Question 7

Simulaora which is something that replaces reality with its representation can be seen in so many forms such as architecture today because many places have a theme, such as if you go to a restaurant that tries to create a theme of a 1970s diner. This is one of the diners at the Grove in Los Angeles where they try to recreate that feeling of the past with the coin in, old fashion music players and the design of the stools, chairs and booths. The Grove shopping center itself is an example of simulaora because all the buildings, designs, decorations are probably built or made when the shopping center was made, however the decorations resemble things that old times, around 1960s, use. A good example would be the sign "The Grove" on the theater of The Grove. This sign looks like it is a sign that old times would use because it has the same design but it was made in modern times, meaning it is somewhat a substitute or a fake, meaning simulaora.
The Grove is also an example of pastiche which is the transformation of historic past such as symbols, motifs, etc into mere stylizations of the past. Again, the big vertical sign, "The Grove" can be an example because this sign represents the past, around 1960s design. The old fashion diner at The Grove can also serve as an example because it is transforming a style of the past so that it can be used as decorations of the diner now. Another example is that fake gas station at The Grove because it is a symbol that represents the old lifestyle, it gives an idea to how cars and gas stations use to look like, and because this fake gas station was made in modern times, it is also an example of simulaora.

The Grove sign has an old fashion style

Old style music player found in a diner that has a theme of old fashion 1960s diner.

Fake gas old fashion gas station at The Grove

Christian Kerez, Architect Lecture.

Event: Christian Kerez, Architect Lecture. Friday, November 9, 2012

Christian Kerez, an architect and professor from Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich. In his architect lecture, he talks about the schoolhouse design in Leutschenbach in Switzerland. This school has a very unique design. It has many floors and the most interesting thing here to me, and to many others, because it is a highlight to the design, is the that the gym is in the sixth floor. The gym being on the highest level lets the students get a very good view of the city and I’m sure it is very breath taking to be there and look down. This part really reminds me of De Young Museum tower because it was so high and for a tower, there was a lot of space. I went up only once but it was sure a very spacious and the view of San Francisco was amazing and beautiful. I felt really relaxed and free when I was there in such a high elevation. I really like to feel so high up which is why I like heights and I really like Kerez’s idea of having the gym be so high and just having the whole building have so many windows to look out of. He commented on how he wanted students to feel like they have a lot of space which is why the halls and staircases are very wide, which I believe is a great design. I remember my elementary school had wide staircases and I felt safer than when I was in high school where the staircases were very narrow. Maybe because I was a lot smaller in size when I was in elementary school, but in high school, I felt so cramped and I hated walking up the narrow stairs because there were so many people and everyone always bumped into each other. Thus, having a wide staircase and halls is a really convenient and thoughtful design. Overall, I really like the idea to this design especially that the gym is high up so it gives students and people the opportunity to sightsee and feel like there is a lot of room to breathe.

Here are images showing the resemblance of De Young Tower compared to the schoolhouse

De Young Museum Tower interior. The big glass walls allow people to see  the outside which is similar to the school house gym and the building in general

Schoolhouse in Leutschenbach, Switzerland

De Young Museum Tower, San Francisco, CA

International Games Day

Event: International Games Day, November 3, 2012

I saw the multi-colored flyers of International Game Day at Powell Library and now that I think about it, it really reminds me of pop art, which is making art into “multiples” (Lecture 6) and how who ever made these flyers made them on so many colors of neon that are so bright to attract students to be interested. It certainly caught my eyes and I was really interested. I was already energized by the many colors I saw in front of me. This design or advertisement served its purpose very well because of the design of using certain colors and its placement (having them next to each other so all the colors are seen at once by the viewers). Secondly, what was on the flyer was also a great choice and helped served to attract people to this event. There are so many famous and well known game icons on this flyer. This is quite contradicting because I believe I only saw chess and a deck of cards available at the actual event, yet there are so many other game icons that are on the flyer but not present at the event. The design of putting well known and common games that everyone mostly are familiar with relates to brand loyalty and the design of branding everything. When I see the monopoly man or Pac-man, I felt happy because it brought me back to good old childhood memories of my siblings playing those games with me and how happy our lives were. These brands really relate to showing people that if we play this game or have this product, we will live happily. This same concept goes with other brands as well.

