Anderson Dalle LasteMA GMD PT2016

Research Portfolio

Research Gathering and making sense of information

Reaction Sketches, experiments, writings, tests...

Results Individual project outputs

Review Analysis of emerging research interests

This portfolio highlights practical and contextual crossovers found during Unit 1 of the MA Graphic Media Design course at London College of Communication. By presenting three projects simultaneously, I intend to reflect more critically on each projects similarities and differences. The reader can either focus on a single project at a time or follow the dialogue between the three narratives. This approach takes into account the evolution of Unit 1 through four universal sections - Research, Reaction, Results and Review.

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Project 1

EnvironmentProject 2

WordsProject 3

Object

Research

Source material

Ridley Road Market, Dalston, London Dematerialisation of Screen Space, Jessica Helfand Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer

Community

Immigration

Diversity

Urbanism

Social experiment

Ridley Road Market

Apart but a part

Exchange

Individual x collective

Process x substance

Reaction

Screen spaceTechnologyEvolution

Jeopardy

Conflict

Complexity

FutureSpeculation

RiskNarrative

Satire

Science

Environment

Observing

Practice of observational skills using diverse recording tools. Ridley Road Market is located in East London, it attracts a multicultural clientele everyday. Some of the most common selling goods are food, clothes and house utensils.

Analysing

From a focused reading, I have analised the authors point of view in order to further develop my own position that would take the form of a visual essay. The text poses questions about the limitations of the screen space and make predictions about the future of technologic avant-garde.

Questioning

Before choosing an object for Project 3, I practiced observational and analitical skills in order to pose questions about a given object.

Research

First steps

The source text provided four key themes for exploration:

1. Technologic evolution2. The role and rhetorics of the screen3. Defining and delineating space4. Elements of digital language

During a visit to LCCs archive, I selected the object that became the basis for Project 3.

Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer is a tool in the shape of a flat disk that calculates the power and physical damages of a nuclear bomb attack based on a set of variables. By rotating two plastic handles the users can specify numbers for each variable in order to generate an output related to their chances of survival. The stark nature of the object proved to be a rich source of further questioning.

Research

Finding a route

Initial research

From photographs taken at the market, a selection portraying disengaged single individuals provided an unconventional perspective to the bustling environment. It also raised initial insights about the role of the individual within a community.

Iconic banknote figures transformed into superheroes or villains whose personalities correspond to the publics perception of the individuals political influence. These characters represent the opposite of disengagement.

Questions regarding effectiveness of technologic evolution and how user trends follow those in order to remain up-to-date.

Visual analogies based on objects form and nature. The individuals active or passive role on a spinning game in which survival is the final prize.

Satire as a language for visual expression with humanistic approach: perceiving the individual within specific circumstances. Different roles are played - victim, hero and trend-setter.

Research

Rhetoric: satire

Rabatti, Alessandro (2015). Facebank series Sideshowworld (no date) Unknown title

FKA twigs #throughglass Thanko thumb extender

ABC News (2013). Wheel of Fortune

Research

Insights through words

These are the most essential books during my research for Unit 1. Not only they provided useful information about contemporary design practice but also extended my interests to other fields such as sociology, technology and science.

How can design help strenghten every day exchanges and engage people? Everyday trades (at Ridley Road Market) cannot be completed without cash. The idea of a social cash (or currency) emerged.

The commodification of the object puts into question its utilitarian aspects. Is it meant to increase the populations chance of survival or simply raise fear?

Daniel Neville proposes a rationale that approaches the value and nature of evolution in relation to design. Is it possible to create processes that alter the natural evolution of society and humanity?

It can be said that evolution works because it sees process not substance as the main constituent of the world. Forms of behaviour emerge from the process of the relationship and feedback between the organism and environment.

Daniel NevilleA Relational Design Process

Back in those psychedelic days of yore, you could order your own fantastic pastel plastic Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer directly from the U.S. Government Printing Office for a single green dollar.

John Walkerformilab.ch

In cities, large numbers of people live in close proximity to one another, without knowing most of those others personally.

