Contradiction-driven design

Frederick van Amstel http://fredvanamstel.com

Architecture and Design SchoolDigital Design

PUCPR

Multiple definitions of design

Design is making sense of things.Klaus Krippendorff

The dirty mind game

•Work in pairs: draftsman versus reader

•Goal: to draw something without meaning

•Draftsman draw and the reader tries to find meanings (draftsman loses 1 point per meaning)

•Draftsman remembers all the meanings and adds his/her secret ones (+1 point per meaning)

•Draftsman wins if he has a positive balance

•Meanings should explain the whole drawing

Meaning comes from contradictions

• I don’t know but I want to know

• I suppose someone knows, but I don’t

• I make sense of this thing based on other things

• I make my own sense, but I’m influenced by how others make sense

• Conclusion: meaning comes from contradictions, hence it is possible to make a game out of it

Contradiction in design and in architecture

Contradiction between representation and represented

Contradiction as a formal feature

The Pompidou Centre is an inverted building, with service infrastructure at the facade (Piano, Rogers e Franchini)

What is a contradiction

• An accumulated tension in society

• A struggle of two forces

•No force can be eliminated from the struggle

• Cannot be solved but can be overcome

• Contradiction is overcome by the creation of a third force which contains the two existing forces in a new configuration

The Treachery of Images (Rene Magritte)

What is not a contradiction

• Technical problems which can be solved

• Paradoxes which can’t be overcome

•Dilemmas in choosing between options

• Controversial opinions

Discussion

• Is it a contradiction or not?

• An umbrella that breaks with strong wind

•Drivers who do not obey the Law

• Children who asks for money at the traffic light

• Lack of options in the supermaket

PSP Game

•Identify problems and solutions in an activity using PSP

•Use different post-it colors for problems and solutions

•Patterns of unsolvable problems may reveal contradictions

Contradiction is not something abstract. It is very concrete.

This is not concrete.

Social inequality is concrete (Paraisópolis - São Paulo)

Consumption is concrete (Waste Land, Vik Muniz)

Prejudice is concrete (Viviany Beleboni)

Oppresion is when you feel a contradiction

•... even if you don’t know it is there (that is why it is concrete not abstract)

•It is possible to conceptualize contradiction, but, the concept is insuficient to understand

•The only way to understand is to go through the contradiction

The Skin I Live In (2011)

Image theater

•Make an image using your colleagues’ bodies as statues

•Show the oppresion through posture and artifacts

•The oppresion must be visible without explanation

Contradiction is the root of the problem but also its

solution.

How to overcome contradictions

• Society is the one who overcomes contradiction

• Contradiction is what allows society to change

•What the designer can do is to make it visible, gather people and provide instruments to generate the third force

• The third force is not a great idea (abstract). It means going beyond idea and taking action (concrete)

Dialectics can help designers working with contradictions... or

confuse them even more!

Everything is under constant change...

... and contradiction is the drive behind change.

Contradiction changes when the object expands.

Example: smartphones

The smartphone expanded its objects by incorporating functionality from specialized instruments.

Steve Jobs in MacWorld 2007 criticized the lack of adaptation to different objects in smartphone keyboards

System crisis (Clay Spinuzzi)

people

AppBlackberry’s physical keyboard

community

rules division of labor

object result

Smartphones could run apps, however, buttons could not adapt to the new objects brought by the apps.

On-screen keyboard from iPhone

System crisis (Clay Spinuzzi)

people

AppiPhone’s on-screen keyboard

community

rules division of labor

object result

On-screen keyboard can adapt to objects, but it is imprecise and difficult to memorize, hence, less

efficient.

Tactus keyboard with microbubbles

Voice recognition (iOS Siri)

Electrolux touchscreen refridgerator tried to steal some objects from the smartphone (alarms, calendars, photos).

The Internet of Things may overcome this contradiction between generic instruments and multiple objects

Object expansion

• Communication object — cellphone

• Consumption/production object — smartphone

• Relationship object — Internet of Things

Object analysis

•Make a play-doh model of an object which orients an activity you want to change

•Draw a mind map around the object with its characteristics

•Connect the contradictory characteristics

•If you don’t find any contradiction, map the bad characteristics

Change through contradiction

• Contradictions are neither good or bad; they are changing forces

• Change happens in cycles while the contradiction is not overcome (incremental changes)

•Overcoming contradiction (radical changes) happens when a third new force reconfigures the relationship between the two opposing forces

• The third force expands the object of the activity

Third force

Hybrids: hybrid motor reduces carbon emissions

Electric motor Diesel motor

Hybrid motor

Hacking: some Internet content is distributed through USB sticks in Cuba

Centralized Internet P2P Networks

Digital pirate

Ambiguous models: androgynous people question the split of gender identities

Male Female

Transgender

Historical dialectics

Remembered past

Lived present

Imagined future

Male Female

Transgender Cisgender

Pansexual

Intersexual cyborg

Asexual

Design in the third force

• Create hybrids, hacks, and ambiguous models

• Analize contradictions, conflits, and problems

• Synthesize a new configuration for a contradiction (equal but different)

Design dialectics

Creation

Creation

CreationAnalysis/Synthesis

Analysis/Synthesis

Analysis/Synthesis

Creating observations in a park, analyzing visitors’ behavior and synthesizing a diagnostics of the park’s usage

Creating a map of issues, analyzing the pros and cons and synthesizing a controversy around the park

Creating a template, analyzing the usage possibilities and synthesizing a proposal for a workshop about the park

Creating a visualization of activities, analyzing the place and synthesizing an occupation strategy

Historical-design dialectics

“Not in my backyard” neighborhood reaction towards the park rennovation

This rendering made by a University of Twente student raised too much expectation from the park center

Park rennovation proposal presented at Almelo’s City Council

A project unfolds not only in history, but also in space.

Spatial-design dialectics

Alternatives sketches for an interactive installation about city development

Space of possibilities for CICI 2011 (Faber-Ludens)

Possibilities of space in CICI 2011

Interactive installation built at CICI 2011 by FIEP

Bodystorming exercise

•Redo the image theater

•Explore the possibilities of action to overcome contradiction

•Map actions in a flowchart

•Check with an outsider if the action looks realistic

•Try a new action if it does not work

Mapping the possibilities for action which reassure the contradiction (no third force yet)

Mapping an action that steps out of the cycle and reconfigures the contradiction (third force)

Design does not generate certitude. Design creates possibilities.

Creation of possibilities

• Every idea is just a possibility and one among the many

• The first idea is never the best

• A bad idea can work as a bridge to a new idea

•New ideas rise when testing the old ideas

• The impossible may become possible by the creation of new possibilities

Using one contradiction to hide another. Only one possibility is presented: drink Zero Sugar Coke.

Exposing the contradiction between taste and health. Two possibilities are presented: taste or health.

Overcoming the contradiction: taste with health. However, aluminium package is less healthy than plastic.

Contradiction-driven design

• Reproducing a contradiction in a new configuration does not means eliminating it

• Leaving the project open is interesting to stimulate adaptation and interpretation, multiplying the possibilities for action and sense-making

• Contradiction-driven design keeps hopes for change alive

Thank you!

Frederick van Amstel http://fredvanamstel.com

Architecture and Design SchoolDigital Design

PUCPR