            Now in the actual event, I see that games really reflect culture of an area in the world, this is the area where the games are played. For instance, The “Los Angeles Loves You” Game really interested me. I know, it was designed in Los Angeles and why was it designed? It was designed and created because people in Los Angeles relate to the values of the game. Los Angeles residents know how bad traffic is over here, thus, a great way to make fun of this frustrating aspect of the city is though this game. I do not think this game would be as popular if it was played in Africa where there are very few cars. Thus, games really reflect people’s culture and what they are interested in. This way of designing games to fit the people that share a certain cultural background is a successful way of finding meaning to what makes a good game or what makes fun moments.  

Week 6 Blog

Pop art is defined as the relationship between consumer culture and product design. This came out around the 1950s when consumer culture emerged, which is after World War 2 and there were more markets, advertisements and everyone started enjoying shopping. As a technique of marketing, designers designed advertisements and this was part of pop art. For instance, Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup can design was mass produced which relates to how pop art mixed the traditional art and design. Like how the lecture said “pop art began to blur the traditional boundary between art and design (art was transformed from unique objects to “multiples” by Andy Warhol and others)” (Lecture 6). Thus, Campbell’s Soup cans had art that kept on multiplying and this became that design. Pop art influenced design because there became more and more products that followed pop art by taking imagery and multiplying them such as posters and textiles.

Now, after 50 years, I still recognize Campbell’s Soup. It is brand and this really relates to brand loyalty and how Campbell’s Soup brand conveys a sense of familiarity and folksiness (Naomi Klein) to regular customers. The same idea applies to all brands now. Therefore, pop art influenced art to be multiplied, thus, making it a design, and this designing of putting the same image in all products attractive customers. Brand loyalty is still everywhere so after 50 years, pop art and design still play a key role to the way we buy products.

For today, when I think about pop art, I think about Candy stores and advertisements for candy. For example, there is Rocket Fizz in Westwood and RX Candy in Ackerman. These candy stores use a lot of pop art to give the idea that candy is sweet, delicious and fun. When I walk into those stores, I feel so energized because not only he candies are so colorful, but the walls are filled with colorful posters which is the pop art design. So, this is an example of how pop art and design are used today as a means of commercial design and marketing.

 http://vimeo.com/29204051

Week 5 Blog

I do not see many benefits to planned obsolescence because this really does bother me when I’m buying electronics or think about buying a car in the future.  Planned obsolescence which is “artificial shortening of the lifespan of consumer commodities” (Lecture 5), is basically planning to break something one just bought, thus in a way wastes money, especially when this is not worth the price.  I’m mostly against this because I’m a consumer and never a salesman who tries to make a living by having others buy from me. However, salesmen, whether door to door people or corporate companies, depends on a certain degree of planned obsolescence because they need to make a profit. In this way planned obsolescence benefits the companies and when the company does well, it can open more job opportunities for others, thus benefiting common people such as myself. This whole cycle is basically economics and keeping the economy moving. This can relate to how Loos writes “the rapid changes in fashion provide employment for millions” (Loos, “Ornament and Crime,” pp.172). Here is referring to the fashion industry, but it can be applied to all sorts of businesses if “fashion” is replaced with new trends. Thus, when a product breaks in a short amount of time, the owner will probably either want the new and “improved,” as advertisement claims, version, or they would want to try another product completely new. Either way, the owner would buy something again, thus, stimulating the economy.

            Another benefit I see here is that because this concept exists and is applied, this keeps design, creativity, and new ideas moving and developing. If everyone kept all their belongings for such a long time, no one would buy much anymore, thus manufacturing companies would not only lose business, but they would not have to even care about thinking of coming up with a new idea. New ideas is what made humans so advanced. It is because of creativity and wanting to change that there is new technology and cures for diseases, etc. Without throwing things away or making things from the past old, there would be no new ideas and no one would follow them, thus, society would not be moving forward. Change in this case is good because thinking back, I’m sure everyone gets excited at new things or is amazed when he or she sees a new toy in the market when he or she was a child, or when the new IPhone 5 that recently came out.