Contact between city-dwellers is fleeting and partial, a means to other ends

Anthony GiddensSociology

Research

Insights through words

Another recurring subject during my research was the theme of parallel realities and experimentation of possible futures.

Dr. Strangelove is a fiction movie that portrays the start of a nuclear war. The link between this possible scenario and the real commodification of the Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer during the Cold War intensifies the sense of imminent jeopardy.

Augmented and Virtual reality technologies are extending the functionality of the screen space for these to become active frames of alternative realities. How can design create new processes and stories for this new window? How these technologies will affect the way we see the world?

Craig Freeman, John. (2012) Border Memorial: Frontera de los Muertos Dr. Strangelove (1964), Stanley Kubrick [Film]

Research

Alternative realities

Imagining an ideal urban community in which every new member could easily blend in. Not necessarily like a hero, but someone who is valued and values other people's service and work in return - money would become secondary.

Sociologicalcommunity integration

CulturalRidley Roads diversity

Urbanismexchanges and trades

Capitalismproposal of a new currency, money as secondary

SpeculativeWhat if a exchanges were firstly paid with gratitude rather than money?

Technologicthe screen space: new inventions, new realities

Sociologicsocietys relation to surrounding technologies

Scientificevolution (natural x artificial)

Visual rhetoricmetaphor, satire:human adaptation to new technologies

SpeculativeWhat if the course of human evolution is profoundly altered by science and technology?

Political war, conflict

HistoricalCold War

Psychological fear, threat, jeopardy

Visual rhetoricmetaphor, satire: gamification of danger

Commodificationpresence of the tool in the household

SpeculativeHow useful would the tool be during a real nuclear attack?

Research

FrameworksThe lists below give context and represent possible routes for further research and experimentation of each project.

Analisying the environment and its participants to question society's influence, the individuals role and their perceived identity. Newcomers and immigrants are ideal protagonists in this story as they reflect how culturally diverse Ridley Road Market is.

The first drafts of my visual essay were composed of a mixmatch of ideas. A recurring interest seem to be the use of generative systems (or algorithms) as tools for the design of processes that create an infinite and unpredictable array of outputs.

The circular shape and spinning movement of the original object were chosen elements for the language of Project 3. A selection of images that make analogy to jeopardy were carefully sequenced to build and break the tension of the narrative.

Reaction

Sketching the narratives

Stamps and banknotes influenced the visual language for the project's narrative. They reinforced the symbolic role of the individual. The new currency works as normal banknotes, it must be given when a trade is made as a sign of honest gratitude. Different messages can be incorporated to it through an online customisation platform.

Sound was incorporated to the visual narrative in order to enhance the oddness of the subject and increase tension. Slow spins reduce tension, transmit heaviness and promote reflection.

A countdown creates a distressing sense of gamification within a scenario of imminent danger.

Mapping different evolutionary processes to serve as framework for the visual essay.

The nature of the pixel and analogic patterns is used to illustrate the evolution of the screen space.

Reaction

Visual experiments

Results

Overview

Project 1

Social currencyProject 2

Visual essayProject 3

Moving imageLeaving, Arriving, Settling Evolution is Reactive Doomsday

After testing different variations of the currency, a more universal version without picture has been chosen to extend the usability of the artefact. The translations on the background link with the different languages that can be heard from the leaving sound. The 1st watermark intends to evoke a progress from the 2nd present on the stamps.

Stamps as artefacts that travel across borders symbolising a link between the individual's original and new home.

In collaboration with Rebecca Worth

Audio: multiple languages expressing a single narrative: the excitement but nervousness of moving abroad.

In collaboration with Amanda Perry-Kessaris

To whom: Individuals who left their home countries for a better life somewhere else.

Leaving Arriving Settling

Results

Project 1: the narrative

Results

Project 1: overview

At the marketobservation, people's movements, sounds, rhythms...

Finding a framework and developing the narrativeurbanism, individual and collective

Visual experimentation and testing tools

Results

Project 2Click to view

My key insight comes from Jessica Helfands Dematerialisation of Screen Space (2001) in which the author analyses the progress of technological evolution:

More likely, our response has been a reactive one: to technological imperatives, to pragmatic considerations, and to each other. To think beyond these practicalities is to respond to a broader and more compelling challenge.

