COP Seminar 3/11

During this session we looked at deconstruction and pastiche and their relationship to graphic design.

Deconstruction 

Deconstruction was created by Derrida, initially as a mode used in questioning existing and assumed hierarchies and structures, such as speech being greater than writing. It was Ellen Lupton in her 1996 book 'Design, Writing, Research' who explored the aspects and methods of deconstruction and it's relation to graphic design. 

'Deconstruction focuses not on themes or imagery of its subjects but rather on the linguistic and industrial systems that frame their production.'

There is an argument with Derrida's looked on deconstructionism that an intellectual system built on the opposition between reality and representation is, in fact dependant on representation to build itself. Despite the fact that language is considered superior to writing, both rely on repeatable signs in order to function.

Taking this further into the world of graphic design we can look at typography. If writing is a copy of spoken language then typography is a mode of representation even father removed from the primal source of meaning in the mind of the author. It is not in opposition with written text, rather it is embedded within it.

Hori's Poster is an example of typography used in deconstruction.

We can also look at layout as another layer embedded with language, writing and typography. :about and typography can inform the meaning of the content just as much as the words themselves. Examples of layouts that used deconstruction to add an extra layer to meaning include the layout to GLAS, designed by Eckersley, House of Leaves designed by Danielewski and the layout of the Mouse and the Fury from Alice in Wonderland. 

GLAS is an academic piece of writing, the layout of it is based off of early printed books. The voice of the main text and the voice of the footnotes are represented through different fonts and the way they are laid out together entwines the both as opposed to separating them.

House of Leaves is a book compiling letters written from the authors mother from within a mental hospital. The layouts represent her scattered mind and the sense of mess and confusion that comes with mental illness. Her words are given a stronger meaning by placing them in a messy and muddled context. 

The Mouse and the Fury is more of an illustrative example of layout design, the words of the poem twist and turn down the page visually representing the tail of a mouse.

Pastiche

Feed Jameson coined the term pastiche, it is described as a loss of connection to history and a pure fascination to the present. He explains that post modernism in design has left history emptied out stylisations that can be commodified and consumed. 

Pastiche is simple a parody or imitation of a particular unique, idiosyncratic style.

Examples of pastiche within graphic design include deigns by Stranger and Stranger and packaging for the brand Soap and Glory. 

Stranger and Stranger parody Victorian style posters and etchings and reference the style of image and typography used in these contexts. The overall look is one that I personally find pleasing, however there is a danger that if a form of pastiche becomes common place it can render it's previous history as useless; it will only be understood in relation to the present.

Soap and Glory do not directly copy the advertising style of the 40's and 50's, rather it takes codes and styles commonplace from the era and mixes them with more modern fonts and techniques in order to create this branding parody. 

COP Lecture 2: Subculture: The Meaning of Style

Subcultures are always something presented by the youth culture, born out of fashion decisions and music styles. As a whole when subcultures begin they issue symbolic challenges to the larger society, however over time they all must end. They establish new conventions, create new commodities, new industries and are eventually swallowed by the society they initially challenged. 

After watching 'Subculture' (2012) by Dir Don Letts and presented by Fred Perry outlines each subculture, what they were born out of and what they each stood for.

UK Youth culture began after the second world war, there were no more uniforms to be worn and so people began to make their own. Subcultures were born alongside the term teenager, young people had extra money and extra time and so spent this time and money on rock and roll records rolling in from the good ol' US of A. 

The first subculture were the Teddy Boys. Being a parody of the upper classes who wore mainly Edwardian style dress, they wore a drape jacket and crepe soled shoes. The theory was, as a working class teenage boy, you had no money or education but you could still choose your clothes and consume music. 

There were also the American inspired rockers who wore big battered leather jackets and jeans, rode motorcycles, and cared very little about their appearance. The ideal behind rocker culture was the freedom to travel anywhere not looking pretty. 

Then came the Modernists (Mods) who adopted skinny ties, clean hair cuts. They took a lot of their inspiration from European fashion and adopted the Italian mode of transport- the scooter. This, like with the motorbike for the rockers, gave a sense of freedom and this freedom meant there was less of a reliance on the older generation. 

Mods and rockers were renowned for fighting, there was no more war for the country and so the subcultures created their own. The most famous of which occurred in Brighton in 1964. The media demonised both groups as violent and out of control.

Eventually mod began to divide into two groups, the first was influenced by other cultures, wore looser clothing and eventually became hippies. The other went more tight and clean, cut their hair very short, wore suspenders and boots and became what was later named the Skinheads.

