On Overlooking Glance

Since my first Art History class, I’ve soaked up all I can from these classes in order to gain a better understanding for this world that I love and am submerged, intrigued that I have learned so much more about history in these courses than I have learned cumulatively in any History class I’ve ever taken. I signed up for this class expecting a traditional Art History lecture course, with linear timelines of events, accompanied by the usual slide shows. I was eager to finally learn about the major I’ve elected to pursue. However, as we have all discovered, this class is definitely of the unconventional and Industrial Design is not something that can simply be tracked on one linear timeline.

Albeit a surprise and harder thing to grasp, the essence of this course taught us to ask questions with questions and thoroughly explore the concepts which revolve around Design and innovative thought. Though some things really can be taken at face value in the world of Art and Design, for the pure sake of beautiful aesthetic, as Industrial Designers we have been pushed to ask the why and where and how of products and concepts and environments, etc. With these explorations, we have been equipped to design better-informed and higher-quality products (when I say products, I use this noun to encompass all that is possible to design whether its cars to systems to instruments).

Addressing some of the most important issues like responsibilities of Green Design and Humanitarian Aids, we’ve raised awareness among the class of real problem-solving issues we face in today’s world. We have been trained to trace products like chairs and historical movements Modernism and the Bauhaus in order to find purpose and pattern. I now see with more clarity how interweaved the worlds of Design and Fine Art and Architecture can all be, all areas than overlaps and affect one another. Sometimes Design ends up running so many circles within itself it becomes convoluted with so many questions, and sometimes ultimately ends up losing meaning. Since the very first lecture of glowing, genetically-altered bunnies to the eyebrow-raising histories of vibrators, this course has definitely demonstrated that Industrial Design spans a vast array of subjects and conversations that are really not limited by much. We skipped right over the book-definitions and delved right into the more intangible concepts of Art and Design. There were plenty of times many of us went home asking ourselves, “Wait, what exactly did we learn today?”

This course has left me with more questions than answers, but I guess that’s when you learn the most. If you had all the answers, isn’t that when learning ends? This is, of course, an on-going search, a continuous exploration, as should our approaches in Design. Amidst the course, I already saw that it was one where you would get back as much as you put in. Even with as minimal effort I feel I’ve put forth, I’ve been given a new dynamic perspective on critically seeing things in this colorful world (past and present) of Design and Art, as well as a million new resources of names and companies and organizations galore to further enlighten my knowledge base. Still, I would like a traditional, boring, slide-lecture course on Industrial Design, you know, to have my bases covered.

...ArtDesignArtDesignArtDesignArt...

The MoMa is an emulsion of Art and Design. Two Separate but integrally intertwined disciplines. The Museum of Modern Art serves as a body to unite but separately display these worlds. It is by far one of my favorite Museums. It is one of the places I can go to visit some of my favorite post-impressionists paintings, and be enlightened to the new innovations in the world of Design all in the same wonderful afternoon. It gratifies the romantic, searching artist, as well as the crafty, clever nerd inside me. How could you not love the MoMa?

Design for the Elastic Mind was an exhibit put on earlier this spring that featured artists and designers that were discovering the latest innovations in time, space, matter, and individuality. A featured artist, Geoffrey Mann, displays something called “motion engendering form” in his installation “Attracted To Light” where he takes the course of movement of a moth and captures this ephemeral thing into something solid. He records the movement of the animal with a 3D scanner, then extrudes the shape with a rapid prototyping machine. The resulting piece is whimsical, ribbon-like form. Stationary, it still dances with movement.

Sometimes I see the idea of an Artist and Designer being the two opposite poles of a spectrum, a person’s creativity and identity being placed on any point on that line, being closer to either the Art or Design, but always being a part of both. However, I also can see how a person can be a Designer superimposed onto an Artist, or vice-versa, like two veneers, one a little more transparent for the other to show through.

