organism environment art experience
“Art as Experience as Design” Patrick J. O’Donnel | NEU 2016
How is it that our everyday enjoyment of scenes and situations develops into the peculiar satisfaction that attends the experience which is emphatically and constructively esthetic? Why is it that, to many, a product seems to be an importation into experience and the esthetic a synonym for something artificial and intellectually inferior? The following graphic forms set precedence* for a visual exploration of the role of human experience in any form of making, most notably in the discipline of Design. All quotes come from John Dewey’s Art as Experience unless otherwise noted.
References De Saussure, Ferdinand. Course in General Linguistics, 3rd ed. 1966. 2 Dewey, John. Art as Experience. New York: Minton, Balch, 1934. 3 Peirce, Charles S. Philosophical Writings of Peirce, 2nd Ed. 1955. 4 Shannon, Claude E. “The Mathematical Theory of Communication,” 11th ed. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1949. 5 Verplank, Bill. "Chapter 2 My PC." Designing Interactions. By Bill Moggridge. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2006.
how do you...
1
interpretant signified
object
information source
transmitter
receiver signal
destination
know?
signal (received)
message
feel?
message
signifier
*The amalgamation of these four visual forms is uniquely my own, though both Shannon and Verplank’s lectures and publications postdate this instance of Dewey’s writing.
representamen
Saussure’s Theory of a Sign1 A connection of inner representation (the signifier) of an outer manifestation (the signified), a sign is united in that each calls the other.
Peirce’s Theory of a Signs and Semiosis3 Every act of reasoning, according to Peirce, is an interpretation of a sign. The object, representamen and interpretant reinforce, in a triadic manner, semiosis (as drawn by Hugh Dubberly).
do?
noise source
Shannon’s Mathematical Model of Communication4 A communication of any message has a source and destination, and Shannon’s model shows the mechanical relationship among message creation, signal transmission, noise, and message receiving.
Verplank’s Interaction Design Model5 As drawn by Verplank, Interaction Design (and therefore interaction) consists of processes of human mechanics with the product/world, perceiving of the product/world, and the associations of the knowledge graph.
“Experience is the result, the sign, and the reward of that interaction of organism and environment which, when it is carried to the full, is a transformation of interaction into participation and communication.”
noise source
+ emotional quality
“We have an experience when the material experienced runs its course to fulfillment. Then and then only is it integrated within and demarcated in the general stream of experience from other experiences. A piece of work is finished in a way that is satisfactory; a problem receives its solution. [...] Such an experience is a whole and carries with it its own individualizing quality and self-sufficiency.”
“Experience is limited by all the causes which interfere with perception of the relations between undergoing and doing. There may be interference because of excess on the side of doing or of excess on the side of receptivity, of undergoing. Unbalance on either side blurs the perception of relations and leaves the experience partial and distorted, with scant or false meaning.”
contained within and exist because of
EXPERIENCE
needs
+ intellectual quality
previous
experiences
appreciation
“Every living experience owes its richness to what Santayana well calls ‘hushed reverberations’. ” Past successes inform the present, due to associations.
impulsion intake of stimuli
esthetics
interpretation of stimuli
“the result”
ORGANISM
interaction
“For to perceive, a beholder must create his own experience. And his creation must include relations comparable to those which the original producer underwent. They are not the same in any literal sense. But with the perceiver, as with the artist, there must be an ordering of the elements of the whole that is in form, although not in details, the same as the process of organization the creator of the work consciously experienced.”
“Impulsions are the beginnings of complete experience because they proceed from need; […] the need that is manifest in the urgent impulsions that demand completion through what the environment—and it alone—can supply, is a dynamic acknowledgment of this dependence of the self for wholeness upon its surroundings.”
ENVIRONMENT
designer
“When artistic objects are separated from both conditions of origin and operation in experience, a wall is built around them that renders opaque their general significance, with which esthetic theory deals. [A philosophy of art aims to] restore continuity between the refined and intensified forms of experience (that are works of art) and the everyday event, doings and sufferings that are experience.”
senses
ART
actions
“While art itself is the best proof of existence of a realized and therefore realizable, union of material and ideal, there are general arguments that support the thesis in hand. […] The works and the responses they evoke are continuous with the very processes of living as these are carried to unexpected happy fulfillment.”
“Life goes on in an environment; not merely in it but because of it, through interaction with it. [...] The career and destiny of a living being are bound up with its interchanges with its environment, not externally but in the most intimate way.”
product
form
redisposition participation
“Art is the living and concrete proof that man is capable of restoring consciously, and thus on the plan of meaning, the union of sense, need, impulse and action characteristic of the live creature. The intervention of consciousness adds regulation, power of selection, and redisposition.”
