✹ Industrial design history
5th March 2021
After receiving feedback for the abstract, we were assigned to come up with 3 tangible plans to work on across this term. The plans should be something that can help us enrich our research paper. Mine are
1) Experiment with new material every one or two weeks
2) Weekly artist research
3) Exploring shiny material through new form every one or two weeks.
I have been committing to material experimentation quite well. I tried lenticular sheet, pewter sheet, acrylic in different effect. Though the other two plans are a bit more challenging. Weekly artist research seems to be not that necessary any more as I have a bunch of reference on hand. I still keep researching though not much to conclude for each week as plan. And the form exploration also not much progress - only one or two sketches for each new material.
During the weeks under lockdown, even if everywhere is closed I still have to travel to my part-time job which takes 1 hour by tube - twice a week. I enjoy watching the video of ⇲History of Industrial design by Matthew Bird so much during the way to my work. I first found him from the one that he lectures about Art Deco, which I need for the pewter live competition. He started to hiccup in the middle of the video and it was hilarious.
After that, I downloaded his video on other subjects like - history of Art Nouveau, The art and craft movement or the tutorial of making rivet.
The history of Industrial design has taught me about how material and technology can change the face of the product. For example, one of the videos I have watched about plastic when this material was first introduced to the designer -with the quality of lightness and moulding method. It can be used in producing a module product like a plastic mug or the handle of scissors. Also, with the flexibility of the plastic - it had been used to produce many other things that wood and metal can not do - like a fragrant bottle for example.
Also, knowing the history of industrial design is giving me an opportunity to reflect on the current world’s situation - How will the industry be after the pandemic? Along with the crisis of global warming. Seem like in the past we were trying to survive and make our lives better, by focusing on that we might forget about our offspring - what we may leave behind.