The skin heads of the 60's was a pure subculture born out of mod and Rude Boy influences and were not burdened with the racist label they have today. The racial side was only born out of the late 70's revival of the skinhead look adopted by the EDL and nationalist groups.

Rude Boy Look

Northern Soul followed, and the style could be considered to be purely about wearing clothes to dance in. Fixated on the latest record and unknown record from the black American genre, it was all about the music and all about the dancing.

What followed next was punk, possibly the most famous of all subcultures. Punk was all about not giving a shit, ripped clothes, safety pins, being an outsider. It was about doing what you want even if you weren't very good at it. It opened the doors for many new bands and a lot of female bands, something that hadn't been seen to nearly the same extent before.

Two tone came next. A mixture of reggae and punk created the classical ska sound we all know today. The Thatcher regime put a lot of pressure on working class people, anger was felt by both black and white working class teenagers and two tone music was a way of expressing their anger (especially in The Special's Ghost Town) it was a unity between both races in music and fashion.

With the birth of drug culture came rave culture. People dancing in warehouse parties, tripping off their minds, wearing casual sports clothes suitable to dance and sweat in. You couldn't look good in rave culture because even if you took time on your appearance you'd look like a drowned rat 20 minutes into dancing. 

The final, and some call it last subculture was Britpop of the 90s. Although many people speculate whether this was a sub culture or not- it was driven by the music made and not started by a bunch of working class teenagers trying to find their own identity. Whether it is or isn't a subculture doesn't change the fact that britpop caused some excellent music to be made.

COP Lecture 1: The Gaze and The Media

It was said by Berger: 'Men look at women, women watched themselves being looked at' 

The gaze is a term describing the sexualisation of women through art and media because of the object of our desires not looking back. this gives the viewer the impression of permission as their gaze is not being challenged and the subject appears submissive. 

This gaze is found in many classical paintings throughout history the most famous being Hans Memling's 'Vanity' (1485). It's said that because she is more occupied with looking at herself, that gives us permission to look at her, she is not challenging our gaze.

There are many devices used to hide the subjects gaze in order for them to not be able to challenge ours, like with 'Birth of Venus' (1863) painted by Alexandre Cabanel, her arm hides her eyes from views whilst her body is still appearing open and free to look at. 

Examples of the gaze are not only present in paintings, there are also countless examples found in modern photography and design, such as Wonderbra's 'Hello Boys' campaign of 1994. The billboard ad was said to have caused traffic problems from so many drivers slowing down to look at it. However once again we see our gaze is neither met nor challenged giving permission to look and sexualising the woman as a mere thing to stare at.

There are some examples where the gaze is met, however our gaze remains unchallenged, it is more encouraged with, for want of better words, a 'come hither' look. We are encouraged to continue staring. An example of this is the obsession for men advert (1993)

In this series of adverts for Tom Ford's fragrance for men (2007), we see a further device used to encourage the gaze. In these images the women is segmented into different sections of her body, boobs, legs and vagina, vagina and stomach, this breaks down the view of her a whole person and makes her a mere sum of her body parts. 

The gaze is used in many of todays adverts and although can be said to exist in some adverts where the male is the subject of our gaze majority of the time it is women being turned into objects. This has caused backlashes across society where is seems to be deemed normal for a women to be objectified. Unfortunately this means many women, such as Lucy Ann Holmes, who stand for any feminist issue can be received with tonnes of anger and backlash (all she wanted was for a women to be placed back onto a note bill and she received death threats).

It also means that we almost expect women to be naked, this year with the scandal around leaked nude photos of celebrities it was surprising how much angry backlash was geared towards the celebrities themselves for taking these personal photos for personal use rather than towards the person or people who actually invaded their privacy and leaked them. (It also a funny surprise when it ended up being only female actor's pictures that were leaked and no males)

COP Seminar 20/10

We looked at an extract from Contemporary Sociological Theory on the subject of Identity.

The first half of the chapter focused on Sheldon Stryker's identity theory based on social hierarchies. His theory can be summarised thus, we have multiple identities and the identity or identities we choose to reveal depend on social and physical structures in place. These can include the people we are with, the place we are or our position/social status within society. Our many identities are held with different regard, the amount of commitment we place in specific identities is based on their position within our own salience hierarchies; the ones we deem the most important are at the top, the ones we deem less important, at the bottom. The position of an identity on the salience hierarchy is determined by outside validation, we seek approval of an identity from others and it is others who determine the effectiveness of our various identities. Because of this the more committed we are to a particular identity the more our self-esteem is tied up within it's validation, if we do not gain approval or validity from others it is a huge blow to our self esteem and our emotions. Stryker describes emotions as makers of adequacy, our emotions exist to inform us of whether or not our performance was successful or unsuccessful.They motivate individuals to play particular roles that revive positive reinforcement. 

