fuzzy memory of what it was once like to not be interconnected. This instant connection at almost all time affects greatly the way in which most everyone today develops a relation to everything. I will begin this chap-ter with a dialogue of a typical day for myself;

As I open my eyes, roll over, and stretch, my hands have already—without any conscious decision


M A C Y

making—latched onto becoming connected to the world. I let out a yawn, swipe my thumb, and away I go less than one minute back into the physical realm, and I have started my day of consumption. I spend the first 30 minutes of my morning hast-ily skimming through all my major social medias to find out what it is that I have missed, this is followed by empty minded f lowing through Instagram liking photos of moun-tains… or some well lit photo of an espresso. This action finally stops when the realization of time shocks me back into reality. I get up after this, switch to listening to a podcast about politics, or art, and tell myself that ‘this is okay, at least I’m learn-ing useful information about what's important to me.’ But really I just can’t seem to be able start my morn-ing without being totally enveloped in the connection. I continue this dance until I reach my destination

02— 03

for the majority of the day, this place is where I produce work as a graphic designer and my mode of content consumption f lips into content pro-duction. It doesn’t really matter what I’m making and for whom in this sense—it could be an art catalog or a soda can—I’m still making something that will force the gen-eral public to stop what they are doing and escape from reality and consume something that has no real necessity. After hours of content creation I switch back to consumer. I spend more time on the internet, surrounded by virtual objects that are being force fed to me. This con-tinues into my bed where still, I am mashing my thumbs around on my phone, staring into the soul of what-ever social media platform that has regurgitated generative empty and useless content.

I think that it is safe to say that this


M A C Y

all probably sounds pretty familiar to anyone who has been categorized within the Millennial generation. I would go as far to say that a decent portion of all generations leading back to X can identify with the actions that I come to call my daily routine. Obviously there are going to be some huge differences between my routine and others. But there are two specific periods of time in my day that I think would match accu-rately with many who may be reading this. The first of these actions being the moment you open your eyes and the first thing you grab is your phone. Secondly, as you begin to doze and the f luorescent screen of your cell phone illuminates your face in a dark room.

Being interconnected to the world and all that surrounds us digitally, has evolved into a tertiary limb that we can't live without. “79 percent of

04— 05

smart-phone users check their device within 15 minutes of waking up every morning”3 these users have now developed compulsive tendencies to check messages and notifications. No one can imagine a day without any source of connec-tion or consumption—it’s just unfathomable—we must be dis-tracted at all times. Can you imagine if global connection went down indefinitely? We would be thrown into some apocalyptic scene where people wander the streets unaware of their social presence, unable to find their way home, taxi drivers would be useless and no one would know how public transit works ‘I can’t buy my bus pass from my phone? This is unbelievable!’•

3Nir, Eyal, Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products

(Westminster: Penguin, 2006), 1.•

This probably is very untrue, but very amusing.


M A C Y

06— 07

As the internet has shaped the rela-tionships we have with our surroundings, so has our idea of self; self-image, self-awareness, and self-actualization. This connectivity has allowed anyone to explore their true inner self with relative ano-nymity through a disconnection with the physical world. For refer-ence on the idea of “self ” that I am referring, I have attached a page out of Jacobi Jolande’s book: the psy-chology of C.G, Jung; and introduction with illustrations.

A stand alone description within this text states that

A SENSE OF SELF


M A C Y

Jolande, Jacobi, The Psychology of C.G. Jung; an Introduction with Illustrations (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1973), 128-129.

08— 09

In this way there arises a consciousness which is no longer imprisoned in the petty, oversensitive, per-sonal world of the ego, but participants feeling in the wider world of objective interests. This widened consciousness is no longer that touchy, egotistical bundle...it is a function of relationship to the world of objects bringing the indi-vidual into communion with the world at large.4

The freedom of self expression described in this text has been extensively written about as an experience that is not easily achieved. In the world previous to the implementation of the online interconnection, finding out what your ‘self ’ actually was took a lot of inner ref lection.

4Ibid.


