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Monday, September 18, 2006

Is Technology the Designer?

The other day I was conceptualizing a design of movie props that took place over many decades, primarily in the 20th century. It was sort of a parallel universe science fiction scenario where people had computers all throughout that century, however textiles, fashions and appliances pretty much looked the way they did in reality. So although technology had advanced so that people were surfing the web in the 1920s, they were doing so wearing the clothing of that era, sitting at desks of that time. I was thinking about the design of the computers and how they would probably resemble the designs of radios, blenders and cars. How utterly cool would a turquoise and chrome computer from the 1950s be? Or a real wooden one from the turn of the century? Which got me thinking...if technology was so that we *were* online 100 years ago, would we have gone through all the precursors to the technological revolution 100 years before that, and with that, would we have then had the fashions of clothes and household items from what we think of from the 20th century accompany that? Are the styles of furniture, clothing, hairstyles, textiles, etc. a result of technological change, or did they evolve independently?

To partially answer my own question and to give one example, the Arts and Crafts movement was a reaction against industrialization and mass-production. But it would not have gotten there had there not been the industrial revolution to react against in the first place.

9 Comments:

Blogger Stan said...

I would imagine that the abilities of any technology would influence designe. I don't know if there is a ludite art movement or not, but I imagine they are mostly interested if finding clean spinach to eat.

Is there a connection between the concept that digital media can be copied over and over and the post modern concept of only having to quote everyone else to make one point or another without using any of a person's origional imagination... The post modern concept came to life before digital media hit main stream culture, but the people thinking up deconstructionism must have been aware of the emerging technology.

I really hate the way people can avoid putting any effort or take any personal risk by using a batch of quotes to creat content. I hope this fad of vapid mental creativity dries up soon. In history the manerism art movement died after about 25 years, so I imagine we still have another 12 to 15 years of post - modernism - in all of its fluffy spinelessness.

Perhaps as technology moves into biotechnology the death of postmodern nonsense will die a natural death.

9:58 PM  
Blogger Lavender Dawn said...

i want a turquoise and chrome computer! that is soooo cool. imagine- blogs from the jewish ghettos- comments on the war from the source?would we have stepped in sooner? would the concentration camps have been discovered earlier? that would make a great story!

11:46 PM  
Blogger Lavender Dawn said...

imagining if it were available in the 20s... it would be so in the 40s, too.

11:48 PM  
Blogger Ann said...

"Is there a connection between the concept that digital media can be copied over and over and the post modern concept of only having to quote everyone else to make one point or another without using any of a person's origional imagination... The post modern concept came to life before digital media hit main stream culture, but the people thinking up deconstructionism must have been aware of the emerging technology."

Maybe this is an example of life immitating art.

Stan, I know how you dislike Mannerism, the postmodernism of the post-Renaissance. But you must admit the (self-)referential qualities of PoMo sometimes work very well, for example, Tarantino.

"i want a turquoise and chrome computer!"

Wouldn't that be to die for? Why oh why is computer design so stodgy? The only thing I can remember that wowed me, design-wise, was when Apple came out with the iMac and iBook in 1998 with the lifesaver colors. I still have my Tangerine, and would still be using it if it weren't so slow and outdated system-wise. It's been replaced by a very boring styleless white ibook.

"comments on the war from the source?would we have stepped in sooner?"

Well, look at the mess we are in now with Iraq, and blogs are a dime-a-dozen. But it does make for some interesting speculation on what the 20th century would've been like if everything was the way it was except for the introduction of the computer and the internet back, oh, maybe 100-150 years earlier. The concept of people travelling out west on stagecoach and train with early wooden laptops is quite entertaining to me.

9:41 AM  
Blogger Lavender Dawn said...

know how people build "faces" for cell phones and xboxes? hmmm... think what could be done for computers! snap on classy covers! how about psychadelic keyboards?

2:31 PM  
Blogger Ann said...

"know how people build "faces" for cell phones and xboxes?"
Um...no. (I'm out of it in many ways...I have no idea what an xbox is...I assume its something for a PC to play games on or something? I don't know...) I know there are cell phone covers, and if I wanted to I could get a cover for my ibook. But there's something sort of artificial about it that I don't like. Like a tablecloth. I hate tablecloths. I'd rather have the design built into the actual structure of the device, rather than it all be surface. But maybe that's just me.

2:41 PM  
Blogger Stan said...

Tarantino isn't a copy cat, he takes things he uses that have been used before are reinvented with a new and fresh look.

Just because someone is making movies doesn't mean they are fitting into the mainstreem philosophy of their era. I think Tarantino is working on a level above all of the ones that are fitting into the time and fashions they are making movies in now.

I like the concept that technology might have helped saved lives in WW2, and a lot of old movies that have been lost would still be with us too. So many movies were left to decay or were simply thrown out, and if we had digital technology then we would still have these movies now.

I imagine that a movie lover like Tarantino would love to see the lost movies.

6:00 PM  
Blogger Ann said...

I wasn't implying Tarantino is a copycat! I was making an observation that his work makes use of a lot of different movie influences, and yes, it does then create his own unique style.

---

Yes, in my little bizarro world, all the movies from the early 20th century would be preserved and backed up on digital media because they never would've been recorded on film in the first place. They would've all been created digitally. However, all those really, REALLY old movies from the 1700s and early 1800s...you know, the ones starring fops? Those would be in serious decay. Pity.

6:39 PM  
Blogger Lavender Dawn said...

you guys are so funny. you make me laugh. we seen in a dell magazine some colored pcs that cost extra just for the look! crazy. no chrome tho! i hate table cloths too. they are icky. I will put one on the table for thanksgiving dinner and thats about it. my current table is wood, and hopefully a tc will never grace its top.

i didn't know there were lost movies, but it makes sence. i agree about the fop movies. may the burn...

imagine "gone with the wind" in bizzANNworld. if it was stored on digital media, think graphics like lord of the rings!

10:57 PM  

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