Tag: Reading Response #7

Reading Response 7- SL

April 8, 2022 / Sonia / 1 Comment

Culture jamming is when an artist takes the symbol or logo for a company and uses it to counter what the company really is. It is sort of like an attack which makes viewers raise doubt towards the specific company. For example, the Mcdonalds logo is known for the slogan “I’m Lovin it” and when an individual spots the big yellow “M” they correlate the two. What culture jamming artists did to the Mcdonalds logo is turn the “M” upside down so that it is a “w” and put the slogan “I’m gaining it”, they went even further and put “Weight” to replace the name of the company. When viewing this “new ad” one would reconsider buying it because of the message it portrays.

In the 1950’s and 60’s there was a concept of underground vs mainstream which devalued many artistic things. The underground is defined to be a safe place for artists to create and not have it be used universally. Mainstream includes the big companies and the art that they use. The underground was basically the place where artists could be recognized for what they created because the mainstream or big corporations have not drowned them out. When the mainstream corporations use the underground art, it becomes devalued because it gets used so much and the original creator gets tuned out. In the end, the underground artist gets forgotten, but the corporation wouldn’t because they are now associated with the art.

Reading response 7 -BV

April 6, 2022 / Belen Vazquez / 1 Comment

04/04

Culture Jamming

Belen Vazquez

Culture Jamming has been a very controversial topic but also a very bold act for many. The Avant-Garde movement that went against many entitled companies’ norms and created a sense of debate and rebellion. Designers took this sense of art direction a bit more seriously to emphasize social and or political issues. Culture jammers held power against big companies and would create questionable design statements to bring up a point. One of the many examples would be this “vandalized” Coca-cola poster. stating the message of “LOVE” within coca-cola, but in reality, what is the message they have been giving the public? Is it really “love” or is it all about money, benefits, and Coca-cola. Culture Jammers created this new environment in which one’s opinion is kept to themselves. But started to become a freedom of expression and art overall.

Reading Response 7 E H

April 5, 2022 / Emdadul / 1 Comment

Paul Rand, explained critically the mindset of a designer and work ethic in his writing. Paul put the focus to the logical point of view, that trigger a designer want to be appealing to the eye, but not every design will be successful.

Very similar to his works, just like IBM (1962) logo is widely celebrated and stands out of crowd but eventually his last created logo NEXT (1986) failed to create magic. Paul produced a single finished logo along with an elaborate book explaining the rationale behind it.

Jobs was delighted with the work but publicly is it that much appealing like the Apple logo? The answer is no, basically its not obvious to be successful all good designs.

Design industry allow the designers to draw and design whatever they want to create or how to tell the story to sell ideas and the director decides if the design is suitable to pitch or shown to the client.

Creatives can create a statement by using a famous logo or a design to protest, building awareness by posters and road paintings or sarcastic graphic noble where harsh reality can be expressed in dark comedy.

Reading Response 7 – MD

April 4, 2022 / Matthew De Souza / 1 Comment

Design is very subjective. Some people can interpret one design as “good design” while others may look at it and see nothing interesting. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The two great minds of Paul Rand and Steven Heller both looked at the concept of advertising from two different angles, with each coming to a conclusion about the relationship between design, corporations, and the underground mainstream.

From the point of view of Paul Rand, design is less a business than a calling. Rand brings up culture jamming, which is a form of protest used to disrupt or subvert media culture and its mainstream cultural institutions, including corporate advertising. An example is a designer creating a Coca Cola variation that instead states “Enjoy Capitalism”. This design uses the same typeface and colors as the original but has a different meaning. He also believes that ideas are the lifeblood of any form of meaningful communication. An open mind is required in this field of work. Narrowmindedness doesn’t create room for growth. While some other jobs and career professions are factual based, referring to a set of information obtained from reading books and research, design is subjective and must be designed for the audience. The design field is an easy profession to get into however, it requires constant adaptation and improvements. There is no “perfect” design. Every piece of work will be judged critically by others, but it is an opinion based profession rather than a factual one. In the text “Good Design Is Good Will” it states, “There is no set body of knowledge that must be mastered by the practitioners… What a designer does is not limited to any particular idea or form… It embodies visual ideas…”

Mainstream design, however, leans more towards profiting and political change. It is sometimes even used to alter the opinions of viewers and change their mindset on a certain topic. This is manipulation. A perfect example is the political cartoons. These cartoons were made for the purpose of conveying editorial commentary on politics, politicians, and current events. It has become easy for political cartoons to shape and set forth a certain narrative about someone or something without giving much information. In today’s society, companies and industries prefer to use design to create propaganda and promotional advertisements.

Reading Response 7- JD

April 4, 2022 / Joval Davis / 1 Comment

The idea of taking something meaningful and turning it into something profitable has existed for a long time. Cooperation’s due this so that they can turn something popular at the time into something that can be sold by them to the people for a profit. An example of this is the 1950 and 1960s which saw the creation of styles that rebelled against consumerism at that time. It also saw the creation of styles that embraced the idea of the period they were in. This led to these styles becoming very district in how they looked such as the Psychedelic art style. These styles were then taken by mass media cooperation and turned into something that could be sold to the public whether it was through bands or clothing. They used the styles and turned it into something that was no longer district. This can be seen even today something unique can come around but soon it becomes the norm and loses the voice it once had.