M A C Y

Post-interconnected world, you have the ability to bypass the issues of finding self and express yourself with relative ease. The anonymity of an online presence grants every-one the ability to experiment with different personalities and perso-na's. The repercussions of these experimentations have little to no effect on those conducting the exploratory experiments. When one attempts to express a new self in a public arena, you are faced with the chances of social backlash. It is that moment in grade school when you had decided that you wanted to explore a new style, nickname, hair-do, what have you, and you had to mentally prepare yourself for the possible outcomes. In this situation you were attempting to explore what self was and how you experienced it in your physical environment. There was a good chance of even your friends not accepting your explora-

10— 11

tions, you just had to be willing for that outcome. Online, however, this experimentation is cushioned by the fact that no one is in your physical sphere, you can decide against it at any moment and no one will really be able to affect your well being. This is arguably the strongest reason how the interconnected envi-ronment has made for a greater understanding of oneself— by facili-tating welcoming communities to those experimenting with who they think they may be.


M A C Y

12— 13

TECHNO BODIES

When we step through the screen into virtual communi-ties, we reconstruct our identities on the other side of the looking glass. This recon-struction is our cultural work in progress… Many of the institutions that used to bring people together—a Main Street, a union hall, a town meeting—no longer work as before. Many people spend most of their day alone at the screen of a television or com-puter. Meanwhile, social beings that we are, we are trying to retribalize and the computer is playing a central role. We correspond with each other through electronic


M A C Y

Sherry, Turkle, Life on the screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet (New York: Touchstone, 1995), 176.

14— 15

mail and contribute to elec-tronic bulletin boards and mailing list; We join interest groups whose participants include people from all over the world. Our rootedness has attenuated.5

This quote was written in 1995 in Sherry Turkle's book life on the screen, and given the addition of social media platforms since then (ones like Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Reddit, etc.) it still applies to this day and age, nothing is much differ-ent. Turkels idea of the need to retribalize is especially interesting in this interconnected world of social media platforms. A majority of these social places are geared towards re-grouping large amounts of like-minded individuals within a common ideological meeting place.

5Ibid.


M A C Y

It is clear—by the success of these social platforms—that we as individ-uals are not only trying to reconnect with each other and share experi-ence as a common group, but are searching for an easier substitution for the face-to-face interaction. These vast digital communities are where we now go to tell our stories, our gossip, to find our news, and even connect with our elders. The “tribal” like connections we create online absolutely ref lect our needs to connect daily with our common social kin (if you will). This idea is made stronger by the research of Caroline Haythornthwaite in her journal social networks and internet connectivity effects and the studies they conducted with students;

These combinations of net-work studies and interviews help address a question that is often asked about online interac-

16— 17


M A C Y

18— 19

tions: Are online ties as ‘real’ as offline ties? From LEEP• it looks like they are: online-only ties are charac-terized by the same kinds of interactions, the litera-ture tells us are found for offline ties.” Friends...com-municate more frequently, about more different things, and via more media...Interviewees report deeply held friendships, as well as working relation-ships, with other LEEP students even though the relationships are main-tained online...Other studies of LEEP also reveal that many of the attributes of offline communities adhere, including bonding to the group as a whole, and development of common history and folk-lore...Overall we find that, when asked, online partici-

•Library Education Experimental Program, at the Graduate

School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign


M A C Y

pants themselves report strongly held, close ties with others that are as important to them as any offline tie.6

The fragmentation of our connec-tions to each other physically has held true since the implementation of the interconnected world, and it has even become the norm. It seems as though our physical common places have become less about fostering connections with each other and more just about functional environments for us to exist digitally. (I’ll give a couple examples of this in my life.) Take the common corner coffee shop, this was once a place of friendly encounters and conversations. A place where friends used to go, sit, and discuss life together before

6Caroline, Haythornthwaite, Social Networks and Internet

Connectivity Effects. Information (Communication & Society 8, no. 2, 2005) 125-47.

20— 21

starting their day, or while enjoy-ing a lovely weekend mid-morning. This cafe ideal has taken a slight detour since the time of favorite NBC 90’s sitcom coffee lounge. Central Perk. W hat you will f ind today is a similar shop, full of all the typical coffee shop noises and even a conversation or two, the major difference is the amount of people sipping coffee with head-phones on staring idly into their laptops soul. Dozens of strangers sitting rather close to each other, neither mentally anywhere near their physical selves.•

Here is another example that most may have encountered recently; the bar/pub/watering hole. This envi-ronment is still a very lively place to meet strangers to have wonderful conversations with, but you will be

•Sadly bleak existence…experiences may vary.•


M A C Y

7Walter, Scott, The Psychology of Advertising in Theory and

Practice; a Simple Exposition of the Principles of Psychology in Their Relation to Successful Advertising (Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1921). 271.