The second part of the chapter looked into George McCall and John Simmons' ideas of identity. Unlike Stryker who believes identity is determined and pre planned by a set of structures, physical or social. They believe that identity or role performance is mostly improvised as a way to achieve goals and that this role reflects an idealised or imagined view of ourselves and is the driving force behind our behaviour. The validation sought out for this form of identity comes from ourselves rather than others and due to the high standards we set for ourselves we will always feel some sense of dissatisfaction in regards to our role performance. We review and validate our performances based off of the interpretation of gestures of others, due to ambiguous nature of gestures and social interaction there is plenty of room for this interpretation. The aim of reviewing our roles is in order to search for support of our chosen identities and several mechanisms are in play in order to maintain our vision of support, these include short term credit; looking back on previous experiences of validation to certify an identities effectiveness, the selective perception of cues; only noticing the responses that confirm the identity choice, selective interpretation of cue; seeing the social cues and interpreting them in a way that supports identity, withdrawing from interactions; moving from a situation that doesn't support chosen identity to one that does, switching role identity; changing from one identity to one that is more likely to bring support, scapegoating audiences; blaming audiences for lack of support as opposed to the chosen identity,  disavowing unsuccessful performances; rejecting blame and denying responsibility for failure and rejecting the audience if they withhold support for a performance. 

With many interactions being unambiguous, as mentioned earlier, other than personal interpretation, there is a degree of exchange negotiation and altercasting,  negotiating the position both parties will play. e.g. whose the leader, and attempting to persuade others to take specific roles. The reward methods for our role performances are both intrinsic and extrinsic, there are the obvious rewards of money, or perhaps pride, however McCall and Simmons argue that the largest reward is support and validation of a role performance. They go on to state that is our expectations of a role performance are met that our need for validation begins to decline, however if they fall short or over achieve what was expected then our need for the support and validation increases.

So how can those theories relate to or even inform graphic design? Well I have two theories, Stryker's theory relates to design driven by social confinement. The target market and what they expect to see is the driving force behind a design, where as is McCall and Simmons the driving force is the personal identity of the designer. They have an idea if what they want their design to look like and will seek all support they can to validate their belief in their own design identity. My second theory is similar to the idea for Stryker's theory, that identity is important for a designer to understand due to our need to please and design for a specific target audience. These theories allow us to understand the people we are targeting in order to best market our designs and products.

Linking Interactionalist Identity to Psychoanalysis 

There are some similarities and connections between the socialist and interactionalist identity and the theories of psychoanalysis, specifically those subjects related to ego, desire and the mirror stage. If we look at Freud’s idea of the ego ideal, we see a similarity with the ideal identity described in McCall and Simmons’s. The ego ideal is an ideal personality or identity perceived by an individual just as the role identity is described as an ideal or imagined version of self. Moving onto Lacan’s ideas of desire, that an object or person is considered desirable simply because others deem it so, we can see a striking similarity with the social identity described by Stryker. The identity we form can be a conclusion of understanding and imitating characteristics and identities deemed socially acceptable by a specific group. The characteristics we adopt within certain identities are only considered successful choices because others believe them to be and validate them to be so. The only reason we fully commit to certain identities is because we believe them to be the ones that people validate the most, they only become important to us because others deem them as best and in certain cases, the ones that fit best into societal structures determined by a majority.

We can also compare Freud’s theory of id, ego and superego to the social identity described by Stryker as well as the idealised self specified by McCall and Simmons. The id is our unconscious instinct the demands immediate satisfaction to instinctual feelings, such as anger, hunger or sexual desire; the ego is the partly conscious, partly subconscious realistic part of our brain, it aims to satisfy the id’s wants but it creates a realistic, however not moral strategy in order to do so; the super ego is the area of ourselves that holds the morals and the values, often influenced by parents and authority figures as children, it controls the id though conscience a way the ego alone cannot and punishes and rewards the id through emotions such as guilt or pride, it can withhold id satisfaction, and projects an ideal form of self for us to work and aim towards. The conscience can be linked to Stryker’s social identity, what is considered good or bad is determined by what others deemed good or bad, and often our behaviour is modified from what we want to do to what we shouldn’t do due to social pressure. You may want to jump on the table and have sex with the person opposite you, however sex is labelled as societally forbidden and so our conscience disallows us the right to do so through embarrassment and guilt. In the same way that we may have identities that we wish to display, but certain societal structures labels them as inappropriate so we don’t reveal them. The other half of the super ego, the ideal self, as mentioned earlier is just like the ideal or imagined identity we strive towards described by McCall and Simmons.

