Formulas For Now [Book] by Hans Ulrich Obrist

"Imagine if the whole of life were reducible to a single formula. The results are not just unexpected but as wild, as weird and as wonderful as life itself.
Many of the most creative and original minds of our time - more than a hundred from the worlds of art, science, mathematics, architecture, design, performance, literature and sociology - give us their personal and enterprising, or visionary, or inventive, or novel, or just deliriously delectable, formulas for contemporary life. Damien Hirst's colour wheel; 'sex x technology = the future' by J.G. Ballard; Gilbert & George's injuction to ban religion; a distillation of Darwinian theory from Richard Dawkins; Olafur Eliasson's x and y axis; Peter Saville's sketched diagrams; Louise Bourgeois's conviction that there is no logic in love..
Look here for some novel answers (and many new questions and possibilites) in a book of 100% addictive allure."
"More than 100 contributors from art, science, performance, design and literature reveal their personal formula to understanding contemporary life"

I chose to look into this book as a form of research as it takes something not often associated with contemporary culture, formulas/science, and documents how creatives use this in their own way. This reflects the potential idea I have to take something (digital processes) and explore it differently and more personally, (analog).

Interviewing Ai *

Digital Issue: Artificial Intelligence

In response to the feedback from the research presentation, and my interest in Amy Suo Wu's projects, I need to find issues that apply to the digital world that I can then explore or "solve" through analog processes, as Amy did with stenography.
Starting on eyeondesign, the most common topics I found immediately were to do with the issues arising due to the continuous development of AI. Thinking more about it, AI has been a really common topic lately as I've even seen it in relation to the current Coronavirus pandemic.

As AI is so contemporary, I feel as though it would possibly be more effective in exploring, and make more sense to my practice as I'm interested in current affairs. It's also such a broad subject that if I were to continue with my original plan and turn this into an exhibition, it would welcome many approaches.



https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/we-need-a-new-approach-to-designing-for-ai-and-human-rights-should-be-at-the-center/

We Need a New Approach to Designing for AI, and Human Rights Should Be at the Center

Designers need a methodology that helps them weigh the benefits of using a new technology against its potential harm

"AI is going to radically change society. It will do so in exciting and even life-saving ways, as we’ve seen in early projects that translate languages (in your own voice!), create assistant chat bots, make new works of art, and more accurately detect and analyze cancer. "

"Here’s why we need this: AI is technology, and technology is never neutral. How we make technology, how we conceptualize it, how we imagine where it fits into culture, and what problems it will solve when placed into product design—these are design choices that can have a deep impact on society. 

Take facial recognition, for example, which seems relatively innocuous when used to unlock an iPhone more easily. That same technology can spell radical harm for another person when used by law enforcement due to its tendency to deliver false matches for certain groups, like women and people of color."

AI Has a Real Environmental Impact—Here’s How Designers Are Handling It

The principles of sustainable design are getting an update in the age of AI

"Her assertions about Turing’s tape may sound self-evident, but they bear repeating at a time when the material and energy required to run global computational systems (websites, for example) and their associated infrastructure (like data centers), tend to be hidden from plain sight. Terms like “the cloud” further reinforce a sense of intangibility in the digital world; a “misunderstanding of data as a pure resource rather than reliant on resources,” as Burrington wrote in Architectural Design."

" “You have to realize that AI doesn’t mean just one thing,” says David Rolnick, "
"Jarno Koponen, head of AI and personalization at Yle, Finland’s national broadcasting company, has been researching the use of AI in the ever-changing digital media landscape. He says that the most common uses of AI for consumer applications—feeding us content on a news app, for example—use very specific and narrow AI models and therefore require much less computer processing power. "

Digital artist Oli Frost’s latest project explores the potential power of Nice Fake News

https://www.itsnicethat.com/news/nice-fake-news-website-oli-frost-digital-010818

"Oli’s determination to do things differently in the digital sphere, while still ensuring there’s a direct link to life outside of the internet, is proof that the medium really is the message. "