            The harmful and negative side towards planned obsolescence is that manufacturers are acting like con men because from my experience, no advertisement would ever point out that a product will break in a certain amount of time. In addition, companies are counting on their products to give out on their nice customers who probably over paid for their product with their money that they worked hard for. Well, maybe not everyone has to work so hard to earn their money, but I do. Thus, I get disappointed at times when products are not in great quality and even then, I’m still skeptical about spending my money on something that seems to be in good quality because of this technique of planned obsolescence. 

“Reflecting Culture: The Francis E. Fowler, Jr. Collection of Silver

The “Reflecting Culture: The Francis E. Fowler, Jr. Collection of Silver has objects such as dinner sets, ships, horses and sculptures made from silver and at different times. The objects are from the 16^th century to the 19^th century. As I look through the objects and read about when they were made, I noticed that different cultures had very different style and there was a certain degree of ornamentation in each culture or region. At first, I hypothesized that in the 16^th century, dinner utensils such as plates, spoons, cups and teapots would have a high amount of ornamentation and that as time passes and moving toward the present, there would be less decorations because society was moving to a modern design. However, I was wrong; this exhibition does not show a correlation between time and level of ornamentation. Instead, ornamentation is correlated with region and culture. For example, I compared the Irish, Russian, and American dinner sets and focused on the level of ornamentation of these dinner sets. I observed that the American style was very simple relative to the Russian and Irish because it lacked patterns on the silverware. Irish style had more patterns and carvings on the silverware and the shapes and forms of the objects were very unique. The Russian, I thought valued ornamentation because there was a lot of it around the plate. Much detail was on the teapot and what I believe to be a goblet on the bottom right corner. In Russian style, there is even color such as the teapot and the pitcher that are blue and also have designs and patterns on them.

I think that comparing these three cultures, this collection related to design culture which is that design culture “contains things of the mind: plans, dreams, utopias, fears…” (Lecture 1). Design culture displays what the designer values. Applying this to silverware, the Russians seemed to value ornamentation more than the Irish and the Americans because they obviously put a lot of effort into making the dinner sets, which means that they found ornamentation worth that much time and effort.

In Extremis: Death and Life in 21st Century Haitian Art Exhibition

In Extremis: Death and Life in 21^st Century Haitian Art Exhibition

I went to the “The Extremis: Death and Life in 21^st Century Haitian Art” gallery. I looked closely at Pierrot Barra’s art work and design on “Cross with fork and spoon, 1995”. This artwork consist of many materials all clumped up together. The description writes that it is made up of wood, fabric, metal and plastic. It has a very wild and abstract background. What mainly struck out to me was the cross, fork and spoon. The cross represents God and because it looks as though the cross is holding onto the fork one end and the spoon on another, it looks like or represents a person getting ready for dinner. When I thought about relating the cross with a human, the concept of anthropomorphism came into mind. This is the “tendency to…see likenesses to living beings in inanimate things…” (Lecture 1). When I looked at these cross, I immediately thought about a person sitting at the dinner table, holding a fork and a spoon and ready to dig into their meal. I think Barra thought the same way on anthropomorphizing because the description writes “But he’s always there, waiting to dig into you with his fork” (Cross with fork and spoon, 1995).  Barra names the cross as a “he,” thus meaning that he is relating the cross a human like creature.

This work also reminds me of bricolages, which are “compositions designed by combing pre- existing designs. They express their creator’s identity and worldview” (Lecture 1). I think that the cross is famous for representing God, the very powerful being, the fork and spoon are eating utensils which can mean that they are tools for inflicting pain because humans use it to eat meat which kills animals. The arms and body parts on the artwork represent the dead because in general, if a body is not whole, it is either in pain or the person is dead. These objects are very familiar to everyone, and they are put together to send a message. This message is that if a person has sinned in their life, God will inflict pain on you when the sinner is dead by picking at him. Thus, these objects are combined to form a bricolage and it displays how Barra views sinners and the things that will happen to them in the afterlife.