Finally we can look at the mirror stage, this is similar to the ideal self previously mentioned but relates on a more physical sense of self. As infants we enter a stage of development where we begin to recognise our own reflections and experience an external image of our bodies, this leads us to develop a mental representation of ourselves or “I” this perception of “I” becomes the basis for our identities. Due to the undeveloped condition of our body and the preconceived ideas of a body as a unified whole we begin to establish an ideal version of “I” that we will strive towards for the rest of our life. This is, once again, like the ideal or imagined identity from McCall and Simmons’s book; we have a perceived inner version of ourselves which we strive towards and which drives us to behave the way we do.

OUGD401: Context of Practice: Lecture Notes

Visual Literacy

 Typography

Chronologies of Print

Chronologies of Animation

The Photograph as Document

Graphic Design in Mass Media

Post Modernism

OUGD401: Context of Practice: Task 5

Analysis of a Typeface

Beatrice Warde states that a good typography must ask of type not 'How should it look?' but 'What must it do?' which is wrong. Ok in her context of type for books, where large amounts of text are present I believe her 'crystal goblet' logic is sound but to state that it is the only form of typography worth considering is just a very dull way of looking at the world. 

My example of type is Franchise Bold- I love this type face, it shouts, it demands and it stands strongly out from the crowd, yet it also restrain itself before it becomes too overbearing. It's a transitional san serif type that appears to have begun it's life in the wood printing press, however this font is relatively new and still a baby, designed by Derek Weathersbee who states that each character was "meticulously drawn to achieve a unifomity without compromising style". It's decorative rather than functional, as all my favourite type is. Not all type should blend into the background, and certainly shouldn't be ignored.

So why is Beatrice wrong? I'll use the example of Franchise to defend my opinion. She proclaims that

"the most important thing about printing is that it conveys thought, ideas, images, from one mind to other minds."- Warde

Perhaps, but what about the tone? It's all well and good relying purely on content to deliver your message; and in the context of books and large amounts of body text this may be true, as mentioned previously, but for all other forms of type this cannot be the case. Surely type must convey something about what it's saying rather than just saying it? Isn't that simply mirroring language? In human speech when two people communicate what we say means little to nothing, it makes up about 10% of communication. The rest is made up of 50% body language and 40% tone of voice. 

I can say the words 'I love you so much' but if spoken sarcastically without eye contact and a body held away from the person I'm talking to do I really love them? If spoken maliciously with a strong and defiant body then surely these words become threatening and scary rather than loving. It works both ways, if I were to say 'You're such a stupid bitch' with a smile on my face, an open body posture and a tone of voice that conveys joking the words are taken in jest and humour rather than pure insult if they were read without context. 

Typefaces are called typefaces because they are the 'face' we look at whilst being spoken to and that face can change the meaning of words by distorting it's expression or setting itself in a new font. 

"A public speaker is more 'audible' in that sense when he bellows. But a good speaking voice is one which is inaudible as a voice. It is the transparent goblet again!"- Warde

Well surely this comes down to context? Yes a good speaking voice may be one that is also inaudible but if I were attempting to warn people about a fire that's broken out then I think bellowing it would be more suitable than using a good clear speaking voice. This is the same with typography, if I am trying to sway your opinion on a subject I don't want my voice inaudible, I want it as loud as possible. if I'm trying to sell you something or catch your attention I want you to hear me. Let's look some examples, three examples in the ever so legible font Baskerville and three in Franchise Bold.

Which examples jump to your eyes attention first? Which examples do you read first? And which ones seem more suitable for their contexts and topics? For each, Franchise Bold is the answer. There's a reason headlines are set in typefaces similar to Franchise Bold and not in Baskerville. If we were to 'hear' these phrases the tone of voice for each font in dramatically different. I can barely hear Baskerville but I can definitely hear Franchise Bold, it's demanding I do something right now, whether that's paying attention to it, buying something from it or saving the whales.

