‘As we enter the 21st century it has never been more clear that the definition of what designers do and who they are has never been more ambiguous.’ p8
‘…the designer has never been more crucial to commerce and business. In the last 20 years the designer has been promoted up the order from being the tea-boy of business, fetching a brief and running with it, to being on the front line.’ p8
‘And then of course there’s the training and educational background of designers which sees them entering schools of ‘art and design’. This relationship with art is something that simmers away at the back of the minds of most designers.’ p8
‘Their sense of themselves is bound up with the idea of being ‘creative’, yet this existential imperative comes face to face, on a daily basis, with the demands of the client.’ p8
‘It is precisely because it is a discipline where art and commerce face-off against each other that it becomes a graphic benchmark of where society is.’ p8
Talking about Brian Eno’s philosophy:
‘Most designers have some private negotiation with themselves about the contract they make between art and money. On the surface, they simply find a spot nearer one end or another on the ‘Job-axis’ between cash and culture. Some take dull big-paying jobs to fund the hours on more rewarding cash-poor jobs, or take the money to spend on their own work. The latter, design writer Rick Poyner calls a ‘Robin Hood’ tactic.’ p8
‘…about designers reflecting on what they do and on how they imagine themselves. It’s about how the conflict of commerce and creativity is played out. An ultimately it’s about the existential brief they set themselves.’ p9
‘Design has always been regarded as art’s cousin from the wrong side of the tracks. Tainted by commerce, it has to earn its way in the world in the way that aristocratic art doesn’t. The tradition of art is a cultural inheritance from which any artist can draw.’ p128
‘In any case, in very practical ways this crude distinction between art and design is increasingly untenable. Many contemporary artists actually rely on designers’ work as a crucial feature for their artworks.’ p128
‘Jeff Koons used to farm out work to craftsmen and recently Damien Hirst has relied heavily on input from Jonathan Barnbrook. Barnbrook described his role for Hirst’s pharmaceutical series The Last Supper as being that of an art director.’ p128
‘Often artists and designers play out the same topic.’ p128
‘Experimental Jetset, Peter Davenport and Tony Linkson have all created work relating to the nature of time.’ p128
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