•Solution: just talk to a stranger, it's nice sometimes*

surprised at the amount of people surrounding you, staring into the eyes of their cell phones rather than the eyes of a human. They are ignor-ing the physical world but still in need of the constant connection. An ever more common activity by these individuals is to be engaged in some form of dating application, f lipping through images of potential matches, fully ignoring the fact that there are actual people in the same room as they are inhabiting…proba-bly doing the same thing as them, wishing for some sort of human connection. Psychologists define this action as a habitual behavior, one that is habitual and automati-cally triggered by the situational cues of their environment, rather than conscious intentions.7•

22— 23


M A C Y

24— 25

Due to the internet's ability to facili-tate areas of social commonplaces, it much easier to find those whom you associate with. In Relationship Formation on the Internet: What's the Big Attraction, Katelyn McKenna and her associates discuss the ways in which the internet has facilitated these gathering places. They make the claim that it is sig-nificantly more difficult to foster relationships in the physical world, when compatability with others is so much easier to find online. Their research goes into the facts about the time it takes to “get to know one another” 8

EFFECTS ON INTIMACY


M A C Y

But, if you are to log into your favor-ite social platform and begin a conversation within a stranger, there is already an immediate social barrier that has never exhibited in that arena. Both yourself and the online stranger have an understand-ing of each other's likes and commonalities based on the simple fact that you are engaging each other within a place of common interest. The special qualities that an online connection brings to a relationship with another interconnected person, facilitates the revealing of a true inner-self, compared to moments of physical interactions where you're more likely to withhold a majority of your true traits.9

Earlier in my writings I mention

8Katelym Y.A. Mckenna, Amie S.Green and Marce E. J.

Gleason, Relationship Formation on the Internet: What's the Big Attraction? (Journal of Social Issues J Social Issues 58, no. 1 2002) 12.

9Ibid.

26— 27


M A C Y

28— 29

the bar goer who is feeding through some social dating platform instead of interacting with those around him. Many of these online dating platforms allow the user to break the commonality barrier much quicker than, say, a first date with a complete stranger. These dating applications immediately show common interests and friends you share on other social gathering platforms. This ease in breaking that initial barrier is an obvious appeal with the use of an online dating/social platform. It is a hazy understanding that your changes at a successful physical relationship with this person are possible. The disappearance of these barriers online have made “self-disclosure” that much easier; easing the destruction of the personal infor-mation barrier.10

10Katelym Y.A. Mckenna, Amie S.Green and Marce E. J.

Gleason, Relationship Formation on the Internet: What's the Big Attraction? (Journal of Social Issues J Social Issues 58, no. 1 2002) 11.


M A C Y

The need to tear down this social barrier is digital commonplace, all platforms have it and we almost expect to have a common tie revealed to us when interacting online. If there seems to be no con-nection, we pass on the chance for a relationship. Why waste your time when there are thousands of other chances for personal connections the click of a mouse, or the swipe of a thumb?

30— 31

After the early internet, which had ‘home pages’ to ‘surf to’–distinct locations within a geography–the social networking site and its user-generated content transforms and includes the formerly dispersed homepages into a single surface. Inside this sur-face, worlds exist in worlds, scenes in scenes, friends in friends, based on the reciprocal addition of more surface and more doorways to your friends and your friends’ friends surface as a mutually empowering social act. On

SEAMLESS CONNECTION


M A C Y

this form of organized activity rests the mac-ro-scale corporate appropriation of its pro-jected revenues...in the continuum of surfaces, the mechanisms that define the relations between products, needs and values are trans-formed...The result is the simultaneous abolition of distinctions between pro-duction and consumption: when products generate needs, when needs trigger speculative value and when values are embodied by products, we can no longer speak of pure consumption, as con-sumption itself becomes a productive force...con-sumption directly creates new needs.11

11 Metahaven. White Night Before A Manifesto (Eindhoven:

Onomatopee, 2008), 5.

