OUGD401 - Context of Practice Lecture 7

Print Culture and Distribution – Part 2

Key themes from last lecture

- We live in the late age of print

- The Aura of a work, creates a sensation of superiority and mysticism. Art institutes do this with fine art elevating them to a higher level.

- The collective practice in independent studios as seen by William Morris

There has been a return to handmade production and a movement from digital work to mechanical modes of printing.

Why do people use these techniques when digital methods are quicker, more efficient and more reliable than other methods?

Handmade methods provide a retreat from the logic of the modern age and a life of instant gratification.

With digital techniques, anyone can do it without having the skills to do so. In modern day life, there is a constant need for quick turnarounds for clients, to make a quick profit. This has led to no one learning skills anymore because they are trying to do things quickly, which is dehumanising.

In Praise of Slow

The Slow Movement seeks to avoid rushing, encourages people to do less and increase quality. By clearing space in your routine you can take your life back.

Slow Food Manifesto

Seeks to avoid the monotony of fast food and return to locally proved produce, that is more environmentally friendly.

Slow Fashion vs Fast Fashion

In fast fashion companies sell the same product for a profit making little variation on the highstreet. They copy high end products and sell it for a cheaper price. Shops also ‘create’ your identity by showing you what works well together.

Slow fashion is made up of independent producers who use discarded or locally sourced products, with the focus not on being about profit.

Slow Design

There is little focus on the output or end product. Instead the aim is to think about the consequences of the designer’s actions. How can the designer affect an individual, the environment or socio – cultural issues?

Handmade techniques have a humanist politics within them.

Designers and projects

Anthony Burrill’s poster work talks about publicity and our society.

Experimental Jetset show the ephemeral quality of magazines and how they come and go.

The Print Project seeks to revive old printing machines and techniques that society has had no regard for. They also set up workshops to help people learn the processes. They also explore how traditional mediums can take on the digital world by testing the medium against the aesthetics of the digital age.

The Pink Milkfloat allows people to learn and share skills. This means the person is not just buying a product they are learning and investing in the work.

Nicholas Bourriaud suggests there has been a tendency in art to move away from making work about yourself or symbolising something. Instead it is about forming human relations. Whereas traditional art is just bought and sold.

Felix Gonzalez Torres created a work of sweets on the ground. Viewers were encouraged to take a sweet and do what they wanted with it.  They could of ate it, kept it , shared it etc. The art was the relationships created by the gift of the sweet and the actions that came from taking the sweet. In this instance the viewer becomes the collaborator. However, because of the institute it was in this made people unsure and frightened to take one.

The Helter Skelter in the Tate Modern encouraged social interaction between people. A plaque wasn’t needed to tell the viewer what it was, we have an understanding of human connection and fun.

The Galstonbury Free Press is made by the people for the people. Participants learn to typeset and print. The whole newspaper is co-authored and distributed for free.

Social relationships have been commodified. You have to buy something in order to have social interaction.

People are more bonded with you if they understand the process of how something is made. This adds a human value to the work. Returning to handmade processes is not just about the technical process, it is about rehumanising ourselves in the digital age and reusing what we have.

Post print culture?

With new technologies, we have infinite access to information.

Handmade techniques can be seen to be regressive and recreate an auratic sense around art / design. The aura of art has already been broken up by digital technology. Going back to handmade techniques introduces the idea of elitism and master craftsmanship again. It also has negative politics because work created on a smaller scale can be sold for more.

What is wrong with a world where anyone can become a designer? Could be seen as snobbishment and a return to old ways of thinking if we disagree.

Are there radical practices to be found in print? Where things can be circulated instantly and for free.

Digital Print Culture

Inside out is a project that puts large scale prints up in different places. The public can send ideas and images in to be used as the art. This makes the participants, authors of the work as well. Themes that have been explored are the idea of family within poor neighbourhoods in America and the positive role of women, in Indian communities, who are otherwise expected to be in the house.

Digital technology can exponentially enhance art and means we can steal knowledge to use in our own way.

There is an underlying politics to print culture.