Dear Mike,
There is a wonderful example by Donald Schön in his Educating the Reflective Practitioner (1987 pp.179-181) that involves a music teacher with a student learning to play the violin. The teacher asks one particular student to identify the character of the music she is playing. The student identifies the qualities of the three themes as “lively”, “stormy” and “reflective”. The teacher continues by asking the student to identify from her own theme descriptions how she could change her playing to achieve a more precise expression of those themes.
I have often used this example to help students and design educators to understand what I am asking them to do from a design perspective, in particular in a co-design process to make the point that visual associations, themes and narratives are inherently shareable even though those involved can't necessarily see the same image. They can however make a collaborative, material or visual interpretation that can be negotiated and re-nogiated by drawing on the variations of interpretation of a collaborative theme or association. I do believe that the ability to leverage the inherent conflict of interpretation, in a very positive sense, of an association or theme lies at the very heart of a design process, both from an individual and a collaborative process.
If you would like to see the context in which I cited the Schön example, you can find it on p. 85 in my PhD.
The download link is: files.me.com/designarena/5amotu
You pose an interesting question "... If they are indeed the same, then why do we differentiate the design process from the creative process?"
My attempt at an answer would be that it is the context of practice that is significant... Or as a question, as regards one or another context of practice one could ask: "What is actually going on here, how are those involved doing what they do?"
My further research has led me to understand that much of what one could consider as being intimately or even solely related to a design process, for example design thinking, visual thinking, is in fact the fine tuning of human capabilities that in this case are brought to bear in the context of a design process. So it stands to reason that others can bring these capabilities or one could maybe even call them levels of perception to bear and fine tune in other processes, other contexts.
Kathryn Moore has written a very good and very provocative paper that rather pulls apart the notion that visual thinking is necessarily part of a design process or is even something that designers do altogether:
"Overlooking the Visual." The Journal of Architecture, vol. 8, Spring 2003.
I am tempted to wonder if her point could also be made as regards the widely used term "design thinking."
Best,
Chris.
-------------
from:
Chris Heape PhD
Head of Institute, Head of Research
The Institute for Product Design
Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences - HiOA
Norway
Work at HiOA, Kjeller
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On 21 Sep 2011, at 10:36, Janet McDonnell wrote:
> Dear Mike,
>
> I have a paper forthcoming in Design Studies - available via their in press list which is a (single) study of fine art collaboration - and relates the(ir) practice to what we know about designing. There is also recent work by Linden Ball at Lancaster, UK working with poets - there are refs to some of this latter in the Design Studies paper. Please let me know off-list if you publish anything.
>
> Regards,
>
> Janet
>
> Professor Janet McDonnell
> Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, Southampton Row, London WC1B 4AP
> tel +44 (0) 207 514 7144
> ________________________________________
> From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of McAuley, Mike [[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: 20 September 2011 23:45
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: differences in process between design and other creative disciplines.
>
> I would be interested to know if anyone is doing work which seeks to establish differences in process between design and other creative disciplines such as music. Obviously outcomes/artefacts are different, but are the processes the same? If they are indeed the same, then why do we differentiate the design process from the creative process? Questions, questions.This is my new, post PhD research direction and one which I seek to partly pursue through my own creative practice as a musician and illustrator. In my previous work I used Swann's (2002) design process model to help describe the processes of my illustration students when they interpreted written text into illustrations. Here is the link to the thesis if anyone is interested.http://mro.massey.ac.nz/handle/10179/1046
>
> Creative practice as research method is a new venture for me, but I do think that having undergone the rigours of a traditional PhD I may now be in a position to develop verifiable knowledge. If I don't, well I'm going to have a ball writing songs and painting! [log in to unmask]
>
> Mike
>
> Dr. MIKE MCAULEY
> SENIOR LECTURER, SUBJECT DIRECTOR,
> ILLUSTRATION
> Institute of Communication Design
> College of Creative Arts
> Massey University
> Museum Building
> Buckle Street
> Wellington
> http://creative.massey.ac.nz<http://creative.massey.ac.nz/>
> ________________________________
>
> (04) 801 5799 ext 62461
> (04 027 357 8799
>
> We've moved into our amazing new home at King's Cross.
>
> FIND OUT MORE:
> www.csm.arts.ac.uk/kings-cross
-------------
from:
Chris Heape PhD
Head of Institute, Head of Research
The Institute for Product Design
Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences - HiOA
Norway
Work at HiOA, Kjeller
e.mail: [log in to unmask]
e.mail: [log in to unmask]
Tel: +47 6484 9346
Mobile: +47 915 90 613
Work at Home
e.mail: [log in to unmask]
Mobile: +47 915 90 613
Tel: +45 2620 0385
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