"When you listen to a song in a language you do not understand, part of your mind actually does fall asleep, leaving your quite separate aesthetic sensibilities to enjoy themselves unimpeded by your reasoning faculties. The fine arts do that; but that is not the purpose of printing. Type well used is invisible as type, just as the perfect talking voice is the unnoticed vehicle for the transmission of words, ideas."- Warde

This is so very untrue, if we are listening to a song sung in another language then we surely are listening to how it is sang to gain our sense of context and tone. If they sing harshly and sharply, strong defined consonants and spitting on P's and T's then we know the song must be about anger, frustration. If we were to hear it in the natural and monotonous speaking tone then we would derive nothing from the song at all. We don't know the words, we have no idea how it should be sang, and we are given nothing to fill in the gaps- it becomes empty, flat and useless. 

In the context of voice we look to actors, an actor would consider themselves unsuccessful if they weren't able to communicate to you their intended emotions through facial expressions and tone of voice; an inaudible, clear and empty actor is a bad one. How can you communicate to an audience if you don't use any tools of communication? The transmission of words and ideas come laced with persuasion and tone, these must be transmitted along with the words and without tone the words becomes meaningless jumbles of letters.

In conclusion type and fonts are voices, not wine glasses. They communicate to us as another person would and we rely not on what they say but how they say it, on the tone of voice they choose, the context in which they're speaking to us and the inflections used in language to keep our attention. Each typeface is another person, a different character, a different voice and it is up to the designer to find the appropriate context for a font or the appropriate font for a context.

If I am to view type as just an object then surely I want a beautiful object, I want an object that tells me something about the drink inside.

  Give me the golden jewel encrusted goblet anyday, I prefer to drink my wine in style. 

OUGD401: Context of Practice: SB2- Theory into Practice

'Certain advertisements, posters, packages, logos, books and magazines endure as sign posts of artistic, commercial, and technological achievement that often speak more about particular epochs or milieus than fine art ’(Heller and Pomeroy 1997).

This was the key inspiration behind  my publication. I thoroughly believe when it comes to the representation of culture and society that Graphic Design is the medium through which it can be viewed the most clearly. So to put this theory into practice I decided to produce a picture book depicting graphic design examples of a certain era- I chose the 90's as it's a decade close to my heart and one I remember with fondness- and also one that I feel is easily definable through design. 

The title of the publication is: Defining a Decade through Design.

The format I chose for my book was 89x148, the exact dimensions of the original game boy- which would also be the front cover. The images included and gathered would all be examples of 90's design. (originally I had wanted to include more clothing and toys into the book, however I felt these were examples of design and not specifically Graphic design and so most of my content was made up with packaging, posters, magazine and album covers.)

It was at this point that I decided to change the binding of the publication from a stitch bind to a concertina bind. I felt that this style of publication lent itself better to picture books and more 'arty' looking pages. Also it meant that each page could be appreciated individually as well as the publication as a whole when you fully stretched it out. 

For my inspiration into the look, layout and design of the pages I looked into 90's graphic design- mostly David Carson and, I really like his stuff. 

I found a lot of 90's design has a visual beauty to it that doesn't consider form or function, it considers personalty above everything and that spoke to me so much more than clean, dull and empty modernist design. What's the point of being a creative if you're not even going to try and make something look beautiful? 

I enjoyed creating a 'mess' in the background on which to place my images. It was a refreshing way of thinking about design, I didn't have to consider the practically rather the look and this appealed to me. 

For my fonts I only used fonts developed in the 90's -FF Tokyo and FF Gothic were my two choices. Both looked drastically different from each other whilst still remaining bold and unapologetic- characteristics I wanted to represent of the decade. 

FF Gothic

FF Tokyo

Final Publication

The front cover and format were inspired by a Game Boy, how cool is that?

The actual title of my publication hidden at the back: Defining a Decade through Design: The 90's

Evaluation

As a whole I really do like my publication- it may not be the most intense book ever produced but I do feel as a piece of design it is successful- it sums up the decade of the 90's through pictures and layout design. I really like the look of it, the slight chaotic beauty really appeals to the scatter brain in me. 

The production of this book could've been done better. The stock I printed on didn't lend itself too easily to being folded concertina style and the attempts to stick the font and back pages together resulted in some bubbling on a few of the pages- this really bugs me because other than that it worked out very well. I think this was due to the way I printed my pages as a continuous piece of paper rather than dividing them into sections to glue together. 

I believe this publication highlights one key theme I refer to in my essay- That Graphic Design is a better communicator and representation of particular times, epochs and decades than fine art. This is the driving inspiration and rational behind the entire book. The representation of the 90's through graphic design demonstrates that graphics can represent particular times and sum up the tone and feel of a certain decade.