In Mann’s case, I do not know which he considers himself, if at all, but I see how he utilizes the tools of an Industrial Designer (rapid prototyping, a process we have become familiar with in our Manufacturing Techniques class) in order to create something that can be perceived as a fine art. I was not fortunate enough to see “Attracted to Light” in real life, but judging from the pictures, I assume it would invoke the same passionately moving effect as a Rodin sculpture. The form has a very gestural flow. Encased in white, it has a very light, flighty feel, frolicking in the air surrounding. It is not surprising this is the flight path of a moth’s interaction with light. But it is not only about refracting art from the literal, Mann exhibits a sensitive understanding of design, of science, and of beauty with his pieces. Part of his Long Exposure series, he also studies the motions of a bird, with twisting, satiny shapes made of porcelain and glass. He fuses delicate into solid, holds movement captive and inspires imagination from fact.

So where is the line between Art & Design? Maybe it’s in the way the viewer sees it, just as someone who visually likes abstract art, without understanding the meaning behind it, or taking the beauty of mathematical tessellations at face value. Maybe it is not a line at all but a telescope to focus in what we wish to see, or a kaleidoscope of sorts. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then perhaps Art & Design are in these eyes as well.

Designing Because We Should

Humanitarian Design

“To those much is given, much is expected,” this is a mantra that has been shared by a dear friend of mine. This is what drives her close-nit, hard-working family. A child of doctors, pursuing the medical field herself, my friend is my inspiration for the good, life-changers in this world. This encompasses what I feel as the obligation of those who are capable. Regardless of what career you may have, what field you are in, I believe that every person, when they feel that profound need to give, they will fulfill it in anyway, in whatever capacity they can, big or small. This gratifying act can be done by charities, or volunteer work, or donating art, etc. The issue of how designers can contribute to this wasteful, trash-accumulating, resource-depreciating world has been a pertinent on-going discussion.

Dr. Bruce Becker of Brown University, Rhode Island Hospital and Hasbro Children’s Hospital, gave a lecture about emergency aid to disaster and refugee relief. As designers, how does this pertain to us? In regards to humanitarian aid, we can concern ourselves by designing effective ways of making the most basic and important resources (food, water, shelter) available to everyone, regardless of location or demographic.

The most vital needs of a human are food and water, correct? To add to this, shelter is usually immediately to follow. In several places in many countries, these simple needs that can easily be taken for granted are scarce in supply and availability, needing to ration food, settle for dirty water or share poor housing conditions with hundreds of others.

Food has been, and may always be, the hardest issues. Food can be replenished, but it takes time to grow plants or raise stock. There are thousands of organizations that raise money or take donations to distribute food to needing areas. Back to the Berlin Wall and even now during the current War on Terrorism, the idea of literally dropping food from the air is a means to provide aid. Due to the large scope and the relating issues that designing for this aspect entails, it may be the most challenging to an industrial designer. However, that is to say that solutions or smaller solutions cannot be found that lead to a greater improvement. Even things like Solar Cookers, may be an immediate solution to generating energy, but it serves as a vehicle for making food more quickly consumable by the user.

The simpler of these needs may be water, in the sense that water is readily available in many parts of the world. The hardest part, of course, is to be able to filter it into potable forms. The average North American home hardly ever has to consider the importance of clean drinking water, we just turn on the faucet and tap water pours freely through. Even the water from our hose wouldn’t pose a threat of a deathly disease. Only in rare occasions, like Hurricane Katrina, do we see the stark magnitude of having a clean water supply. Water sources were contaminated and people were dying from water-borne disease. This is no new thing, look back to the ages of the plague, whether in Europe or the Americas, the quickest spreading places were around public water sources.

At home, I have my Brita Filter. Someone somewhere designed it as an alternative to buying bottled water, whose standards of suitable drinking water are higher than tap. I actually hardly use it. I’m perfectly fine with drinking tap, from my city’s lead-free-guaranteed water utility. For more rural and underdeveloped areas, like the vast regions of Africa, there are products invented to mitigate these water problems like LifeStraw and Q Drum. Lifestraw is a portable on-person contraption that will filter any kind of water into drinking water. This brings the control to the individual user level and provides freedom of any water source. The Q Drum, while not a system of filtering, is a mechanism that allows for the transportability of a high volume of water. It is essentially a giant plastic hallow wheel, pulled by a rope. It is extremely effective for dragging heavy amounts of water over long distances by adults and children. There is nothing frivolous or excessive here; it is a real problem-solving concept that contends all other useless and overly ornate products out there. This is living proof that design can still come down to be simple and true, and completely functional.

