Art history essay

1980s—2000s:

Impacts of Computerization, Digital Networking, Interoperability + the Rise of

Interface/Interaction Design

Frank Owen Gehry (b. Canadian, 1929), Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Bard College, NY, 2003. IMPACT OF COMPUTERIZATION ON ARCHITECTURE: -Gehry was among the first to use CAD (computer-aided design) to generate complex + organic (non-orthogonal) forms + reduce discrepancies (+ cost) in process from original drawings to end product. -G. has used CATIA, a modeling + analysis software allowing mathematical description of complex drawings, so that builders + fabricators can read + execute forms previously untranslatable.

Frank O. Gehry, Guggenheim Bilbao, 1997. Bilbao, Spain.

First completed project using CATIA = Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao.

Toyo Ito in collaboration with Cecil Balmond, Serpentine Pavilion, 2002. London. -Architect Ito collaborated w/ Balmond, a pioneer in the early 2000s of computational design. It allows one to use the computational powers of computers to simulate many iterations of a set of variables (too many for most humans to do w/o the computer) until one arrives at a desired pattern. -Here, Ito wanted a bldg. w/ irregular, criss-crossing beams. Balmond helped Ito find a system that had eccentric order but would not need a secondary system of supports to hold it up.

Toyo Ito in collaboration with Cecil Balmond, Serpentine Pavilion, 2002. London.

-Balmond came up w/ a simple rule (algorithm) that the computer can model: drawing a line from the halfway point of one side of a square to a point 1/3 the way along the adjacent line. The patter repeated, creating a mesh-like network of lines. These he could cut + fold + form into the bldg., made of steel.

-All intersecting lines are mutually supporting.

Interface + Interaction Design

• Interface = point of contact between human + machine. (For screen-based design, think of the display.)

• Interaction design = the design of the entire experience w/ the machine over the period of engagement. It includes the design of interfaces.

Interface + Interaction Design

• Interaction design is as old as the abacus, compass + clock. In the digital age, its role has increased dramatically.

• It has expanded to include designing conditions for 2- way or many-way communications (responsive objects, user-input).

• In the 2000s, fields known as “user-experience design,” “Interaction design,” + ”information design” have grown in importance.

Key Early Development in User-Friendliness + Seamlessness

• A significant historical trend in interaction design = user-friendliness + seamlessness—a type of suppressive design that allows the user to ignore the technology making it possible.

• 1983 saw the first GUI (Graphical User Interface) for commercial use (for Lisa [1983] + Macintosh [1984] computers). It featured pointing + clicking to “desktop icons” w/ a “mouse.”

April Greiman (U.S., b. 1948), poster, 1986.

In graphic design, use of computers to generate digital type + manipulate images = 1st w/ 1984 Apple Mac GUI.

Apple GUI used terms familiar to graphic designers + amateurs (“cut” + “paste”).

Trends: amateur publishing, professional graphic design using ditital tools to generate forms distinctive to digital technology of the time

(as in L.A.-based April Greiman’s work here: pixelated typeface inspired by low-res technology; incorporating digital photos + simple abstraction of images made w/ MacDraw).

Zuzana Licko (b. Chechosolovakia, 1961), typefaces styled after computer pixelations, 1980s.

-San Francisco-based magazine Émigré, fnd. 1984 by Dutch-born Rudy VanderLans, published work by international graphic designers using new media.

-VanderLands worked w/ Czech-born Zuzana Licko, whose pixilation-inspired typefaces are below.

Barry Deck, Template Gothic typeface, for Émigré, 1990s.

-New software + higher resolution eliminated pixilation + made possible new fonts (published in Émigré, 1990s).

-This one breaks the traditional opposition between serif + sans-serif, the mechanical + the calligraphic.

Ad for Sharp Corp., flat-screen TV, in The New Yorker (May 2001).

Over the 1990s: the computer became a standard tool for graphic designers. Students entering the field made projects using software packages such as Quark Xpress + Adobe Photoshop; universities replaced drafting tables w/ computer stations, scanners + high-res printers.

It became possible to create persuasive graphic + filmic illusions, ever more seamlessly integrating animation + photography, complex layering of images + using a wide range of colors + tonal subtleties.

W/ the rise of the WWW in the mid- 1990s, web-page design emerged as a new multimedia field.

Key Early Developments in User-Friendliness + Seamlessness: Design for Networked Technology

• 1993: Marc Andreessen develops Mosaic, the GUI that made the WWW available.

• 1995: the first commercial web browser w/ totally interconnected network (Netscape, introd. 1994) dominated the market. It worked w/ IBM, PC, Mac + Unix. Its use of open protocols (like HTML) made different digital systems able to communicate. Before this, corporate networks, including email systems = incompatible.

Key Early Developments in User-Friendliness + Seamlessness: Design for Networked Technology

• 1995: Along w/ Netscape, Windows 95, which became the most popular OS worldwide, sparked what we now know as the Internet + digitization revolution (conversion of all types of data---text, pictures, music, film—into bits + bytes, combinations of 1s + 0s, to be stored on microprocessors or transmitted via satellites + fiber-optic lines). Had built-in Internet support, making PC apps., not just browsers, recognize + interact w/ the Internet.

Key Early Developments in User-Friendliness + Seamlessness

• 1996: Telecommunications Act. Allowed local + long-distance companies to compete w/ each other in the same markets. This sparked competition, driving the global fiber-optic-laying boom in which companies extended infrastructural capacity.

• Late 1990s: Development of XML (data encryption language) + SOAP (related transport protocol). These became Internet standards, allowing softwares to interoperate—thus enabling web-enabled work flow (exchange of digital info. between programs).

• Late 1990s: Development of meta-search engines (Google, Yahoo!, MSN Web Search). This democratized research.

