Gifts that keep on giving
Article Abstract:
Designing an object can be very similar to giving a gift, because both the designer and the gift-giver are motivated by love of the user of the object or receiver of the gift. The pleasure derived from fulfilling a real need by designing an object or by giving a present is destroyed when substitute objects, such as gift-articles, replace real objects. Real gifts express the giver's desire to recognize the receiver, just as useful objects express the designer's recognition of the user's needs. Gift-articles symbolize the superficial, artificial and materialistic basis of modern relationships.
Publication Name: I.D.
Subject: Business
ISSN: 0894-5373
Year: 1992
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The name game
Article Abstract:
Clive Dilnot's ideas on art and design theory elucidate the undermining of the value of design by the categorization of objects. Categories are used to ascribe characteristics to things and give a name to them, but they ignore the diversity of objects in a group. Categorizing is an insufficient process as there as there is a difference between abstract categories and real things. Categories are powerful design strategies whose ascriptive nature determines the form of things, making objects mere representations of already existing ideas.
Publication Name: I.D.
Subject: Business
ISSN: 0894-5373
Year: 1993
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There's good taste and there's bad taste. But is there a theory of taste?
Article Abstract:
Taste has always been a part of people's attitudes toward individuals or objects, yet no clear definition has been formulated. Attempting to clarify its meaning, museum director Stephen Bayley described it as a way of discriminating between objects and between people, deciphering a personal style. However, taste can also be regarded as social in nature. In this sense it is seen as a process by which a certain value is bestowed on an object, which is used in such a way that this value is affirmed.
Publication Name: I.D.
Subject: Business
ISSN: 0894-5373
Year: 1992
User Contributions:
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