All, 
I often feel, listening in to the discussions on this list, that one is
entering a slightly odd world, especially when it gets to posturing
about research practice. 
Last week we had distinctly mad differentiations offered between
fiction and history, this week it is (thankfully less barmy) reflections
on the ‘artifacts of evidence’ in design research. Where both become
mad, or show signs of madness is the desire to reduce substantive
complexity—in the world, in practice, in thought, even in
research—to formulaic simplicity. 

I can (just about) allow Dori’s initial formulation— 
>In graphic design, it is the poster.
In industrial design, it varies on scale but it ranges from the cup to
the
car. (Not alphabetically of course)
In architecture, it is the blueprint.
All of which find optimized distribution through the client and
competition
Prizes< 
—as the kind of thing one says to be brief, though taken literally it
is nonsense for obvious reasons.. 

Terry’s notion that in design it is “typically the representation
of the designed object” that is assessed is equally over-simple and
quite untrue. Only perhaps in the artificial environment of the
pedagogic studio would it come close to truth.  In reality, as number of
people have already pointed out, it is, like it or not at least also the
realized “thing” (or situation) that is the object of evaluation. 

What both formulations seem to me to be struggling to articulate or
accept is that in design you have an ambiguous artifact. And in two
senses. First, because depending on context the “artifact” one
evaluates or studies or uses as the beginning of study, may be either or
both evidence of process and intent and the realized “thing”
(whatever it may be).

But design(s) are ambiguous in another and more profound sense. All
designed objects are, to a degree, inherently impure. By “impure”
here I mean that they are radically impure; impure in their essence
shall we say, impure because both the evidence of process and the
realized entity each address (if slightly differently) both the real and
the possible or the ideal simultaneously. 

To try to simplify: a design may be a realized thing but it also
contains a moment of being a proposition. Typographically we can render
it that it offers itself as simultaneously “this!” and “this?” ;
i.e., it is at once idea and realization; that which can work and that
which is a proposition (a “perhaps).  

Put yet another way the design (meaning both its moments of process and
realization) is both “rationalist” (in a speculative and reflective
manner) and “pragmatic” (in a fallibilistic sense). 

It is not difficult to see that in respect of all these moments the
evidence of process will tend towards exemplifying the first, the
realized “thing itself” the second. 

Is this the end of the complexity? By no means: almost certainly the
design offered is propositional in another sense: that it is in some way
re-descriptive of a situation or a context or a set of categories,
concepts, norms. This means that while addressing a “real” condition
the design also addresses cognitive expectations— and this is as true
of a utilitarian things like the Wright bros. airplane as it is of a
piece of “high art” design. 

This is why, as Dori notes, in many ways the “design prototype” is
the “Ur” artifact for design study, for it is here that we see
combined most strongly (and usually most interestingly) the two elements
of rationalized and projective speculation (“making-up”) and
“making-real.” The fascination of design is surely in the
negotiation between these moments, which are inescapable for design (and
it is their combination that in my view distinguishes design from pure
technology—if the latter can actually exist, I have my doubts). 

But at the same time this is also why Chris’s comment that the
artifacts of design research could be—[Re eg. the Wrights bros]
“anything” from "performances, aircraft and tables of data or the
understanding of performance, constructional principles and aerodynamic
knowledge that represent the generalisable knowledge from their work."
All of these are moments of the practice as a whole and therefore viable
as moments of evidence of that process. 

We might still want to focus though on what is it that is particularly
distinctive to design. 

At the great risk of over-simplifying a too complex a situation I would
want to make the case for configuration. It is in the configuration of
the “thing” (both in process and realization)  that we can see that
negotiation of the projective and the real which distinguishes realized
design from “mere” projection on the one hand and from pure
production (without speculation, without a propositional—or
critical-content) on the other. 


From cold New York
Best 
Clive Dilnot 


Clive Dilnot
Professor of Design Studies
Dept. Art and Design Studies, Rm 609
Parsons School of Design,
New School University,
2w 13th St.
New York NY 10011

T.1-212-229-8916 x1481

>>> "Tunstall, Elizabeth" <[log in to unmask]> 1/31/2008 5:19 PM >>>
I wrote:

In graphic design, it is the poster.
In industrial design, it varies on scale but it ranges from the cup to
the
car. (Not alphabetically of course)
In architecture, it is the blueprint.
All of which find optimized distribution through the client and
competition
prizes.

Note: This is not to say that these are the only artifacts, but they
seem
to be the ones in which you are assigned/encouraged to design in order
to
prove yourself as a member of the group.

Response to Terry who said: it is typically the representation of the
designed object (a 'blueprint'?) that is assessed rather than the cup
or
car as finally manufactured.

I think you are correct, in the sense that a prototype of a
poster/car/
etc. is the "representation" of what will become before the
manufacturing
process. This perhaps points to the dividing line between design and
manufacturing or print production, in which the role of the designer
traditionally was less significant.

So I stand edified by the need to be explicit in terms of the
"artifact"
being the poster prototype, the car prototype as the "blueprints" in
the
same way as the architectural blueprint. This is why I love this
group.

This is also more correct in the sense that it reifies the
"rationalist"
bias I find among my design colleagues who are more interested in the
ideal represented in the prototype before all the constraints of
production.

Ken said I should clarify by what I mean by rationalist philosophical
tradition. Citing the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (I know it
is
one step up from Wikipedia, but it is concise), the rationalist adopts
three claims:

"The Intuition/Deduction Thesis: Some propositions in a particular
subject
area, S, are knowable by us by intuition alone; still others are
knowable
by being deduced from intuited propositions...

he Innate Knowledge Thesis: We have knowledge of some truths in a
particular subject area, S, as part of our rational nature.[which is
not
gained from experience.]

he Innate Concept Thesis: We have some of the concepts we employ in a
particular subject area, S, as part of our rational nature.[which is
not
gained from experience.]"

So it is the "design prototype" that is the artifact of evidence in
design
practice. This is interesting when I compare it to anthropology, where
in
some ways the artifact as prototype seems true as well. The
ethnographic
monograph, while a specific descriptive account of a society, is also
a
prototype for a kind of society (hunter-gatherers, agriculturalists,
village peasants). Lucy's bones is the prototype for all species of
the
Australopithecus afarensis.

But outside of the community of designers, is it not the manufactured
car
or the exhibited poster that wins the awards, not the prototype?

As per Chris's comment that the artifact of design research can be
anything from "performances, aircraft and tables of data or the
understanding
of performance, constructional principles and aerodynamic knowledge
that
represent the generalisable knowledge from their work." How do you all
(now speaking as an outsider/insider) evaluate each other's work?

As for distinctions between design research and design practice. I
guess I
am making the distinction based on intentions of the activity and
probably
my own biases of what defines research. Design research I think always
feeds eventually into the design process (i.e. practice). Sometimes it
can
have a long durational period before application, which I see to be
more
of the philosophical studies about design epistemology. Or it can
quickly
feed into the design process, which could be some of the design
methods
research. But the emphasis on the understanding (self-reflexivity) of
epistemology or methods distinguishes design research from design
practice
for me. Thus while design practice can have that self-reflexivity, the
pragmatic considerations of time, budget, and client needs make that
understanding not core to the task at hand, which is to develop a
"successful" product. To be clear, many good designers conduct design
research to ensure a successful product, but others don't have to
because
depth of understanding is not a requirement for success.

Hope this clarifies.

Dori



References:

Markie, Peter, "Rationalism vs. Empiricism", The Stanford Encyclopedia
of
Philosophy (Fall 2004 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL =
<http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2004/entries/rationalism-empiricism/>.