Cellular phone, 2000. Manufactured by Nokia, Finland.

Developments in miniaturization + wireless technology extended + further integrated all previous developments + allowed increasing flexibility of usage, further “naturalizing” user experience.

2006 magazine ad for Cingular-plan cell phones.

By. C. 2005, cell phones become miniature offices, recording devices, libraries + entertainment centers.

Aesthetic trends in design of these devices include variable combinations of

1) Miniaturization

2) Bundling target-market-desirable combinations of features, including other mobile devices such as cameras + MP3s

3) Personalization (customized covers, ringtones, wallpapers— after 2007, apps).

Ad for iMac desktop computer, manufactured by Macintosh Corporation, 1998.

Apple products, from iMac computers

to mobile devices such as iPod (2001-)

were in the forefront of the

development of aesthetic design tactics

that reinforced user-friendliness +

seamlessness:

1) Association of computers w/ leisure,

not just work (“fun” colors make the

computer a fashion accessory) and…

Apple Industrial Group, Apple Pro Mouse, 2000.

2) minimalism: reductive design of visual elements. Apple’s minimalism visually reinforced ease of use.

In this case, ease of use is also visually reinforced by transparency.

Apple Industrial Group, Apple iPod Shuffle, 2005.

3) miniaturization. This is evident w/ Apple’s sequential release of iPod variants in smaller sizes.

4) Design of device interfaces to match intuitive, or “natural,” human language, metaphors, or bodily movements.

The first iPhone (2007) furthered these developments w/ multi-touch.

So did the tablet metaphor for iPad (2010).

Key Early Developments in User-Friendliness + Seamlessness

• 2005-: John Underkoffler’s “g-speak” gestural interface first appears in commercial products such as Guitar Hero (2005), Nintento Wii (2006) + Microsoft Kinect (2010).

• 2006: Jeff Han develops multitouch screens, which CNN anchors used to cover 2008 presidential elections. Multitouch screens appeared also on Apple’s iPhone (2007) + iPad (2010).

Jan Edler (German, b. 1970) + Tim Edler (b. 1965), BIX Communicative Display Skin, 2002, for Kunsthaus Graz, Austria (bldg. designed by Peter Cook + Colin Fournier).

RESPONSIVE ARCHITECTURE: a product of recent emphasis on communication + interaction in all design areas.

Detail of Jan Edler (German, b. 1970) + Tim Edler (b. 1965), BIX Communicative Display Skin, 2002, for Kunsthaus Graz, Austria (bldg. designed by Peter Cook + Colin Fournier).

This permanent installation of fluorescent light fixtures adapts to the institution’s communication needs.

Architectural space physically merges w/ screen space (going beyond the traditional mounting of signs on buildings).

Literal space has merged w/ screen space more recently w/ GPS-based mobile apps that offer reviews of products or places in one’s vicinity.

Doris Sung, Bloom, 2012. 6 m. @ Materials + Applications, Los Angeles. [Also see video.]

-Another approach to “responsive architecture” = the pneumatic façade Walls adjust shape or permeability as desired to changes in air, light, temperature.

-Biomimicry = design inspired by organisms.

Another innovator in “breathable skin” biomimicry in architecture:

Tobias Becker Breathing Skins Showroom, est. 2015, in Mandelbachtal, Germany. [See video introduction + demonstration of the technology.]

Apple, iPhone 4s featuring Siri , October 2011.

RESPONSIVE OBJECTS: another frontier in interactive design called User Interface/User Experience, or UI/UX design.

Siri = voice-activated “intelligent assistant” for Apple iPhone 4s. It converts voice into text + allows one to send messages, schedule meetings, make calls, do dictation + searches.

Siri talks back + learns/adapts to one’s use of language, customizing responses in the process.

Responsiveness distinguishes this phase of interface design from prior communication design (e.g., signage).

Violet, Karotz, 2011.

THE “INTERNET OF THINGS” (IOT) =

one outcome of wi-fi-using “intelligent” Internet assistants like Siri.

This Android-OS device can surf the

web, sort + select email + social- media updates + RSS feeds; play music on when asked; wake one up; facilitate live chats; or watch (camera) one’s home while one is

away.

Speak directly to it or to one’s smartphone or PC.

Amazon Echo (3rd generation) on Amazon.com November 2019. First generation was 2015.

-MIT’s Fluid Interfaces Group (http://fluid.media.mit.edu/vision) works not only on ”responsive objects” but also on…

-”augmented reality”: enhancing one’s experience of physical spaces w/ digitized info. + interfaces -”collaborative interactions”: interfaces for interaction among users -”programmable materials”: interfaces + machines for control + manipulation of materials

-A stated goal (of 2017) was to make interfaces (beyond the screen) that feel “seamless” + “natural.”

Interface/Interaction Design: Possibilities, Concerns

• UI/UX designers are uniquely challenged to address the subtleties of interpersonal communication: personality, tone, phrasing, inflection, spontaneity.

• What interaction designs do you love or find frustrating? Why? • Examples to consider: ATMs, the CPP website, Google

search, GPS devices, social-media apps, VR devices, Domino’s Pizza ordering apps (add your favorites or least favorites).

Interface/Interaction Design: Possibilities, Concerns; Discussion of Marc Miquel Ribé reading:

• Designers + consumers of UI/UX design today are uniquely challenged to address concerns of privacy + ownership of user data.

• There is also the matter of ”dark UX,” the subject of Marc Miquel-Ribé’s article, “Dark User Experience” (2020).

1. How does he define dark UX? 2. Explain what he means by practices of “manipulation” +

how they are different from practices of ”deception.” 3. Examples you’ve personally encountered? 4. Do you agree with the author about the ethical implications

of dark UX?