Post-formalism

Today’s state of cultural literacy is characterized by:

  • A non-critical culture of “browsing” fueled by digital media that flattens hierarchies of value and quality
  • A dilution of expertise, specific knowledge, and considered points of view
  • A proliferation of re-presentations of cultural artifacts that are divorced from original context, audience, and author
  • A culture of “likes” and “hates” wherein respectful discourse is replaced by comments and re-posting
  • A lack of skepticism or criticality of media that results in a shallowness of knowledge and lack of exposure to divergent, contradictory or minority perspectives
  • The increasing availability and sophistication of graphic design tools and templates
  • Form is no longer an end in itself, but rather a by-product of process and inquiry.

The Post-Formal approach to graphic design is concerned with:

  • Formal agility over formal innovation
  • Inquiry over commentary
  • Technology over technique
  • Critically engaging with problematic contemporary hierarchies over obeying traditional hierarchies
  • Crafting process over crafting outcomes
  • The non-formal, a-formal, non-visual, multi-modal and speculative over default, standard visual formats
  • Identifying and defining criteria for excellence across media over technical mastery of specific media
  • Locating one’s practice in the landscape of contemporary discourse over personal voice
  • Learning to assess new unknown known over collecting the known known
  • Balancing skepticism and imagination