32— 33

Referring back to the DFs; their challenges now include having to create content that bears this new reality of consumption in mind. The connection, commonality, the hook•,these are things that must be included in their product. This hook is why we now can't live without being connected. The platforms that consume the most amount of people every day didn’t just happen to create this interaction by accident. These desirable experiences were designed with the sole intention of business. Advertising such products is unnecessary because of the addic-tive design equation which compels us to never leave, or want to leave.

•For many products, forming habits is an imperative for survival.

As infinite distractions compete for our attention, companies are learning to pastor novel tactics to stay relevant in users’ minds. Today, amassing millions of users is no longer good enough. Companies increasingly find that their economic value is a function of the strength of the habits they create. (Hooked:how to build habit forming products, p1.),


M A C Y

Effective brands transcend logos, advertising campaigns, and social media presence. Sure, images and messages are important, but the real power in brand today lies in creating dynamic, meaningful relationships with customers that evolve over time. The most successful brands start an ongoing dialogue with people that—through a com-pelling mix of seamlessly connected products, ser-vices, experiences, spaces, and digital interactions— fosters curiosity, trial, love, and loyalty.

At IDEO, we...create multi-faceted experiences that connect people to brands in harmonious, meaningful, and emotional ways.”12

12Ideo.com

34— 35


M A C Y

•This probably is very untrue, but very amusing.

36— 37

Taken directly from the global design agency IDEO’s website, this bullet statement about their process describes simply how they make themselves—and their clients—a great amount of money designing our need to consume. They are tapping into the interconnected community, they know exactly how it is we use this environment and navigate the process of connecting us seamlessly, as they stated. IDEO is a content producer that knows the need for not totally polluting our brains with nonsense. This company words itself like it does, because as I have stated previously, we live in a time where content and information is boundless. So, DFs like IDEO have to navigate this constant f lux of information—and navigate it appropriately—in order to successfully capture the atten-tion of the connected users. This is the duty of the designer as producer


M A C Y

these days, to create solutions to problems the consumers didn’t know they even had.

38— 39

BENEFIT OF DISCONNECT

Disconnecting from the intercon-nected environment is becoming more and more like a fantasy, than something that is actually a possibil-ity. Even when we think we are not apart of the digital environment, there is a good chance that a piece of technology is gathering information about us and updating our digital persona. So true disconnection is almost impossible moving forward into the future. What I’m going to attempt to argue here isn't that being connected is bad and we should all feel awful for it, more for the idea that maybe we could take a step back and think about how we perceive


M A C Y

this connection. I am pressing the idea of a mental pause. Instead of immediately being interconnected as you wake, take a moment to think, contemplate, ref lect on the experi-ence of starting your morning. Or at lunch, sit alone, don’t grab for your phone in order to mindlessly navi-gate your social presence. Sit there and observe, think, or even forget your surroundings. Your environ-ment is still collecting information and constantly connected, but your mind has the chance to disconnect.

In the 1960’s the Situationists•

would conduct open-ended experi-ments aimed at scrambling mental expectations. For example, they would wander aimlessly through

•The Situationist International (1957–1972) was a relatively

small yet influential Paris-based group that had its origins in the avant garde artistic tradition. The situationists are best known for their radical political theory and their influence on the May 1968 student and worker revolts in France. The Situationist International (SI) published a journal called Internationale Situationniste (IS) *Jan D. Matthews, “An introduction to the Situationists,” The Anarchist Library. 2005, www.anti-politics.com*

40— 41


M A C Y

42— 43

busy streets and deliberately create obstacles for themselves by rear-ranging the furniture in their homes. Their intention was to ignore labor saving devices in order to live with time as a restriction, it was a rejection of the relentless spectacle of consumption.12 This may seem like a rather radical approach to unplugging oneself from the consumption, but the Situationist's were able to under-stand the benefits of being present, understanding that even the most mundane of moments had their unique qualities. This is a tool that we as an interconnected community have—for the most part–forgotten how to utilize. Silence has created situational stress for most, at one point silence was the time for a pause and thought, but it is now

12 Vienne , Véronique, The Situationist Spectacle.

(Véronique Vienne. March 2000). http://www.veroniquevi-enne.com/article/the-situationist-spectacle.)


M A C Y

saturated with consumption and interconnection.