Through visual research I have identified a group of shapes that are commonly used to illustrate evolutionary patterns and these became the framework for the essay. My initial idea was to explore how humans and technology are reactive to each other. From this starting point I then looked for further writing material. Neville (2011) highlights the process of feedback between organism and environment, which led me to expand my research to the scientific field. Taking also into account Charles Darwins evolution studies I came across the concept of Eugenics and how DNA manipulation technologies can distort our notion of natural selection.

The visual language of this project was mainly inspired by The Media is the Massage and The Age of Earthquakes. I believe the appropriation of relatively unrelated imagery to create new relevant meaning helps accentuate the highly critical tone of those books. I tried to explore a similar approach. For example, the use of a diamond on page 8 helps illustrate the elastic instance of the evolution process, but it also serves

as a metaphor that questions the value we give to mobile devices (such as the iPhone). Even though these devices are on the extreme opposite of a diamond in terms of rarity, their value is linked to how much of our own lives are transferred to them and how much we are willing to adapt our mental capacities in order to make the most of our user experience.

Some of the graphics are overlaid with different pixel densities, RGB stripes and blurs. These represent the progress of the digital space - from undefined, rough and unknown to a crisper retina display that portrays the mediums relevance in modern urban society.

I decided to materialise the essay through printing as an provocative response to the title of the source text. The book format is a simple but efficient communication tool, which allowed the development of the theme in different ways for each page spread. The book also allowed the experimentation with superimposition of layers of content using drafting film. The initial intention was to print the essay with strong contrast of black and white. However, I learned that the dense black ink in some of the pages would compromise the quality of the final output from a riso printer. I then modified some of the artworks in order to match risographs printing limitations. For this project my efforts were focused on content. The research produced some intriguing ideas which I tried to communicate in a metaphorical and hopefully thought-provoking way.

Results

Project 2

Structuremapping and visualising evolution

Contextual reseachnatural x technologic evolution,human evolution and science,DNA manipulation, eugenics

Visual languagescreen-based systems

Results

Project 2: overview

Results

Project 3Click to play

Results

Project 3: overviewContextual reseachDr. Strangelove, characters as caricatures

ExperimentationSketching, time factor, moving image, sounds (new software skills: After Effects)

Editing Humanity

The text references an emerging technology in the scientific field called CRISPR, which promises to make it possible to edit genetic information quickly and cheaply in order to cure and treat diseases.

The central hypothesis of the text is based on ethical issues related to non-medical enhancements made possible by the technology.

For the author, its not the role of scientists to determinate whether it is right or wrong to edit the genome for improvement of human attributes - the judge of that should be society as a whole. The text also raises awareness of some countries which may have legislation gaps or poor enforcement, letting privately funded scientists or fertility clinics carry out unregulated CRISPR research.

The author concludes that those concerns should not obstruct CRISPRs progress since its ultimately a tool that gives people healthier, longer and better-quality lives.

Rehearsing the disaster: Pre-enactment between reality and fiction

According to Cavallo (2011), our vision of the future seems more tangible than ever thanks to the increasing confidence in the human ability to devise tools capable of modifying it. The author approaches risk assessment through pre-enactment practice, which serves to identify ways that supposedly forthcoming dangers and worst-case scenarios are performed before they happen.

Pre-enactment is a useful tool for governments to produce a more risk-aware society in the hope of making their countries safer. However, it can also be used by artists to reflect on, speculate and critique the consequences of current world affairs.

Pre-enactment is constructed and often perceived as a narrative - meaning an organised sequence of events. It is described by the author as a sort of spiritual vaccine which injects fear in order to release immunity antibodies.

Review

Annotated Bibliography

Review

Annotated Bibliography

Speculative Everything

The authors approach design as a means to change reality (so it becomes more malleable) rather than simply describing or maintaining it (p. 3). The book offers a contemporary crossover of art, design, architecture, science, sociology, futurology, political theory, philosophy of technology and literary fiction. Speculative Design complements those disciplines in order to propose imaginative alternatives for a better future.