What is AI?/Examples

• Google maps - traffic predictions - algorithms feeding this information
• email spam filters 
• plagiarism checkers
• fraud prevention
• facebook tag friends suggestions - in photos
• pinterest - Pinterest uses computer vision, an application of AI where computers are taught to “see,” in order to automatically identify objects in images (or “pins”) and then recommend visually similar pins. Other applications of machine learning at Pinterest include spam prevention, search and discovery, ad performance and monetization, and email marketing.
• face filters
• instagram feed
• product recommendations 
• voice to text
• siri, alexa and echo etc
• 
  

Digital Issue: Security

Cameras, cookies, user data, tracking, conspiracies

• Issue with security cameras being hacked - how could this be represented with analog?
• Cookies/user data - this wouldn't be an issue without the use of digital/internet
• Privacy - phone calls being listened to? Instead using a string telephone - humour/playfulness/dystopia

Digital Advancement: Online Shopping/E-Commerce

Looking at catalogues again - finding funny/absurd things to sell through catalogues that only make sense on online shopping? e.g

• Depop - selling your own clothes but in a world where it has to be through a catalogue - catalogue could be set up based on usernames, etc.
• Groceries
• Software - even buying online softwares would have to be done this way like Adobe 

Interview with Becky (Printmaking Instructor)

1. What attracted you to print and printmaking?

Personally, I was properly introduced to printmaking during my A-Levels – I enjoyed the different stages within processes that allowed for reflection and response. 

2. Do you believe there is too much reliance on digital methods to produce design nowadays?

Not necessarily, but it is just a different vocabulary as any form of making is.  I suppose this is down to the individual.  Some people do just use processes that they are comfortable with and experiment very little in this regard.  It’s good to have an understanding of as many different areas of making as possible.  If you have the vocabulary, then you can use it.   

3. What do you think are benefits of using more analog processes (prints and letterpress) rather than digital?

It depends on the character of mark that you want.  Both are relevant, some are more appropriate for different applications.  I personally enjoy finding out the variables based on process, choice and formal elements and try to apply them in response to each stage as a reactionary aspect to an element of pre-planned making.  That’s not always the case though, sometimes I prefer to consider the concept of making prior to image production and just ‘follow the rules’ that I have set out to use whatever the consequences may be.  To become part of an imperfect machine.  

Another thought is that one may operate in a way that has been impacted on by ones experience in other processes.  i.e. Applying knowledge to different areas.  So if my brain is wired to printmaking and the elements of making within that field this will affect the way that I work digitally.

After that long answer – I guess that both have their benefits.  But an analogue image will allow for printing onto different surfaces (e.g. wood), It will have a unique character (based on its physical properties), the making decisions are slower so can be arguably reflected on more at each stage in making which could give way for more experimentation.  On the flip side, the speed that digital image manipulation can be used could potentially give quicker and more varied experimentation.  Its just breaking down the language within each process and trying different things out.

4. What do you think are the benefits are of using digital processes rather than analog? 

Different character of image and speed.  Different applications such as for the web.  But I guess that you can scan in an image that you have produced and manipulate it digitally. This may not be as relevant? However, I think the character of image that we produce quite often is predetermined by what we think we are expected to produce for different contexts.  That sounds obvious on reflection especially when we are considering clients, but I think it runs deeper than this.  We all have contexts that we work within.

5. Do you believe that craft and analog processes create outcomes that are more personal/intimate than outcomes that are only created using digital softwares? Why?

Potentially, yes.  Probably because we spend more physical time with the actual piece and the tools and materials are tangible things that we used in order to make that piece.

6. Do you think there will be a future where print and printmaking processes are no longer needed?

Again, this would be one for context.  I would say that there are always things to explore with variables of making within any process.  Whether this will always be relevant for certain applications is another thing altogether and one which would come down to money and context.  For example, a web based company may want quick graphic design where someone to produce some artwork in a ‘slow’ way may not be what they would be looking for in terms of money spent on speed of production or the slick finish that they may be after.  Crossover work would still be relevant here – for example, a designer may purchase artwork to then digitally manipulate to fit their client’s wishes…

Artists will always look for things to explore.  Designers will also.  Corporate design agencies may buy the findings to use as an end product to tweak for their clients.