+ practical quality
“the sign” “the reward”
the rhythm of life “Life itself consists of phases in which the organism falls out of step with the march of the surrounding things and then recovers unison with it […] and the recovery is never a mere return to a prior state, for it is enriched by the state of disparity and resistance through which it has successfully passed.”
fulfillment
power of selection regulation DESIGN
How is it that our everyday enjoyment of scenes and situations develops into the peculiar satisfaction that attends the experience which is emphatically and constructively esthetic? Why is it that, to many, a product seems to be an importation into experience and the esthetic a synonym for something artificial and intellectually inferior? The following graphic forms set precedence* for a visual exploration of the role of human experience in any form of making, most notably in the discipline of Design. All quotes come from John Dewey’s Art as Experience unless otherwise noted.
References De Saussure, Ferdinand. Course in General Linguistics, 3rd ed. 1966. 2 Dewey, John. Art as Experience. New York: Minton, Balch, 1934. 3 Peirce, Charles S. Philosophical Writings of Peirce, 2nd Ed. 1955. 4 Shannon, Claude E. “The Mathematical Theory of Communication,” 11th ed. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1949. 5 Verplank, Bill. "Chapter 2 My PC." Designing Interactions. By Bill Moggridge. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2006.
how do you...
1
interpretant signified
object
information source
transmitter
receiver signal
destination
know?
signal (received)
message
feel?
message
signifier
*The amalgamation of these four visual forms is uniquely my own, though both Shannon and Verplank’s lectures and publications postdate this instance of Dewey’s writing.
representamen
Saussure’s Theory of a Sign1 A connection of inner representation (the signifier) of an outer manifestation (the signified), a sign is united in that each calls the other.
Peirce’s Theory of a Signs and Semiosis3 Every act of reasoning, according to Peirce, is an interpretation of a sign. The object, representamen and interpretant reinforce, in a triadic manner, semiosis (as drawn by Hugh Dubberly).
do?
noise source
Shannon’s Mathematical Model of Communication4 A communication of any message has a source and destination, and Shannon’s model shows the mechanical relationship among message creation, signal transmission, noise, and message receiving.
Verplank’s Interaction Design Model5 As drawn by Verplank, Interaction Design (and therefore interaction) consists of processes of human mechanics with the product/world, perceiving of the product/world, and the associations of the knowledge graph.
“Experience is the result, the sign, and the reward of that interaction of organism and environment which, when it is carried to the full, is a transformation of interaction into participation and communication.”
noise source
+ emotional quality
“We have an experience when the material experienced runs its course to fulfillment. Then and then only is it integrated within and demarcated in the general stream of experience from other experiences. A piece of work is finished in a way that is satisfactory; a problem receives its solution. [...] Such an experience is a whole and carries with it its own individualizing quality and self-sufficiency.”
“Experience is limited by all the causes which interfere with perception of the relations between undergoing and doing. There may be interference because of excess on the side of doing or of excess on the side of receptivity, of undergoing. Unbalance on either side blurs the perception of relations and leaves the experience partial and distorted, with scant or false meaning.”
contained within and exist because of
EXPERIENCE
needs
+ intellectual quality
previous
experiences
appreciation
“Every living experience owes its richness to what Santayana well calls ‘hushed reverberations’. ” Past successes inform the present, due to associations.
impulsion intake of stimuli
esthetics
interpretation of stimuli
“the result”
ORGANISM
interaction
“For to perceive, a beholder must create his own experience. And his creation must include relations comparable to those which the original producer underwent. They are not the same in any literal sense. But with the perceiver, as with the artist, there must be an ordering of the elements of the whole that is in form, although not in details, the same as the process of organization the creator of the work consciously experienced.”
“Impulsions are the beginnings of complete experience because they proceed from need; […] the need that is manifest in the urgent impulsions that demand completion through what the environment—and it alone—can supply, is a dynamic acknowledgment of this dependence of the self for wholeness upon its surroundings.”
ENVIRONMENT
designer
“When artistic objects are separated from both conditions of origin and operation in experience, a wall is built around them that renders opaque their general significance, with which esthetic theory deals. [A philosophy of art aims to] restore continuity between the refined and intensified forms of experience (that are works of art) and the everyday event, doings and sufferings that are experience.”
senses
ART
actions
“While art itself is the best proof of existence of a realized and therefore realizable, union of material and ideal, there are general arguments that support the thesis in hand. […] The works and the responses they evoke are continuous with the very processes of living as these are carried to unexpected happy fulfillment.”
“Life goes on in an environment; not merely in it but because of it, through interaction with it. [...] The career and destiny of a living being are bound up with its interchanges with its environment, not externally but in the most intimate way.”
product
form
redisposition participation
“Art is the living and concrete proof that man is capable of restoring consciously, and thus on the plan of meaning, the union of sense, need, impulse and action characteristic of the live creature. The intervention of consciousness adds regulation, power of selection, and redisposition.”
+ practical quality
“the sign” “the reward”
the rhythm of life “Life itself consists of phases in which the organism falls out of step with the march of the surrounding things and then recovers unison with it […] and the recovery is never a mere return to a prior state, for it is enriched by the state of disparity and resistance through which it has successfully passed.”
fulfillment
power of selection regulation DESIGN