The concept of shelter, another thing taken for granted, may only cross one’s mind when that comfort is threatened or questioned, like when a college student sees a homeless person on the street. In this situation the idea and contrast of a “home” is starkly exposed. I am in the Reactive Matter studio here at RISD, where we are creating a dwelling utilizing smart materials. Some of my colleagues found this a great opportunity to address the horrible conditions of refugee camps and explore solutions of easily deployable units that provided shelter as well as filtered-water facilities. I am very glad that even as young students of Industrial Design, there are those who are aware of the dire situations in the world and take advantage of this time in school to bring attention to these pertinent issues and seek to help in alleviating them.

As young designers, regardless of what we plan on designing, there is already an innate need for us to solve problems. This is us by nature and it is character where we refine ourselves by reaching further than the average solution to design products, systems, and environments that seek to help people and our planet. We should all strive, not to be remembered by a famous product, but to leave the biggest impact globally on making positive changes.

http://www.vestergaard-frandsen.com/lifestraw.htm
http://qdrum.co.za/backup/

What Came first, Man or Chair?

The Ultimate Essence of Chair

What are the origins of the chair and what truly IS a chair? What is the purpose of a chair? What makes a chair a chair? What is chair-ness? Is there such a thing?

The human has a natural tendency to squat and in such position the chair fits in the outline of the negative space. With this said, the origins of the chair may really be an extension of the human body, created out of need rather than want. From this, the idea of a table is born, also. Because we sit, there is a chair, because we have chairs, we have tables, and because there are tables, we sit in a community, and so on. Furniture may have taken a few hundred years to develop into the modern idea, but this sense of community has always been concurrent in human development. In the very beginning, the vehicle was the campfire, where people would gather around, if originally for just the sake of needing warmth, this served as the social construct of bringing people together and in such a setting, there was an exchange of stories, a sense of bonding, the idea of family and community grew from this simple thing. Whether the fire was set inside a single-family home, a cave or lodge, or it was a giant bonfire in the middle of a group tents or a small village. These are the sociological ties a chair, furniture, has.

Now let’s go back to original idea of the chair being born out of need. In the “bonfire” days, natural surroundings yielded things like rocks, tree stumps, and fallen logs. The idea of a stool can be the core essence of a chair where its primary function is to support the body weight, to take the strain off the legs. There is no back support but that is only a secondary need. The stool was the precursor of the chair, this was a concept that may have been around since the beginning of man, whether it was conscious or not. The way a human’s joints are connected in their natural range of motion and angle of bend, man is predisposed to eventually find this seated position, for one cannot stay on their feet forever. Therefore, regardless of intellectual development in the Cro-Magnon days, basic animal instinct would lead one to find objects found in nature, like rocks and flat planes, or tree logs, to “sit” on and find relief, perhaps after a long day’s journey or hunting. When looked at from this aspect, the idea of the “chair” is now nothing new or innovative; it has simply changed and developed greatly since its origins (which cannot be exactly known). It has been approached over the years, over the decades to either be built more sensibly, or cleverly or economically. How does one really reinvent the chair?

In its simple form, what is needed for a chair is a series of three connected planes, a vertical one to support our back, a horizontal one below waist-level to support our weight, and one more vertical to support the height of our legs at a bent angle. This forms a very basic zig-zag shape in profile. From this basic outline or skeleton, this is where creativity can begin. However, the pure purpose of a chair is to function as a chair—aesthetic is completely secondary. Like finding a way to get to a certain destination or achieving a certain level, and then finding a more efficient or creative way of getting there. If a chair looks like a chair, has a conventional shape to it, but cannot physically bear the weight of a person—is it still a chair? Does that not completely defeat the purpose of a chair? Is it an imposter? A mimic or an empty container of what would be a chair?

This brings me back to high school when a very enthusiastic Mrs. Baldwin was trying demonstrate to our Seminar English class the concepts of Taoism and Plato (I don’t know why these two things are meshed together in my head): Lifting a chair onto the table and gesturing to it, she exclaimed “This is not a chair, this a copy of the essence of the ideal chair! This is not a chair, but the negative outline of what should be a chair!” (If that doesn’t sound correct, please blame my spotty memory, not the competence of my high school educators) I never looked at a chair in the same way again.