(Just a thought!)

7. Why is holding on to these analog practices important? Is it a sense of history?

History is cool but it’s not the reason that I use these processes.  There is still a lot of mileage in these forms of making and digital crossover is relevant too! 

8. Do you think most graphic designers don't realise the importance of these processes?

I’ve got no real idea on this one and it might be presumptive of me to comment.  However, I think Graphic Design students probably do see these processes as something to explore. Whether this is a fashionable thing at the moment – that is not for me to say.  Maybe when people have less access to these facilities outside of the education environment, Graphic designers may have to look elsewhere to get a certain ‘feel’ to their work.  A lot of online digital image resources will have originated from analogue techniques and processes.

9. Would you personally like to see projects in which analog processes are solely used to produce a graphic design outcome? Do you think this is needed?

Again, I’m probably on the fence with this one! Ha ha...  It could be good as it would make people have to think around a creative problem, rather than have an ‘easy fix’.  Not that I’m suggesting digital work easy.  It’s just not always good in a creative (finding things out) context to rely on what one already knows.  So pushing people in different areas where they may not be fully comfortable may not be a bad thing.  I would say allow the process to be that process.  Don’t try and make it be something else.  What can this process do?  What can you explore? What are the variables? What ordering and combination, layering etc. of these variables can you use to FIND SOMETHING OUT!  Work towards an outcome rather than backwards from a solution!  Cheers!

Interview with Susie (Printmaking Instructor)

1.What attracted you to print and printmaking?

Whatever the printmaking technique, there's always some magic transformative moment that you don't get any other way. The first time you ink up a lino block; when you wash out an exposed screen; when you first print the chase of type you've been working on. I guess I just fell in love with those cool moments, and keep wanting to learn more.

Also, I appreciate that printmaking is a way of working which is both solitary and communal. There is the design stage, when coming up with imagery to be printed; and the stage in the workshop when you realise your print surrounded by other artists. The workshop community atmosphere is productive as well as pleasant - you can trade ideas, technique and feedback, encourage each other, and keep each other on track. I much prefer this to working alone in my studio for the whole creation of a piece.

2. Do you believe there is too much reliance on digital methods to produce design nowadays?

Digital methods are good at some imagery for some purposes; traditional printmaking techniques are good at some other things. The key is to tailor the method of production to the outcome rather than becoming too attached to one way of working. I do think that more graphic designers should get out from behind a computer and into the print workshop more often - it's quite therapeutic!

3. What do you think are benefits of using more analog processes (prints and letterpress) rather than digital?

Using traditional printmaking methods, and letterpress, often allows for a more process-driven outcome. Having factors outside your control means that 'happy accidents' can lead to new ways of working. Using the wood poster type in letterpress means that the letters print with wear and woodgrain that digital type wouldn't have, meaning that your text has a different feel. Monoprints will give you unique outcome of shape and tone each time. 

4.What do you think are the benefits are of using digital processes rather than analog? 

Depending on the outcome, digital processes can be more efficient, quicker, and less wasteful of resources. You can also achieve imagery you wouldn't get with analog processes, and imagery that can interact with viewers in other ways - for example, appearing on the web as well as a gallery wall. 

5. Do you believe that craft and analog processes create outcomes that are more personal/intimate than outcomes that are only created using digital softwares? Why?

There are many craft/printmaking processes which clearly display the evidence of the hand that made it, which I think does give the viewer a certain personal relationship with the thing created. A woodcut or lino print clearly shows where the block has been carved by hand, which does give you a kind of intimacy with the person who carved it. Knowing that the outcome took time, skill and effort also helps connect with the maker.

6. Do you think there will be a future where print and printmaking processes are no longer needed?

People will always appreciate a physical, tactile object, and imagery which they can have an in-person relationship with. Print and printmaking processes will just adapt and find new audiences, as they always have done - letterpress is functionally obsolete as a mainstream way to disseminate the written word, but is now appreciated in an art and design context for its aesthetic pleasures. 

