Visual Resistance
This books gives examples of how art and graphic design can be used as action material. For this, the author analyzes the effects of the results of creative engagement by using a simple communication model. The roles of the engaged broadcaster and the active receiver all get a chance, as well as the way on which the sent message can be designed - namely by alienation and overidentification - opening communication channels and manipulating them by means of communication guerilla.
With these texts the author wishes to contribute to a fundamental knowledge on the effect of communication processes and the possibilities one has of working with this. For the rest, this book does not ask the question of why showing active engagement, but does ask in great detail the question of how to do this. This essay was not intended to convince artists and designers from the political centre that an actively applied engagement is necessary, nor to deliver proof for the idea that this society could be a lot better, or that exclusion, poverty, a lack of solidarity, the power of capital, and the destruction of the environment are all processes that can and must be fought. This essay is directed at those that (already) agree with the sentences above, that no longer need convincing. The reader might be an activist that wants to know more about conveying a message as effectively as possible, but also artists and designers that would like to apply their skills for creative resistance.
Furthermore this is an experiment in what a book nowadays can be, other than a paper, bound and glued piece of printing. The text is suitable for online processing, so that the concepts and examples can be linked to relevant pages and videos elsewhere on the internet. One can, then, read the book from start to finish, like with the classic paper version, or examine the topics individually. The texts have been written for readers to be able to understand them separate from each other as much as possible.
The creative action practice does not stand still, so new examples will be added on a regular basis. If perhaps you would miss a certain good, well documented creative (form of) action, you could send a contribution to info@visueelverzet.nl. Wouldn't it be terrific if a new creative form of resistance would come into existence that is so revolutionary that the entire of the book would have to be changed? We can't wait!
A random page from Visual Resistance: #13
The Creative Activist in Society
“Designers are part of the system by which ideas enter into people’s consciousness”
In the words of Milton Glaser, a renowned designer, on the role of the designer in society, “We’re part of the transmission system – we’re not usually the originators of the messages. We’re like the telephone lines. (…) When I was growing up, and that was a very long time ago, the idea was that professionalism excluded the idea of your own ethics or your own behavior as part of the process. That is to say that whatever you were asked to do, you did, and you did it well, and effectively, because that was what being a professional meant. But it seems to me, as I grow older, that view isn’t sufficient. Since Nuremburg, the explanation: ‘Well, I was only following orders‚’ doesn’t cut it. You can’t live that way anymore. You can’t justify following orders as the way you behave in the world. That’s obviously an over-dramatized example, but what you do as a person in terms of whether you help or hurt the community you’re talking to becomes significant. If you don’t pay attention to what you’re doing and if you willfully participate in things that you yourself perceive to be destructive, then you are putting yourself in the same category of having suspended ethics in the name of professional appropriateness. And I find that hard to do these days.”1
The visual arts have been a forum for the discussion of social issues for a long time now. This is not the case with graphic design. What makes engaged design different from normal professional design? What happens with graphic design when it’s employed in the political arena, in social movements, and activism? The answer to this question is different for each designer because personal circumstances and experiences are different for every designer. In practice, however, political engagement is different than engagement in commercial or educational context.
“What we’re talking about are social situations where people with a particular skill, a particular passion or professional ability – whether it’s photography, art, writing, graphic design, music or poetry – can fit into a movement of collaborative expression in such a way that they add something without dominating, and without distorting the process. This kind of movement takes you beyond any ‘designer identity’ – when it really works it can spread in all directions, open up new spaces in institutions, even make it possible to change your relations at work, with clients, in university situations and so on. It’s a way to get outside the straightjacket of being a wage-earer and a citizen-consumer. But for people with specific skills of graphic designers, it involves a real responsibility. Because designers have an important role to play in social movements, which is the role if making the goals of group activity visible, precisely in a way that encourages the continuation of the process.”2
- Milton Glaser, (2003). [online] http://www.idanda.net/editorial.php?article=133&type=article&pagenum=1 [↩]
- Tony Credland, Brian Holmes, Sandy Kaltenborn, (2001). ‘Design is not enough’. Online: http://design.concordia.ca/declarations [↩]
In the words of Milton Glaser, a renowned designer, on the role of the designer in society, “We’re part of the transmission system – we’re not usually the originators of the messages. We’re like the telephone lines. (…) When I was growing up, and that was a very long time ago, the idea was that professionalism excluded the idea of your own ethics or your own behavior as part of the process. That is to say that whatever you were asked to do, you did, and you did it well, and effectively, because that was what being a professional meant. But it seems to me, as I grow older, that view isn’t sufficient. Since Nuremburg, the explanation: ‘Well, I was only following orders‚’ doesn’t cut it. You can’t live that way anymore. You can’t justify following orders as the way you behave in the world. That’s obviously an over-dramatized example, but what you do as a person in terms of whether you help or hurt the community you’re talking to becomes significant. If you don’t pay attention to what you’re doing and if you willfully participate in things that you yourself perceive to be destructive, then you are putting yourself in the same category of having suspended ethics in the name of professional appropriateness. And I find that hard to do these days.”1
The visual arts have been a forum for the discussion of social issues for a long time now. This is not the case with graphic design. What makes engaged design different from normal professional design? What happens with graphic design when it’s employed in the political arena, in social movements, and activism? The answer to this question is different for each designer because personal circumstances and experiences are different for every designer. In practice, however, political engagement is different than engagement in commercial or educational context.
“What we’re talking about are social situations where people with a particular skill, a particular passion or professional ability – whether it’s photography, art, writing, graphic design, music or poetry – can fit into a movement of collaborative expression in such a way that they add something without dominating, and without distorting the process. This kind of movement takes you beyond any ‘designer identity’ – when it really works it can spread in all directions, open up new spaces in institutions, even make it possible to change your relations at work, with clients, in university situations and so on. It’s a way to get outside the straightjacket of being a wage-earer and a citizen-consumer. But for people with specific skills of graphic designers, it involves a real responsibility. Because designers have an important role to play in social movements, which is the role if making the goals of group activity visible, precisely in a way that encourages the continuation of the process.”2