44— 45

Designers, as I have noted, are at the front of creating and manipulat-ing this world of consumption. We are the ones who dictate what trends move forward, what is successfully being consumed, and how it will be consumed in the present and future. This reality encompasses both, the Design Fragmentor and Design Artist. We feed off creating, con-nections and effective experiences, and it is through the public's need to consume content and be connected, that we thrive. Although, we as designers must constantly consider the immediacy of a message and how it begins to connect the viewer and

WORKING WITHIN THE

CONSUMPTION


M A C Y

their interests. More recently, the interfaces created by the designer has brought in an unbelievable amount of usable data for the prac-tice to implement into their creative processes. By utilizing the now constant need to be connected to our digital environment, our use of the interconnected environment is col-lecting information about us that informs future designed objects.• At this very moment, entities like IDEO are taking the data that we are creating to ideate new products, ones we don’t even know we want

•“New systems are using rich data, and big data. This is data

acquired from the larger world. It is our movement patterns, buying habits, associations, and travel routines. It comes from a network of cloud services, traffic sensors, weather sensors, social networks, public and personal cameras. It is real-time as well as historical. And it exists in volume. Massive volume.Today we are creating an expanding array of experiences driven by machines that are essentially hidden from the user. They are services that run in the cloud. They are small programs that run silently on our devices, in our homes, in our offices. They feed not so much on direct user input, but on the abstracts of traffic sensors, weather sensors, social networks, public and personal cameras, and hundreds of other compo-nents gleaning our patterns of work, travel and living—these are the cues driving new invisible products in their silent toil. They work from a dataset that is rich and articulate, and the output often comes as direct action. (Mark Rolston, “The Next Era of Designers Will Use Data as Their Medium”. Wired.com, November 27, 14.http://www.wired.com/2014/11/rise-of-data-artists/.)

46— 47


M A C Y

48— 49

although our data tells them we need it. A more recent example of this data usage and creating experiences based off our connected experi-ences; Susan Sellers•• spoke at the Walker Art Center about the new Met logo implementation. Her talk consisted of examples of the new logo in use, the criticism it received via social platforms online, but the most interesting part was how deep her and the entire team working on this project used data to inf luence their design choices and future plans for the museum. This approach to a design solution is an obvious choice when the data is so easily available, and seems to bring the most safe solutions to a design decision moving forward. What happened to gut reactions? Sadly as DFs are, and as they always have been; they are only creating objects to ensure a

••Founding partner at 2x4, and most recently Design

Director at The Met


M A C Y

greater accuracy in implementing new ideas into the connected environment.

With all this data and understand-ing of the interconnected environment, Design Artists are taking all of the systematic aspects of a design practice and using them to facilitate and execute artistic ideas. A unique application of this shows itself within the core con-cepts of relational aesthetics•and conditional design.•• Both modes of creative thought open up a broader way of approaching Graphic Designs and how it applies its sys-tems and theories into an artistic practice. These applications put the user/consumer in the foreground of whatever it is that the designer has created. The purpose is to allow the

• Aesthetic Theory Consisting in judging artworks on the basis

of the inter-human relations which they represent, produce or prompt. (Bourriaud, Nicolas. Relational Aesthetics (Dijon: Les Presses Du Réel, 2002), 112)

50— 51

consumer an understanding into what it is that they are experiencing, rather than attempting to create a seamless connection to the object.•••When communication evolves through ideas that attempt to appropriately utilize the consum-er's, consumption, the relationship between the designer and user then facilitate a holistic experience for both parties. This holistic experi-ence is investigated by the DAs through the systems and frame-

•• Process: The process is the product. The most important

aspects of a process are time, relationship and change. The process produces formations rather than forms. We search for unexpected but correlative, emergent patterns. Even though a process has the appearance of objectivity, we realize the fact that it stems from subjective intentions.

Logic: Logic is our tool. Logic is our method for accentuating the ungraspable. A clear and logical setting emphasizes that which does not seem to fit within it. We use logic to design the conditions through which the process can take place. Design conditions using intelligible rules. Avoid arbitrary randomness. Difference should have a reason. Use rules as constraints. Constraints sharpen the perspective on the process and stimulate play within the limitations.

Input: The input is our material. Input engages logic and activates and influences the process. Input should come from our external and complex environment: nature, society and its human interactions. (Maurer, Luna, Edo Paulus, Jonathan Puckey, and Roel Wouters. Conditional Design . Workbook (Amsterdam: Valiz. 2013) ii)

•••The common thought for DFs when approaching a designed

experience


M A C Y

works of design.

