Discoveries from Reading the Last Chapter of History of Visual Communication
As indicated in my essay outline submitted last week, I want to read more about the history of design (in the broad sense) in order to clarify for myself where I stand from the historic perspective, the role and the responsibility of designer at our time. I firstly read an online version of the History of Visual Communication. (http://www.citrinitas.com/history%5Fof%5Fviscom/index.html). And the process has proven to be very fruitful.
(1) Firstly, I would like to say the online reading experience is very helpful for me in the sense that it provides more color images which can be referenced to and enlarged; and it provides direct links to further reference texts, which I found really convenient.
(2) First Things First 1964, 2000 Manifestos
My first encounter with the very important Manifesto of our practice. The manifesto is basically about reflecting upon the priority of our profession, and advocating a mindshift away from product marketing to an exploration of more useful, lasting, and worthwhile causes.
I cannot agree with the statements more, since this is also what I have been exploring - the application of graphic design to fields other than commercial purpose.
Following this idea, I browsed through a website dedicated to social advertising (http://osocio.org/). I think it is absolutely a good example of how our creativity can be put to good causes for the world. However, I sometimes feel quite frustrated on the thought of how little impact we can actually make through advertising or a social campaign.
In developing the spirit of first things first further, I thought of other possible means that graphic design could take to make a positive impact. Education? maybe it is another more sustainable function; How about the spirit of design? By this I mean the way design solve our everyday problem in a creative way. With this thought in mind I found another website "Design your life". (http://www.design-your-life.org/). It is a website by Designers Ellen and Julia Lupton dedicated to collecting ideas about applying design theory and practice to some of the basic problems of everyday living. I thought it is brilliant. And I am expecting to see more examples from our discipline of graphic design, since visual communication is supposed to be most relevant to our everyday life.
