Lecture 15: Recap and link to level 5

- the importance of knowledge in areas other than your own discipline was highlighted because all of the information that we learn will help to influence our design decisions

- we are here because our job is communicate and solve the problems of communication - illustration, animation and graphic design

- need to be aware of audience and context even though we cannot necessarily control them 

- within our language we have symbols, signs and signifiers - we need to take into consideration the fact that we need to communicate with a universal language

‘process is more important than outcome’ 

What happens from here?

• exploring discipline specific content
• developing individual areas of interest
• formulating research questions 
• developing practical and contextual research skills
• writing research project proposals
• research informed practice and academic writing 

Research question that shape cop:

1. What is good? 
2. To what extent do the individual politics of professional practitioners impact on the roleani function of Graphic Design
3. In an era of globalisation, to what extent do graphic design practices reflect core British values
4. To what extent do technological developments in production and distribution impact on graphic design? 
5. To what extent has graphic design constructed our understanding or view of historical events and perceptions of truth?
6. To what extent does aesthetic style reflect the context, audience and function of contemporary graphic design

Lecture 14: Introducing semiotics

Semiotics is the science of studying signs and their meaning. 
The signified (experience) and signifier (spoken or written language) are the codes (system of symbols or signs) that help us as individuals to understand signs. The relationship between them is arbitrary and the signs are organised into codes. According to Barthes (1957), signs signify on two different levels which are denotation (literal meaning) and connotation (cultural associations).
Saussure believes that a sign's meaning is determined primarily by its relationship to other signs. 

CODES
- codes are found in all forms of cultural practice
- in order to make sense of cultural artefacts we need to learn and understand their codes
- we need to acknowledge that codes rely on a shared knowledge

- they have a number of units to choose from )paradigmatic dimension) which are combined by rules or conventions (syntagmatic dimension).
- all codes convey meaning
- all codes depend upon agreement and a shared cultural background
- codes perform an identifiable social or communicative function

Two ways that Saussure defined codes to be organised into:
PARADIGM - a set of signs from which one is to be chosen 
SYNTAGM - the message into which the chosen signs are to be combined
All messages involve selection (from a paradigm) and combination (into a syntagm).

PARADIGM
Every time we communicate we select from a paradigm. All the units in a paradigm must have something in common and each of the units in a paradigm must be clearly distinguished from the others. 
Where there is choice there is meaning, and the meaning of what was chosen is determined by the meaning of what was not. 
Types of paradigms: 
- changing shot in TV
- Typefaces
- Headgear 
- Type of cars we drive 
- Colour of front doors
- Swear words

SYNTAGM
Once a unit has been chosen from a PARADIGM it is combined with other units. This combination is called a SYNTAGM. 
- a sentence is a SYNTAGM of words
- our clothes are a SYNTAGM of paradigmatic choices of hats, gloves, ties ...
- interior décor is a SYNTAGM of choices from the PARADIGM of chairs, wallpaper, carpets etc. 
- an architect makes a SYNTAGM out of doors, windows etc. and their positions

The PARADIGM is the choice and the SYNTAGM is the relationship.

SYNCHRONIC  
- focus on a instant
- looks at relationships ghat exist among elements of a text
- pattern of paired oppositions buried in the text 
- paradigmatic structure 
- static
- simultaneity 
DIACHRONIC
- focus on development
- looks at the way narrative evolves
- chain of events
- syntagmatic structure 
- succession

Lecture 13: Design and Modernism

Modernism - The subjective experience of the individual in the modern world 

About how the modern world helps us to understand ourselves at a deeper level. 

Modernism is about regaining order and structure. 

Pushing things forward, not looking backwards, inventing, not historic, not quoting

Modernism in design :

• anti-historicism Pushing things forward, not looking backwards, inventing, not historic, not quoting
• Truth to materials celebrate the materials and not disguise them. Simple geometric forms appropriate to the material being used. 
• Form follows function design something to work and then the beauty comes in the elegance in which it serves its purpose 
• Technology embracing the new technologies 
• Internationalism utopian ambition to bring the world together by having one mode of visual communication across the whole planet 

If you follow the trends then it will be lost with time as fashion changes. Modernism was trying to make a style which stripped everything down to its essence so that they became timeless. 

New York is exemplar city of high modernism - Mies van der rohe, Seagram building, 1958

Logic, rationality and reason 

Quarry Hill Flats, Leeds, 1938-78

The Bauhaus - whole wall of glass to make the art studios light, new typeface for the name on the side, all disciplines working together. 

Harry beck underground map - not accurate in distance layout, but it is a visualisation of the London Underground to make getting around as easy as possible. Form follows function, the legibility was the most important, just need to understand london, not understand each of the distances between the stations. 

Modernist do not use the decorative features such as serifs, also argue that all letters should be lowercase(don't communicate anything and don't help with the process of reading) - Herbert Bayer's

The constructivists: Tatlins model of the monument to the third international. Aesthetic of the modern as the iron and other materials are celebrated. 

Stepanova & Popova: 

VKhUTEMAS- Progressive Art School

Just like the Bauhaus but soveit