The Design Comedy: In Defence of Irony, by Tim Parsons
Posted in: Uncategorizedpimg alt=”irony-swisscheese3.jpg” src=”http://s3files.core77.com/blog/images/irony-swisscheese3.jpg” width=”468″ height=”253″ class=”mt-image-none” style=”” //p
pememSwiss Door Wedge/em by Andrew Stafford./em/p
pTim Parsons calls for a sharpened awareness of irony in designmdash;not as a whimsical device for lame gags but as an effective tool of critique./p
pThe buzz-words and objects that appear most frequently in the design media at any given time tell us much about prevailing attitudes. The rise of “design thinking,” “social innovation” and “service design” all point to designers trying to stretch their remit away from the shaping of products towards a more direct manipulation of behaviour. In the realm of products, the talk of the Milan Furniture Fair was Chairless, Alejandro Aravena’s strap that braces your knees and back when sitting cross-legged on the floor. A redesign of a device used by Paraguay’s Ayoreo Indians, some of the proceeds of its sale go towards fighting their cause in a dispute over land-rights. It may be uncomfortable, but it comes with the psychological consolation of having avoided the wasteful production, distribution and disposal of yet another designer chair. Another project that embraces good-old fashioned common sense is the winner of this year’s prestigious Designs of the Year award given at London’s Design Museum, a re-design of an electrical plug by Min-Kyu Choi, designed to fold flat and be easier to pull out. In fact, taking into account the past winners of the awardmdash;Shepard Fairey’s Barack Obama posters in 2009 and Yves Beacute;har’s work on the One Laptop Per Child project in 2008mdash;it’s hard not to conclude that this age of austerity has heralded a new appreciation for ‘worthy’ projects./p
div class=”article_quote”So often irony is painted as anti-progressive, yet its ability to offer cutting critique is a positive when aimed at the right targets./div
pFantastic though some of these achievements are, a strong culture must embrace a broad and eclectic range of voices. After all, it was the excessive moralising of its leading lights that undermined Modernism. From the cartoons of William Heath-Robinson (in particular the series a href=”http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/23182-popup.html”How to Live in a Flat/a) to the outrageous objects of Memphis, irony proved itself to be a pointed and effective weapon to puncture Modernism’s sanctimonious superiority. Yet in recent years “ironic design” has developed a dreadful reputation as an attention-seeking tool for wannabe star designers. Their “clever” objects fill our newspaper supplements, litter design fairs, and pop up on every design blog going. Just as celebrity culture no longer requires stars to be able to sing or act in order to be famous, designers, it seems, no longer have to justify their shallow and showy offerings. To many, this is tantamount to a href=”http://www.jaspermorrison.com/html/8851725.html”pollution/a and the sooner it is replaced with design that actually tries to improve things, the better. /p
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pemA cartoon from emHow To Live in a Flat/em, by William Heath-Robinson, 1936. Source: a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/87111489@N00/1535604095/in/photostream/”Gus Morais/em./a/p
pFollowing this tack, Charlotte and Peter Fiell, in their introduction to a href=”http://www.amazon.com/Design-Now-Peter-M-Fiell/dp/3822852678″Design Now/a, state their agenda to “challenge the moral apathy that exists in much mainstream design today.” They accuse design experts of “consciously (and probably cynically) taking an opposing stance to the precepts of ‘Good Design’ in the mistaken belief that this is an edgy avant-garde position.” It’s worth noting that the Fiells’ description of “Good Design” in Design Now (“a concept based on a rational approach to the design process that encompasses the following criteria: durability, unity, integrity, inevitability and beauty.”) could have come from the Bauhaus, and with the exception of “beauty” it mirrors the sentiments of a href=”http://www.2think.biz/pdfs/HBR_SQA_CS.pdf”Herman Miller’s founder D J DePree/a. While much good work emerges from designers following such principles, this appears to be representative of a conscious effort among some commentators to paper-over the positive lessons of Post-Modernism, the effective use of irony being one./p
pSo often irony is painted as anti-progressive, yet its ability to offer cutting critique is a positive when aimed at the right targets. Take for example the first entry in grand master of Italian post-war design Achille Castiglioni’s a href=”http://www.amazon.com/Achille-Castiglioni-Complete-Electa-Architecture/dp/1904313043/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8s=booksqid=1275225715sr=1-1″Complete Works by Sergio Polano/a. As a student faced with a brief to design a Fascist Cultural Centre, Castiglioni, presented an architectural model made from slabs of cheese. The yellow tower-blocks, their naturally occurring holes suggesting windows, offer an effect far greater than if Castiglioni had simply refused to participate in the project on ideological grounds./p
pMy contention here is that the dismissal of much so-called ironic design is actually based upon a misunderstanding of the term and the kind of work it should apply to. Of the glut of kitsch and whimsical joke-products we are naturally tired of, many are not ironic at all, and those that are, do not use irony intelligently. Secondly, as I hope to demonstrate, using irony in design need not be an empty gesture and can, instead, enrich and stimulate the landscape of objects we live with./pa href=”http://www.core77.com/blog/featured_items/the_design_comedy_in_defence_of_irony_by_tim_parsons_16670.asp”(more…)/a
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