The creation of mainstream advertisement is one of the reasons the idea of culture jamming was created. Culture jamming is a form of protest that was used to rebel against the status quo or the mainstream culture. Examples of culture jamming can be found in many places throughout history. One example depicts a McDonald’s ad that exposes the idea of McDonald’s using growth hormones on cows. This is an example because the ad uses; McDonald’s brand and color to expose them to animal cruelty. It also uses the image of a humanoid female cow to represent the growth hormones. It also has a distorted version of Mc Donald’s in the background to show its corruption. Another example is an ad for Absolut Vodka which mocks the brand’s use of the Shakespearean writing on the bottle. They do this by having the vodka bottle be crusted and having a quote from Shakespeare that states that their action is ruining the point of Shakespeare’s work. It also mocks the ad’s idea of vodka being perfect by calling it impotent or useless. It also pushes further on this idea by having the bottle look like an impotent penis.

Mainstream at times seems like has one goal to sell anything to people no matter what it is. This can at times make it very hard for a unique voice or work of art to get out because it could wind up being used simply to sell to people and not for its original purpose. But hopefully, this does not stop people from getting their voices out there and trying something new.

Anninotion Lin

Proliferation Definition

Aesthetics Definition

Women Design

Reading Response 7 – KR

April 4, 2022 / Kevin Romo / 1 Comment

The relationship between the artist and the client should be reciprocal at all times. Their relationship should be reciprocal because both of them have to show to each other that they respect each other and that they agree to create art. They have to agree with each other. They do not recognize us that are in design as designers. We don’t have a title like the architects. But do we really need one? Do we really want one?. Some of us designers go to schools to prepare ourselves and to become professionals, but some of the greatest artists came from their homes they taught themselves. We don’t care about a title; we care about our satisfaction with our work and the clients satisfaction towards it.

Reading Response 7 – RR

April 4, 2022 / Richard Rohoman / 1 Comment

Culture jamming is the practice of disrupting the mundane nature of everyday life and the status quo with surprising, often comical, or satirical acts or artworks. It presents a variety of interesting communication strategies that play with the branded images and icons of consumer culture to make consumers aware of surrounding problems and diverse cultural experiences that warrant their attention. Which focused on the power of mass media and advertising to shape and direct our norms, values, expectations, and behavior through unconscious and subconscious tactics. Its aims were also to make producers aware of “a new sense of cultural responsibility, based on the recognition that the objects that surround them mold men.” Designers have a responsibility for the content that they produce. Designers’ goal is promoting the corporate culture that they represent and bring awareness to the consumer of these products. The logic of culture jamming is to convert easily identifiable images into larger questions about such matters as corporate responsibility, the “true” environmental and human costs of consumption, or the private corporate uses of the “public” airwaves. By being more aware of our surroundings, we can be more creative in our design process as designers. Designers’ job is to let the consumer know about corporate America and the products that they produce for consumer consumption. I think information is key in the mainstream of opinions that we form into new ideas of creativity.

Reading Response 7 – E M

April 3, 2022 / Emmanuel Mena / 1 Comment

In the readings, we see how paul rand explores what culture jamming is and how the mainstream industry competes with the underground. Culture jamming refers to the creation of images or practices that force viewers to question the status quo. When designers do this they make us think about the products or things we consume from a totally different perspective. This method challenges mainstream corporate advertisement into showing the true side behind the curtain of what their products or services are really doing to consumers. Culture gaming is being used today in one of the biggest food chain industries, Macdonald’s. Many designers have played around with the words and logo of the company, going from flipping the famous M logo, upside down and making it look like a W, and then using it to write “Weight”. They have also played with their famous slang, “I’m loving it” changing it to “I’m gaining it”. This starts a social disruption and it starts making people question the status quote and what they are consuming. Paul Rand also talks about the ways advertisement has been changing and evolving. He says” What has always kept the designer and client at odds is the same thing that has kept them in accord. For the former, design is a means for invention and experiment, for the latter, a means of achieving economic, political, or social ends. This shows the difference between mainstream vs. underground because old designer thinks of design as a way to invent and innovate but nowadays the mainstream thinks about how they can make money or make a political change. We’ve been experiencing this for the longest now from political cartoons to biased news media streams, design has become a way to manipulate and change people’s points of view and it has lost the meaningful power that design has, and that is to make and innovate into a better society. A lot of companies nowadays think that design is only to create advertisements and propaganda and this is taking away the fundamental value that designers like Paul Rand have left us with

Tag: Reading Response #7

Reading Response 7- SL

Reading response 7 -BV

Reading Response 7 E H

Reading Response 7 – MD

Reading Response 7- JD

Reading Response 7 – KR

Reading Response 7 – RR

Reading Response 7 – E M

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