A chair, stool, and bench: all pieces of furniture made to sit on, and are sometimes wrongly interchanged, but are they just different forms of the same thing? They all share the common idea of a “seat.” Let’s think of these in light of geometric terms and defining them by a point. In mathematical terms, a point is an exact location in space, it has no length, width or depth. A line is a set of consecutive points that extend infinitely in both directions. A plane is a set of points on a 2D surface that extend infinitely in all directions.

Geometrically speaking, let’s say the seat is a point and it can extend to any set length like a line segment or a ray. If your seat is the point, then a bench is a line segment, with two definite ends, accommodating any number of seats between, or it is chaise lounge that can be a ray with an indefinite length, or a rocking chair with its range of motion following the limits of an angle. A chair can be a series of points and planes and lines in a 2D form, and in the 3D realm, it is a series of planes intersecting, forms axes. And from these axes, you can get rotations like the rocking chair or swings and hammocks (points, or “seats” at a fixed distance from an axis).
This is a way for approaching the design of a chair, simply relating meaning or relevance to the universe and nature. Or this is for people who need to see the logic or rationale of the structure of a chair. But for the more philosophical, more intangible mind, let’s take it further.
Then when does a plane, like the ground, become a seat? Is that when a section of the plane is cut out to form the seat of a chair? Are legs created when one vertical plane is multiplied for ample support?

At this point, what does a human become? Can the chair exist without the human body? The human can certainly exist without the chair, albeit a little less comfortable. The chair is then innately tied to that of human need and function. The presence of the chair warrants the very existence of man, or the nearest being that would require such an object. Attempt to be as objective as possible and consider questions might arise if we found a chair-shaped object on an otherwise uninhabited planet. Subjective connotation leads us to assume it is a chair. Then one can really evaluate what constitutes a chair or what properties do these visual parts imply? E.g. seat, legs, backing, etc. And why could it not function upside-down, or sideways? What indicates that it bears weight? At that point if we determine it is like a chair, as we know it, and thus functions as one, there would be an immediate query to the life forms that created it or used it. Actually, this association would happen much faster, most likely within seconds of each other: “Chairs? Humans!” Acknowledging if not humans, then creatures intelligent and particular enough to see the need of a chair beyond just a rock or a tree stump.

Therefore, I conclude that the ultimate Essence of the Chair is Man. In a way that some people state that God exists because the Bible exists, then jokingly rebuke it with the fact that Men wrote the Bible. This is the idea that Man will create forms that extend from himself, out of necessity, even want (No jokes about women and ribs please). Focus on the idea of a negative space: it is a void where something could or should be—where something once was or is waiting to be filled. This idea of a chair is beyond just a stool, and therefore is an object created out of an idea. It existed from the moment the first human “thought” about it, carving this negative space in the shape of a chair, in alignment with even Taoist views, it is now a chair because it is the chair that would fill that negative shape, that need, that void. This may be an extension of René Decartes’s “Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am)”--I think (of chair), therefore I am (chair). The chair exists, because man created it, therefore the essence of the chair is ultimately man.

A Hummer Better Than A Prius?

Last November, a British tabloid newspaper called the Daily Mail published an article titled “Toyota factory turns landscape to arid wilderness” reporting that with the production of its hybrid cars, Toyota has devastated Sudbury, Ontario as a dead-zone with its nickel mining and smelting needed for the car batteries. Last December, CNW Marketing Research, Inc. released a study called, “Dust to Dust: The Energy Cost of New Vehicles from Concept to Disposal.” The company, a well-reputed firm based out of Bandon, Oregon, evaluates all stages of production of a vehicle, from research and development, to operation, to the end of its life. In its report, CNW made claims that in the scope of vehicle life, hybrids like the Toyota Prius consumed more energy than many criticized SUV’s, like the Hummer.

The advent of these two stories spurned hundreds of articles and editorials in the past year in newspapers, colleges, and blogs, either promoting the shocking information or avidly discrediting it. The issue was even incorporated into to ABC’s TV series Boston Legal (http://www.autobloggreen.com/2008/01/29/hummers-are-greener-than-prius-study-makes-it-into-an-episode/).