According to the authors, one area which design as critique has obvious practical applications is science research (p. 47). Biotechnology allows not only the manipulation of things in the environment around us but the design of life itself.

This have huge consequences for what it means to be human, how we relate to each other, our identity, our dreams, hopes and fears.

A Relational Design Process

The thesis refers to Andrey Blauvelts theory of Relational Design which views the last century in design and art as consisting of three waves. The first one focused on the creation of a universal visual syntax for those fields, the second continued by exploring its semantic and meaning making potential. The thesis focuses on the third wave, which takes into account changing scientific paradigms that have shaped recent design practice.

It explores how contemporary design can be applied to create processes (generative systems / algorithms) or evolving solutions that are somehow alive by reacting to the context they are part of.

The text references a few case studies. It explores how the use of contingency is used to alter the colours of the logo system for the Casa de Musica, a music hall in Portugal. This logo responds to the immediate design environment in which it is viewed. Another case study looks at how the use of generative systems is able to influence aspects of a dynamic typeface used for the twin cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

The author affirms that design practice must always respond to the broader culture in order to stay relevant in a constantly changing and increasingly complex world.

My emerging interests include design as an investigative tool focused on a future in which science and technology will provide ways of designing ourselves and therefore our evolution. The diagrams below cross-references four selected texts which might influence the next steps of my research.

Review

Context Review

New technologies, such as genome editing, usually pose risks that must be considered. What impact would the manipulation of innate aesthetic features have on a society that is strongly based on self-image? Will genome editing promote the revival of eugenic ideals of an ideal race that was popular in the first decades of the 20th century?

Perhaps some answers could be provided by a connection between genome editing technology and Relational design ideas. Both subjects deal with evolution and promote the design or manipulation of processes. Genome editing alters the route of human evolution (transforming it to something less 'natural'), whereas generative systems provide evolution through design.

The Relational design process also has parallels with Speculative design as both take into account environmental variables and overall context in order to generate design outputs or raise questions. The first method creates

solutions that may be inserted into the present whereas the Speculative approach takes into account socio-political variables and focuses more heavily on the future.Both design methodologies also dialogue with pre-enactment practice, which can be considered a speculative narrative that plays with variables in order to create scenarios of risk in the future. The interaction between the visual language of design, risk assessment and science should provide a rich and scalable range of possibilities for rhetoric argumentation.

I would like to explore the role of design in communicating how present actions can raise future social issues. Design methodologies can help create visual narratives, processes and systems that pose questions regarding whether or not we are entitled to completely manipulate the route of our own evolution.

editing humanity

risks: eugenics, ethic issues, identity crisis...

visual language: science x graphic design

methodology: context has a leading role

risk assessment and pre-enactment

speculative everything

relational design process

key texts

cross-overs

pre-enacment and generative systems: design of process with variable outcomes

designing human evolution

speculativenarrative

Review

Context Review: overview

editing humanity

risks: eugenics, ethic issues, identity crisis...

visual language: science x graphic design

methodology: context has a leading role

risk assessment and pre-enactment

speculative everything

relational design process

key texts

cross-overs

pre-enacment and generative systems: design of process with variable outcomes

designing human evolution

speculativenarrative

The following examples provide an initial and broad scope for my emerging research interests. The languages that compose those narratives can be combined in order to develop a multilayered approach to my chosen subject.

Pre-enactment and satire

In the 1960s Dr. Strangelove could have been considered a pre-enactment of the Cold War that becomes a nuclear conflict. The film was shot in black and white to enhance the starkness of the content. The characters in the movie are highly expressive, almost like caricatures, which intensifies the nonsensical and satirical nature of the plot. The War Games by Peter Watkins is similarly critical. It was also placed on the blurred line between reality and fiction by posing the visual language of war against pacifistic ideals.

Speculation and utopia

Roadmap 2050 Eneropa is an alternative map of Europe which takes into account the geographic landscape of the continent to determine areas of shared renewable energy sources. The reinterpretation of such an instantly recognisable graphic is done by delineating and renaming its parts. This piece speculates new ways in which social and political interactions could potentially occur in the future. The visual language is carefully planned serif typeface and use of motif in thecompass design evoke the past. Those elements contrast with the futuristic subject thus marking its atemporal relevance.

