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Motivation
2.7 Technological innovation 2.8 Ethics 2.9 Sustainability
[16.] Dunne, A. 2007. In: ‘Design Interactions Yearbook 2007’. London: Royal College of Art [17.] Dunne, A. 2008. [Personal communication]. 15 January [18.] Pevsner, N. 1937. ‘An Enquiry Into Industrial Art in England’. Basingtoke: Macmillan [19.] As discussed on p102, although plastics have brought durability at a low price, they suffer from an inability to age gracefully and their tactile qualities are often considered less satisfying than the materials they replaced. Hence the material substance of products can be said to have been diluted by plastics, despite their advantages. -
futures that they do not necessarily advocate. These cautionary tales are easily mistaken for the work of dangerous misanthropes if viewed in the traditional way. (16) The difference – not always discernable from images and sound-bites in magazines (or even the designers’ own websites) – is the context of the work. While some pieces are intended to be manufactured and distributed, others have been designed specifically to generate debate around their implications and these tend to be shown in galleries or disseminated through publications. Whether it is these products, or simply the ideas they provoke that are intended for consumption, is likely to affect our ethical view of them. The discussion, representation, or even satirising of immoral acts and dark deeds is part and parcel of a free society, but the promotion and distribution of tools to aid them is more questionable. The public understanding of design culture is slowly catching up with that of literature, film and other art forms where shocking images have become acceptable when part of an intelligent narrative expression. Like these art forms, designers will have to cope with the righteous indignation of self-appointed moral guardians, who, not prepared to look for deeper meaning in the work or engage in the debate it sparks, will dismiss it out of hand. However, far from being negative, this broadening of subject matter and the emerging context of design for debate provides a conduit for designers and their audience to reflect upon the state of society and the full spectrum of possibilities it holds – a role previously hampered by the expectation of presenting only positive imagery (see 2.12 Design for debate). With context playing such an important role in the ethical view of this work, designers may need to be more careful to communicate their intentions effectively.
Some, however, believe otherwise. A small number of designers have picked up on the benefits of being ambiguous about the planned outcome of their work with the express purpose of using any adverse reaction to fuel the debate (see 1.1 Design and politics). A big enough outcry may even stop others with fewer scruples trying genuinely to release similar products. Rather than eviscerate the work by declaring its hoax status, these objects and scenarios are presented neutrally – neither with a sales pitch nor a damning indictment. Faced with the question “Does the designer really think this is a good idea?”, the viewer is encouraged to form his or her own opinion. Part of this process, explains Anthony Dunne, a leading exponent of design for debate, is to avoid the work being described as art. “If our work is categorised as art, it defuses it. We insist on it being design because people get uncomfortable with that. They say, ‘How can that be design, it’s not mass-produced’. Why does it have to be mass-produced? They say, ‘But it isn’t answering a need.’ Well, why does it have to answer a need? You can raise all these questions by keeping it in that space…We borrow a lot from art but I see that as research.” (17) OBJECTS AS MORAL ACTANTS To the high-minded designers and theorists of the last century, design had a social imperative. As founder of the discipline of design history, Nikolaus Pevsner put it: “To fight against the shoddy design of those goods by which most of our fellow men are surrounded becomes a moral duty.” (18) Thanks to modern materials, especially plastics, the once elusive mixture of affordability and durability is commonplace (19) and the moral emphasis has shifted to ensuring products are conceptually as well as physically sound.
Fig. 5 Afterlife by Auger–Loizeau The project explored uses for the latent chemical energy remaining within the body after death.
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