A manifesto for designers
There’s been a movement for graphic designers to create more content instead of manipulating existing ones. The importance of content has grown even in academic settings as if what we design is more important than how we design.
Design must be used in a linguistic way, as a vibrant language that represents the world. The designer’s role is to reshape content, not write it. We must acknowledge that shaping is a form of writing in itself.
Designers should learn that our craft doesn’t follow content. It is not possible to create form without content because every form is a choice. The way we shape the world evolves from time to time, so we must explore and expand the boundaries of graphic design to create evolving ways to tell these stories.
It is not what we talk about, but how we talk.
Form
Form, not content, is the core of design. How we create, not what we create. Design doesn’t have to be about something, but it always says something.
Devices
We use, experiment with and create devices to give form to our ideas. These can be visual, audio, digital, physical or any other user-world interface we invent.
Work
The nature of individual design pieces is limited. Ideas don’t begin and end in a single product, but within multiple projects that span many years. A designer’s or group of designers’ oeuvre must present central ideas that connect all pieces and reveal their position and criticality.
Michael Rock
Fuck Content Glossary
Author,
Someone who creates original content. Designers can act as authors when they acknowledge that shaping is a way of writing.
Content,
Authors, writers and artists create original stories. This information is shaped by designers.
Designer,
The one responsible for shaping the way users experience the world. Designers tell stories, but don’t create them.
Devices,
The tools and concepts designers manipulate to create form, such as typography, line, shape, colour, scale and contrast.
Form,
Information needs form to be communicated. The creation and manipulation of form is the core activity of graphic design.
Fuck Content,
A call to every graphic designer to value form over content and use design devices to create evolving ways to shape the world.
Graphic Design,
The activity of giving form to information.
Idea,
Central ideas run through an entire body of work.
Oeuvre,
A body of work by a designer or group of designers that usually spans many years and is connected by key ideas and patterns.
Shape,
Graphic designers shape the content that authors create.
User,
The user receives and uses products created by graphic designers.
World,
The way users experience the world is shaped by design.
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About this written response
This is the written response to the methods of translating brief.
I selected Michael Rock’s (2009) article and re-presented its key ideas using the manifesto and glossary form by Blauvelt et al. (2013, pp. ii–xiv).
The text can be read on this post or as a virtual 3D paper sheet that can be manipulated by the user. The virtual environment medium relates to the designers’ position in shaping how users experience the world.
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Reference list