Questions / Prompts

While reading “Revisiting the Avant-Garde” do you notice similarities between avant-garde movements of the past and the design field (or the world) of today?

Let’s look at a few terms you will find in the reading. Define these terms and consider in what ways do today’s designers participate in, facilitate, or reject them.

  1. Authorship
  2. Universality
  3. Social Responsibility

Provide specific examples (ie: specific designers, social media tools, design trends, advertising campaigns, etc). Check out AIGA’s Eye on Design to find out what contemporary designers are working on.

What idea(s) or concerns do you think will drive the Avant-Garde of the near future?

Revisiting the Avant-Garde

Armstrong, Helen. “Introduction: Revisiting the Avant-Garde” Graphic Design Theory: Readings From the Field, Princeton Architectural Press, 2009. Pages 9-15.

The design world of today and avant-garde from the past are definitely similar with the exception of the more advanced technology that the modern world possesses, however the essence of ideologies and practices remain. The book Graphic Design Theory: Readings From the Field by Helen Armstrong states, “The technology through which designers today create and communicate has quietly thrust universality back into the foundation of our work.”

The rapid growth of technology has caused the emergence of new tools and ways to practice design, but one of the main features that continues getting implemented and improved upon stems from the idea of universality. Collaborative and easily shareable workspaces and files are no longer new to designers of our era.

Authorship is almost a given these days when posting on social media and other platforms that require having an account. Designers personalize their feeds to stay on brand, be it personal or corporate. We also see a lot of collaborative work happening that doesn’t necessarily pertain to a single entity. Open-source projects, resources, and tools are huge in the industry these days like the text reads, “Already designers increasingly create tools, templates, and resources for their clients and other users to implement,” supporting the idea of universality.

The idea of “prosumerism” that is being explored in this book is reflected almost everywhere nowadays thanks to social media and “what’s trending”; corporations, businesses, and even small organizations often rely on what the average consumer is interested in to show empathy (sometimes honest, and sometimes only for the clicks, likes and follows— such entities often rely on these social vulnerabilities to sell only while seeming empathetic to issues at hand). But is has become part of the norm that social media presence is to engage an audience, start or join conversations, etc, while selling a product or service in doing so.

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