The question is, however, whether we should inter-pret graphic designers’ tendency to work within the context of art as a political position. The labyrinth—the ideological gloom—within which design finds itself is characterized, ironically enough, by the fact that the possibilities of designing intrinsic values are nowhere greater than within the consumer soci-ety...the consumer research industry has demonstrated the ways in which our expe-rience of an object, and our subsequent interpretation, is shaped by the context that frames our encounter...design remains ‘con-demned’ to a fundamental relationship to commercial culture no matter what one’s political position. What can a designer do if even the intrinsic value of

52— 53


M A C Y

54— 55

design in electro-lands communicative qualities are also employed by a culture that serves exclusively commercial aims? Certainly does not alter the situation by shutting themselves off from a commercial reality and seeking refuge in the cultural context.13

In order for the DAs approach to a design solution to effectively push the boundaries of what design can be, falls back onto whom they make their money from. As the quote above states, these designers must attempt to step outside of the safety from cultural institutions* (foot-note: museums and educational institutions whom actively push the DA mindset) What this means is the actual mindset of the consumer has to shift from an unconsciously con-

13Lisette, Smits, The Most Beautiful Swiss Books, the Present

Issue ‘ Why do Graphic Designers Like to Make (So Many) Art Books? (Zürich: Federal Ministry Culture Bern, 2009.).


M A C Y

necting body, to thinking about what it is that they are constantly consuming. In the past, there have been few DAs that have attempted to take the application of the design practice and shift the public mind. Jan Van Toorn•told Eye magazine in the 90’s “Their unapologetic realism is underpinned by a deep strain of social idealism (Referring to the DAs). They address viewers not as consumers with tiny attention spans who must be perpetually enter-tained and f lattered if they are not to grow bored, but as critical, think-ing individuals who can be expected to take an informed and skeptical interest in the circumstances of their world.This is the front of all the DAs minds, the idea that people are much smarter than the producers

•Jan van Toorn, born in 1932, is one of Holland's most

influential graphic designers. Central to his approach is the application of content-based strategies, resulting in a design practice as a form of visual journalism. Opposite to the more self-contained designs of the modernist tradition, Van Toorn is always striving for designs that are open to different ways of seeing. (vimeo.com/69003518)

56— 57

give them credit for. It is in lieu of this that our current physical and interconnected environments are full of mindless social spaces and content. The DFs and creators of this content are telling us how we interact with our environment rather than creating content which allows us to ask questions.

If you want to know what's really going on in a society or ideology, follow the money. If money is flowing to advertising instead of to musicians, journalists, and artists, then a society is more concerned with manipulation than with truth or beauty. If content is worthless, then people will start to become emp-ty-headed and contentless. The combination of hive mind and advertising has resulted in a new kind of social contract. The basic idea of this contract is that


M A C Y

authors, journalists, musi-cians, and artists are encouraged to treat the fruits of their intellects and imaginations as fragments to be given without pay to the hive mind. Reciprocity takes the form of self-pro-motion. Culture is to become precisely nothing but advertising14

Formulating our own understanding of what it means to be thinking and interacting within today’s age of global interconnection it the true reason for DAs and a movement towards self-awareness.

14Todd, Lambrix, “The Serfdom of Crowds. Todd Lambrix”

Isssue,2010. https://issuu.com/lambrixt/docs/the_serfdom_of_crowds.

58— 59


M A C Y

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bailey,Stuart. Wonder Years, Edited by Lisette Smits. Amsterdam: Roma Publications and ArtEZ Press, 2008.

Eyal, Nir, hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products. Westminster: Penguin, 2006, 1.

Haythornthwaite, Caroline. Social Networks and Internet Connectivity Effects. Information, Communication & Society 8, no. 2, 2005 125-47.

60— 61

Jacobi, Jolande. The Psychology of C.G. Jung; an Introduction with Illustrations. New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1973.

Lambrix, Todd. “The Serfdom of Crowds. Todd Lambrix”, 2010. Accessed March 24, 2016. https://issuu.com/lambrixt/docs/the_serfdom_of_crowds.

Lisette, Smits, The Most Beautiful Swiss Books, the Present Issue ‘ Why do Graphic Designers Like to Make (So Many) Art Books?. Zürich: Federal Ministry Culture Bern, 2009.