7. Why is holding on to these analog practices important? Is it a sense of history?

It's definitely pleasing to think about carrying out a process which isn't too different to how it's worked for centuries. Letterpress, for example, connects us to the past through using the type and presses which have been in use for decades, even though we now approach them differently. 

But mostly I think it's worth hanging onto analog practices because they do unique things. The specific look that you get with linocut, for example, can't be recreated digitally. It's important to use a full range of techniques because we want a full palette of colours, textures, linework, tones etc.  

8. Do you think most graphic designers don't realise the importance of these processes?

I think that most graphic designers could use some experience in letterpress and printmaking. You'd end up with a wider aesthetic palette to draw from, which would help you stand out from the pack. Working in printmaking can also result in a deeper understanding of the tools you're working with - for example, working in letterpress gives you an enriched, tactile understanding of typography.

9. Would you personally like to see projects in which analog processes are solely used to produce a graphic design outcome? Do you think this is needed?

Depends on the project! But I think it would be interesting to see a project, with outcomes in multiple forms, where only analogue formats are used. I'd love to see a full brand identity put together using letterpress and printmaking. I think that constraint would result in some really creative work. 

Student Questionnaire Results

PRIMARY RESEARCH - Questionnaire For Printmaking Instructors

As part of my primary research, I want to interview some of the instructors in the Print and Printmaking workshops as a way of understanding their professional opinions on analog processes such as relief prints, screen prints, and letter pressing. My aim with this research is to see if they have a preference to these processes over digital completely, or if they see the benefits and purposes of both, and what they are. It would also be interesting just to find out their personal opinions on the heavy use of digitalisation in design as they are in a more professional field than I am, and may have more informed opinions.

INITIAL DRAFT
The purpose of this draft is to write down as many questions I can think of that would be relevant to the instructors that I could then edit for the final email.

1. What attracted you to print and printmaking?
2. Do you believe there is too much reliance on digital methods to produce design nowadays?
3. What do you think the benefits are of using more analog processes rather than digital?
4. I find that more physical and analog processes create more personality and emotion within design and the heavy use of digital processes is losing that element. Do you agree with this at all?
5. What do you think attracts students to analog processes?
6. Do you think there will be a future where print and printmaking processes are no longer needed?
7. Why is holding on to these analog practices important? Is it a sense of history?
8. Do you think most graphic designers don't realise the importance of these processes?
9. Do you think more projects where analog processes are solely used is needed, or projects where both analog and digital processes are used?

EMAIL

1. What attracted you to print and printmaking?
2. Do you believe there is too much reliance on digital methods to produce design nowadays?
3. What do you think are benefits of using more analog processes (prints and letterpress) rather than digital?
4. What do you think are the benefits are of using digital processes rather than analog? 
5. Do you believe that craft and analog processes create outcomes that are more personal/intimate than outcomes that are only created using digital softwares? Why?
6. Do you think there will be a future where print and printmaking processes are no longer needed?
7. Why is holding on to these analog practices important? Is it a sense of history?
8. Do you think most graphic designers don't realise the importance of these processes?
9. Would you personally like to see projects in which analog processes are solely used to produce a graphic design outcome? Do you think this is needed?

For the final draft of questions, I ended up changing or adjusting questions 3, 4, 5, and 9. 

• 3 was just altered to be more specific to the instructors by mentioning prints and letterpress as I didn't want the questionnaire to seem vague. The aim of interviewing these instructors is to get more specific insight as they have specific practices.
• 4 was completely changed as I feel the first draft was guiding the instructors to a specific answer - giving my opinion may shift their answer. I included a second part to the previous question to understand both sides of their opinion on analogue and digital.
• 5 is an alteration on the initially drafted 4, however I reworded to remove my opinion, present a statement, and ask why. This would provide more insight, and guide more opportunity for a more indepth answer.
• 9 was altered to add a second part - asking whether they believe this is needed. Exploring the need for either potential paths for this project is important to me as I want the research to dictate how I move forward with the project rather than have my own personal opinions be the main influence.

PRIMARY RESEARCH - Questionnaire For Students

As a way of gathering research from my target audience and forming more understanding of their needs to drive my project, I created a questionnaire and shared it on social media as this is their main form of communication.