What is Design?

Designer Talk

Hey there! This article was born from a “video recording”, so you can play it or read it. You make the choice.

Text version — As designers, there came a point where we ask ourselves common questions like:

What is design, and what are the differences between design and art? Do most people, consider design a form of art?

See, these questions have always aroused discussions between designers and others. If we analyze the reasons that lead some to see design as a form of art, we might begin by saying things like:“both the designer and the artist create visual compositions.”

We could then go on to talk about many subjective interpretations and defend our own personal views, but there would be no intention of finding common ground, so we would never stop arguing about it.

That’s because we attach too much importance to the words.

When we try to define something by limiting it, we create a division. As we know, divisions often generate conflict. It is no accident that every time someone tries to answer the question: “What is design?” and as a result implicitly answer “what design is not,” we witness the birth of long debates.

In the Archaic period, it seems that some people commonly struggled to distinguish the word from the thing. And they ended up perceiving any definition as a representation of reality, rather than viewing it as a communication tool, as a sharing instrument.

Well, I’m not here today to look for good reasons to break us up. Instead, by encouraging a viewpoint that goes beyond its words, I’d like to highlight the facts concerning the true nature of design.

So, let us begin with a fact which we can all recognize, regardless of what we think of as design.

Design with intent

Everyday objects unite us in achieving a purpose (an end) according to our needs.

If we feel tired, a chair allows us to sit down.If it’s raining cats and dogs, an umbrella protects us against rain.If we need to take a note, a pen allows us to write on a piece of paper.AND so on_._

Anything designed with the intention of solving a problem fits within this category.

Of course, you may decide to use the objects listed before in a different way. And that would be your personal decision, moving away from the original intention the object was designed for.Or perhaps, if you have never seen these objects before, you may not understand how to use them. Clearly understanding the cited examples imply that we share the same technological context.

Anyway, a design begins with the intention to create an understandable and sharable solution for the largest number of people involved.

Design unites people

I may think the chair in which I currently sit is aesthetically unpleasant and uncomfortable, but that hasn’t stopped me from understanding and taking advantage of its function. Meanwhile, someone else may decide to sit on the same chair, and they could argue that it is the most beautiful and comfortable chair they have ever used.

And we can both recognise that, regardless of the individual user experience generated, this chair remains a product designed with the intention that as many people as possible will understand how to use it to sit down.

But what if most people standing in front of a chair did not understand it was a chair? Or even worse, they understand it is a chair, but they can’t figure out how to use it to sit down?

In that case, we wouldn’t be in front of a piece of design anymore, but we would only be standing in front of a piece of art, something that was created based on the pure self-affirmation of its creator; anyway that doesn’t mean that the artistic creation in question serves no purpose (although many supporters of art prefer to believe that art doesn’t have a purpose).

But when we talk about the aim of a piece, we should stress that art doesn’t share the same intent or purpose as an act of design. And This difference in the intent of creation is a cardinal rule that helps understand and explain what separates design from art.

Design vs Art

So, can a design be regarded as form of art? The answer to this question lies in the facts we can recognise and observe together, and not in the words we use.

You can personally consider any design object artistic.

You may, for example, consider an iPhone, or whatever other object may pop into your head, a work of art.

BUT — If a designer begins his process with the intention of creating an artwork rather than understanding and seeking a fact, not opinion, based solution to a problem that affects people — he wouldn’t be implementing a design process. Regardless of what he spawns, it won’t be design.

The designer has the responsibility and the role to figure out how to produce a solution that is understandable to others and not just himself; a responsibility which is fulfilled by following a design process devoid of any need to for self-affirmation.

Now let’s consider a final example to understand this distinction between art and design once and for all.

Design is urinal

In 1917 the artist Marcel Duchamp took a common porcelain urinal and he signed it with R. Mutt. Then, he presented the urinal as an artistic endeavor, entitled “Fountain”.

Fountain by R. Mutt, Photograph by Alfred Stieglitz, THE EXHIBIT REFUSED BY THE INDEPENDENTS — via Wikipedia

This piece of art was never shown to the public, and it created a fierce debate.

If you studied some of the Art History of the last century, you might know Duchamp and you might also know that this piece of conceptual art is regarded as one of the greatest works of art of the twentieth century. Today there are sixteen copies of this object in the world, since the original one was lost. But if you don’t know Duchamp, the Dada Movement, the ready-made and whatnot, I suggest you to run a search because you may find it quite interesting.

The urinal that Duchamp used was a common in those days — a sanitary appliance designed to allow a man to pee quickly while maintaining a high level of hygiene in certain situations. The object also saved water when compared with a traditional toilet, and was thus a solution with a minimum negative effect on the environment.

Was the urinal already a piece of art? No. The urinal was, and is, a common everyday object created from a design process, a product developed to resolve certain problems for a specific audience.

However, Duchamp took the urinal out-of-context and placed it in a way buried its practical significance beneath a title and a personal point of view. He gave his own purely personal meaning to an object originally designed to have the same meaning for many people.

As you have heard before, its no coincident that art is affected as much by its context as the design itself.

Therefore, we can recognise that Duchamp gave rise to a work of art and used it to promoted many subjective interpretations.

Take for example the philosopher Stephen Hicks, who interpreted the Fountain of Duchamp as a provocative statement: “Art is something you piss on”.

So we come to the conclusion that anything, even a design object, can be regarded as form of art.

But we also recognise that the latter art, is addressed as a personal intention, as an act of self-expression (merely subjective, as the artist who searches for self-affirmation through the expression).

An act of self-expression’s primary purpose is to invite people to reflect, or to inspire them with the expression of a personal point of view. And consequently, by distributing an invitation to reflect, art gives shape to debates, which often end in the division of people’s opinions.

However, the intention of design is quite to the contrary; it is to reconcile and connect the maximum number of people involved through the production of a clear and understandable solution to a shared problem.

This also means that, unlike with art, any kind of design process won’t simply end with a single person’s thoughts. Rather, it is the result of continued research that seeks to validate any hypothesis and potential solution directly through the people involved. Throughout the entire design process, design will continue to do so as much as is necessary and possible, through a constant iteration.

At this point, I can close this long thought ironically, by saying that Design is urinal and Art is fountain :-)

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