Matthews, Jan D. “An introduction to the Situationists.” The Anarchist Library. 2005. www.anti-politics.com.


M A C Y

Mckenna, Katelyn Y. A., Amie S. Green, and Marci E. J. Gleason. Relationship Formation on the Internet: What's the Big Attraction? . Journal of Social Issues J Social Issues 58, no. 1 2002. 9-31.

Véronique, Vienne. The Situationist Spectacle. Véronique Vienne. March 2000. http://www.vero-niquevienne.com/article/the-situationist-spectacle.

Walter, Scott, The Psychology of Advertising in Theory and Practice; a Simple Exposition of the Principles of Psychology in Their Relation to Successful Advertising. Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1921). 271.

62— 63


M A C Y

64— 65

•A common name given to online anonymous users who use their anonymity to spread generally hate-ful comments/ just create mayhem)

VIII

••Now, I know that these are sweep-ing generalizations on my part but, from my point of view, this extreme view is my reality. IX

•A majority of the time it really isn’t worth anyone’s time, it's just a con-sumer product. X

••Google search of a Google search acquired in under .39 of a second

XI

NOTES


M A C Y

1Marquard, Smith, Visual Culture: Experiences in Visual Culture (Abingdon: Taylor & Francis, 2006), 119. XII

•From here on out I will refer to design fragmentors as DFs XV

••DFs are the origin of design, they are what created the field and what will be the field for as long as our society needs to buy and consume objects. XV

••• Design Artists will be referred to by the first letters of themselves; DA XVI

2Stuart, Bailey, Wonder Years, ed. L i s e t t e S m i t s ( Amsterdam: Roma Publications and ArtEZ Press, 2008.) XVI

3Nir, Eyal, Hooked: How to Build H a b i t - F o r m i n g P r o d u c t s (Westminster: Penguin, 2006), 1.

05

66— 67

•This probably is very untrue, but very amusing.

05

•This probably is very untrue, but very amusing. 05

Jolande, Jacobi, The Psychology of C.G. Jung; an Introduction with Illustrations (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1973), 128-129. 08

4Ibid. 09

Sherry, Turkle, Life on the screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet (New York: Touchstone, 1995), 176.

14

5Ibid. 15

•Library Education Experimental Program, at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign 19

6Caroline, Haythornthwaite, Social Networks and Internet Connectivity


M A C Y

Effects. Information (Communication & Society 8, no. 2, 2005) 125-47.

20

•Sadly bleak existence…experiences may vary.• 21

7Walter, Scott, The Psychology of Advertising in Theory and Practice; a Simple Exposition of the Principles of Psychology in Their Relation to Successful Advertising (Boston: Small, Maynard & Company, 1921). 271.) 22

•Solution: just talk to a stranger, it's nice sometimes* 22

8Katelym Y.A. Mckenna, Amie S.Green and Marce E. J. Gleason, Relationship Formation on the Internet: What's the Big Attraction? (Journal of Social Issues J Social Issues 58, no. 1 2002) 12. 26

9Ibid. 26

10Katelym Y.A. Mckenna, Amie S.

68— 69

Green and Marce E. J. Gleason, Relationship Formation on the Internet: What's the Big Attraction? (Journal of Social Issues J Social Issues 58, no. 1 2002) 11. 29

11 Metahaven. White Night Before A Manifesto (Eindhoven: Onomatopee, 2008), 5. 32

•For many products, forming habits is an imperative for survival. As infinite distractions compete for our attention, companies are learning to pastor novel tactics to stay rele-vant in users’ minds. Today, amassing millions of users is no longer good enough. Companies increasingly find that their economic value is a func-tion of the strength of the habits they create. (Hooked:how to build habit forming products, p1.), 33

12Ideo.com 34

•This probably is very untrue, but very amusing. 36


M A C Y

•The Situationist International (1957–1972) was a relatively small yet influential Paris-based group that had its origins in the avant garde artistic tradition. The situa-tionists are best known for their radical political theory and their i n f l u e n c e on the May 1968 student and w o r k e r r e v o l t s i n Fr a n c e . The Situationist International (SI) p u b l i s h e d a j o u r n a l called Internationale Situationniste (IS) *Jan D. Matthews, “An intro-duction to the Situationists,” The Anarchist Library. 2005, www.anti-politics.com* 40