Review

Practice Review

How can speculation create a pre-enactment narrative? Which risks and variables would be involved? What would the tone be? Satirical? Stark? Fictional? Realistic?

The War Game (1965). UK: BBC.

Dr. Strangelove (1964). USA/UK.

AMO (2010) Roadmap 2050.

Designing the process

Studio MuirMcNeil explores parametric design systems to generate cutting-edge typographic solutions. Intersect is a type system that uses a dynamic grid to subvert typographic weight. It exceed binary limitations of letter forms and counter-forms by emulating a successive range of linear screens to give the illusion of tint densities within the body of the type. This allows a wide range of design options.

Scientific visual language

The humorous movement of the animation allows different interpretations that don't necessarily represent a fact. This gif has recently become viral and presented as an enzime producing feelings of happiness. Although easily believable, it turns out the information isn't correct. I am interested in how science on a microscopic scale can become a powerful graphic tool that allows free reinterpretation and communicates life on its rawest level.

Review

Practice Review

MuirMcNeil (unknown date) Intersect.

Art of Cell (2014). Animated GIF of Kinesin Protein walking.

Could a rigid grid system simulate an organic al process? Would generative systems be capable of designing evolution? What kind of visual cross over would be generated between the molecular and the systemic?

AMO (2010) Roadmap 2050. Available at: http://oma.eu/projects/roadmap-2050 (Accessed: 19 March 2016)

ABC News (2013). Wheel of Fortune. Available at: http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/entertainment/2013/04/13-things-you-didnt-know-about-wheel-of-fortune (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Art of Cell (2014). Animated GIF of Kinesin Protein walking. Available at: http://www.artofthecell.com/animation/well-you-can-tell-by-the-way-i-use-my-walk(Accessed: 19 March 2016).

AstraZeneca (2015) CRISPR technology for genome editing. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrtrM_CPtQQ (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Cavallo, Francesca (2011) Rehearsing the Disaster, pre-enactment between reality and fiction. Available at: https://independent.academia.edu/FrancescaLauraCavallo (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Craig Freeman, John. (2012) Border Memorial: Frontera de los Muertos. Available at: https://johncraigfreeman.wordpress.com/border-memorial-frontera-de-los-muertos (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Dunne, A., Raby, F. (2013) Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction, and Social Dreaming. The MIT Press.

Dr. Strangelove (1964) Directed by Stanley Kubrick [Film]. USA/UK.

FKA twigs #throughglass (2014) FKA twigs #throughglass. Available at:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99YyWeqHaBo (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Japan Times (2014) Gadget maker offers a thumbs-up remedy for overly large smartphone screens.

Bibliography and references

Available at: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/09/25/business/gadget-maker-offers-thumbs-remedy-overly-large-smartphone-screens(Accessed: 19 March 2016).

MuirMcNeil (unknown date) Intersect. Available at: http://www.muirmcneil.com/project/intersect-2/?section=about (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Neville, D. (2011) A Relational Design Process. Available at: http://nevolution.typepad.com/theories/2011/03/a-relational-design-process-thesis.html (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Purestock (no date) High angle view of group of spectators sitting in a movie theater wearing 3-D glasses.Available at: http://www.thinkstockphotos.co.uk/image/ stock-photo-high-angle-view-of-group-of-spectators/79072701(Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Rabatti, Alessandro (2015). Facebank series. Available at: http://www.alessandrorabatti.com (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

Sideshowworld (no date) Unknown title. Available at: http://www.sideshowworld.com/44-KTDA/2013 /Knife-Throwing/Frank-Dean.html(Accessed: 19 March 2016).

The Economist (2015) Editing Humanity. Available at: http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21661651-new-technique-manipulating-genes-holds-great-promisebut-rules-are-needed-govern-its (Accessed: 19 March 2016).

The War Game (1965) Directed by Peter Watkins [Film]. UK: BBC.

Walker, John (2005). Nuclear Bomb Effects Computer Online Edition. Available at: https://www.fourmilab.ch/bombcalc (Accessed: 19 March 2016).