The study by CNW illuminates that the Prius’s original EPA ratings (60 mpg city/ 51 mpg highway) were outdated and based on unrealistic standards of 55 mph and 3.3 mph acceleration per second. When the government updated the EPA testing to 80mph and 8mph acceleration, the Prius’s speculations dropped by 25%, getting only a 45 mpg average. It estimates that the Prius has a lifespan of 100,000 miles and costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven within that time. Whereas the Hummer, with a long life span of 300,000 miles, will only cost $ 1.95 per mile.

The Daily Mail accusations focused mostly on Toyota’s nickel plants based in Sudbury, Ontario. Allegedly the plant, dubbed the Superstack, has “caused so much damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has used this ‘dead zone’…to test moon rovers.” (“Prius Outdoes Hummer in Environmental Damage,” Chris DeMorro, The Recorder 2007)With all the emissions and sulfur dioxide spread, it can no longer sustain any life for miles. Acid rain alone destroyed all the plants and soil on the hillsides.

Many people and organizations, including Toyota, refuted these claims. One of the most influential to discredit the CNW study was a paper titled "Hummer versus Prius: 'Dust to Dust' Report Misleads the Media and Public with Bad Science" by Dr. Peter H. Gleick of the Pacific Institute. Gleick points out many holes in the research, including poor assumptions about the quotes on each vehicles lifespan. Numerous Prius owners attesting that their vehicles is still currently running well over 100,000 miles.

Many other papers sought to do further research on the plants in Sudbury. Toyota has only been purchasing nickel there in recent years, while the addressed environmental disaster occurred more than thirty years ago. Since then, the same factory has decreased its emissions significantly, 90% since 1970, and still declining. Also, while Toyota is definitely not the only company that uses nickel, they have a 100 % recycling plan for all their car batteries.

In conclusion, although the headliner of a Hummer versus Prius has many inaccurate facts, the issue raises important concerns. The consumer should never take the “green” aspect of a car at face value, like purchasing a Prius only based on its MPG and EPA rating. Consumers should take into consideration everything in regards to how much energy and resources it took to make that car and how much it will cost to continue to drive it until the end. For the same reason that certain bio-diesels, like corn fuel, isn’t necessarily the cheapest alternative when you consider how much it actually will take to grow it, reap it, refine it, etc. There are always more than 2 sides to any story.

The original article found on the online version Daily Mail, Mail Online, has thus been removed, to be replaced with the editorial letter discrediting it.
http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/news/article-417227/Toyota-factory.html

Essays

Womanhood, An Ongoing Search

When you say “women,” many images come to mind—whether it is the Soccer Mom, or the Jessica Rabbit seductress, or the ball-busting, career woman in a business suit, or the muscular, tanned skin-exposing athlete, or just the girl next door. As different as all these types of women are, we still consider them embodiments of womanhood. So, what makes a woman a woman? This is topic I’ve reflected deeply on in the past. Is it something physical that separates us from men, like our breasts or a vagina or uterus? What about women who have had hysterectomies or mastectomies, certainly they are still women after the surgery. Men who claim they aren’t really “boob-guys” go crazy over toned legs and tight butts—so if you are lacking in any of these features, are you still considered a woman? Of course, it is tied with that extra X chromosome we carry.

One the times in my life that this issue came strikingly to surface was when I was deployed with my Army unit to Iraq during OIF III. Among the hundreds of things I learned that year, one of the deeper issues I explored, and almost fought with, was this issue of womanhood and beauty. Living every day in uniform, with my hair tied up in a bun, I was in an environment that was extremely masculine, and yet we were all suppose to be the same GI Joe. Which was fine with me, as tomboy growing up, I’ve always been comfortable with being just “one of the boys.” We all wore “US ARMY” on our left tab, we all wore the American Flag on our right shoulder, same boots, same camouflage, etc. The goal was uniformity, it always is. Some people criticize that the military dehumanizes you to nothing but a number. Well, that’s not correct and not entirely wrong either. At least in the Army’s philosophy, they break you down, and build you up again so you lose the selfish mind-set of individuality and take on the identity of being a single element in a greater team. The thought may be kind of scary at first, but this is why uniformity in appearance and mass conformity in conduct and manner are so crucial because we all bear equal parts in this team effort, like cogs on a wheel, in order to make the gears turn.