12 Vienne , Véron ique , The Situationist Spectacle. (Véronique Vienne. March 2000). http://www.veroniquevienne.com/article/the-sit-uationist-spectacle.) 43

•“New systems are using rich data, and big data. This is data acquired from the larger world. It is our move-

70— 71


M A C Y

72— 73

ment patterns, buying habits, associations, and travel routines. It comes from a network of cloud ser-vices, traffic sensors, weather sensors, social networks, public and personal cameras. It is real-time as well as historical. And it exists in volume. Massive volume.Today we are creating an expanding array of experiences driven by machines that are essentially hidden from the user. They are services that run in the cloud. They are small programs that run silently on our devices, in our homes, in our offices. They feed not so much on direct user input, but on the abstracts of traffic sensors, weather sensors, social networks, public and personal cameras, and hundreds of other components gleaning our patterns of work, travel and living—these are the cues driving new invisible products in their silent toil. They work from a dataset that is rich and articulate, and the output often comes as direct action. (Mark Rolston, “The Next Era of Designers Will Use Data as Their Medium”. Wired.com, November 27, 14.http://


M A C Y

www.wired.com/2014/11/rise-of-data-artists/.) 46

••Founding partner at 2x4, and most recently Design Director at The Met

49

• Aesthetic Theory Consisting in judging artworks on the basis of the inter-human relations which they represent, produce or prompt. (Bourriaud, Nicolas. Relational Aesthetics (Dijon: Les Presses Du Réel, 2002), 112) 50

•• Process: The process is the prod-uct. The most important aspects of a process are time, relationship and change. The process produces for-mations rather than forms. We search for unexpected but correlative, emer-gent patterns. Even though a process has the appearance of objectivity, we realize the fact that it stems from subjective intentions. 51

Logic: Logic is our tool. Logic is our method for accentuating the ungrasp-

74— 75

able. A clear and logical setting emphasizes that which does not seem to fit within it. We use logic to design the conditions through which the process can take place. Design conditions using intelligible rules. Avoid arbitrar y randomness. Difference should have a reason. Use rules as constraints. Constraints sharpen the perspective on the pro-cess and stimulate play within the limitations. 51

Input: The input is our material. Input engages logic and activates and influences the process. Input should come from our external and complex environment: nature, society and its human interactions. (Maurer, Luna, Edo Paulus, Jonathan Puckey, and Roel Wouters. Conditional Design . Workbook (Amsterdam: Valiz. 2013) ii) 51

•••The common thought for DFs when approaching a designed expe-rience 51


M A C Y

13Lisette, Smits, The Most Beautiful Swiss Books, the Present Issue ‘ Why do Graphic Designers Like to Make (So Many) Art Books? (Zürich: Federal Ministry Culture Bern, 2009.). 55

•Jan van Toorn, born in 1932, is one of Holland's most influential graphic designers. Central to his approach is the application of content-based strategies, resulting in a design prac-tice as a form of visual journalism. Opposite to the more self-contained designs of the modernist tradition, Van Toorn is always striving for designs that are open to different w a y s o f s e e i n g . ( v i m e o .com/69003518) 56

14Todd, Lambrix, “The Serfdom of Crowds. Todd Lambrix” Isssue,2010. https://issuu.com/lambrixt/docs/the_serfdom_of_crowds. 58

76— 77

The Evidence of Intimacy

•This publication is the first edition of what will become a larger and further developed body. It introduces ideas based within the interconnected environment and how society is responding to it.

COLOPHON

Written and designed by Joe Letchford, during his time studying for his MFA in Graphic Design at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.

Acknowledgments:This publication is typeset in DTLFleischmannST by Dutch Type Library—Designers: Erhard Kaiser and Johann Fleischman (www.dutchtypelibrary.nl) and Knockout by Hoef ler & Co. (www.typography.com)

Thanks to Will Luck for writing the short stories that feed throughout this publication.

Note:Every effort has been made to respectfully provide dull credits and citations for the quotations that appear within this publication. If you feel that there has been an error or infringement of copyright, please contact me personally so that any future editions can be amended.

E V I D E N C E

THE

OF

I N T I

M A C Y


M A C Y

the evidence of intimacy

Documents