So enough of Army logic, the point is that in the Army, you may be a female, but you’re supposed to be asexual in every other way.

I was an “aircraft structural repairer” which is commonly just referred to as sheetmetal in the military and civilian world. I prided myself in choosing a job that was considered a “guy's job.” Screw that, I say, I am all about advocating successful women in male-dominated fields. It’s nothing new that certain grungy blue-collar jobs are only associated with males. And here is where meaning in design comes into play; the very tools that these jobs require are associated and male-gendered as well. This is the very reason why certain people will do a double-take when they see a woman with a power tool crouched underneath a car. It was for this very reason I lugged around my heavy sheetmetal toolbox without wincing and held that rivet gun with as much ass as a 200-pound brute when I did my repairs. I was determined to not only perform the job as well as any guy could, but ten times better. And I did. My unit vouches for me, so do the aircrafts.

And what I learned when I deployed, is that there is a big difference in being a woman and being a female.

From the features that were exposed, my head, my hair, my facial features, or the way in which I fit into my uniform, it all pointed to the fact that I was obviously female. And I was constantly reminded of this fact in situations where I would walk into a room or a crowded hall and receive a multitude of stares in my direction from males, the majority not being from my fellow soldiers, but from the local nationals (hired Iraqis) that worked in our dining, laundry and other service facilities. It was at first the most shocking and disconcerting thing, and unfortunately, is probably something that every female in the Army on a deployment to a similar country will experience. I always said it was because they’re not used to seeing a woman in uniform, but I’m sure there were plenty of other reasons why they stared. I ignored the attention, it’s all you really could do, otherwise it was so awkward and so overwhelming it could really debilitate someone from performing her normal duties.

At the end of our tour, they were looking for volunteers to extend or stay for the next rotation. I was young, single with no dependents—I definitely considered it. However, after a few days, I admitted to myself I was not in the healthiest state to continue serving in country. I felt I was in dire need to reenergize and I realized that what I missed most was indeed my womanhood. I ddi my job, I did my best, and now I needed to go home and feel like a woman again.

I needed to be able to throw on a dress and doll myself up. As much as we complain about heels, we keep buying them because they’re fun. I needed to feel I was attractive again. I never realized just how much being a woman, being able to do all these silly girly things, was so integral to my identity a person. Just as being able to perform the labor-intensive tasks my job required, it was important to me that I still knew how to put on mascara. Maybe this might sound ridiculous to some people, but you don’t ever appreciate some of these things until you’re truly deprived of it.

So, about them tight clothes, high-heels and strippers.

There are some women who feel this is a degrading thing. Then there are those who feel these are the very things that should be celebrated about being a woman. It’s “[our] prerogative.” I have always found it interesting how some women truly see these things as a means of empowerment in which they raise their self-esteem and find confidence. As though, they know this is sometimes so superficial, but they get the last laugh because they know that. Or women who use these hyper-feminized roles in order to gain what they want out of society. This overall sexual awareness is a form of liberation, from conventional taboo and social mores of how women should behave and conduct themselves. I personally know a few women in the adult-entertainment industry and whether it stems from a psychological plea for attention, they are proud of what they do and enjoy themselves very much.

In the 16th century, it was an era ruled by courtesans. These were women, mistresses, who were essentially prostitutes, who used their positions to gain status socially and politically. At a time of arranged marriages, they held a large role in upper-class society, sometimes attending in lieu of the wife at social events. Even in today’s world, with prostitution greatly outlawed and scorned upon, figures like the notorious Heidi Fleiss flourished and built a ring of prostitution that was comprised of Hollywood’s rich and famous. At the time she did hold the conviction that she had the best job in the world.

Now I’m not advocating prostitution, I’m just pointing out how it can be a vehicle in which women find their identity and empowerment, not dissimilar to how women rock those stilettos heels. And these things of course, are definitely not the only things than can define women. Whatever the situation or the confinements may be, a woman will find her own way of translating the world to herself and womanhood is something that can never be taken away.

Loungin' Around