"Handmade" is one of the most effective descriptors to help emphasize the quality and uniqueness of a product. A handmade web is more than an informative webpage. It serves as a medium of artistic expression. It is the choice of graphics and typography, the creation process, layout and design that makes it a handmade website - tailored to a specific individual. It draws attention to the physical work done by an individual - each decision filled with intent and purpose. This ranges from the functionality to the beauty of the web. It is no different than a painting or design.
I found it interesting how the author refers to a Handmade web as an “ongoing”, “in the making” and “under construction”. Such a web has the ability to transform as the artists perspective, style or knowledge evolves. This is especially important in this day and age where trendy aesthetics are ever changing which often affect peoples taste and what they see as unique. I feel like the ordinary man or women isn’t surfing through the internet looking at webpages as artworks… but what exactly is the purpose of art? I like to think it is to evoke emotions and get people thinking - and I believe that is what a handmade website is supposed to do.
In this extract, Min Choi talks about reading through Roma Publications website. To get some context, I visited the site on my own before delving into the reading. The landing page is minimal and has a large ENTER sign - on clicking it - you’re taken to a long index stating the title, artist, page, dimension and year of each piece of writing they have published.
I noticed that I too isolated one column at a time before moving onto the next, like Choi said, simply because my eye is trained to read left to right. I was intrigued by Choi’s idea of approaching to read something in a non conventional way to find new patterns and maybe even meaning. I noticed that I sometimes do my own bit of vertical reading. I open a page of a book and read the first word of every line on a page to see if it makes any sense but beyond that I haven’t explored this further.
Being able to understand a website as an object and a subject at the same time is eye opening. I never really asked myself what a website was because they have always just been there… it’s not something I thought I could understand from a technical aspect because my interactions with website were always about the subject rather than the “architecture”. Until I started understanding web design I never asked how does one actually make a website.
Comparing websites to different forms of architecture and nature helps me understand how the process works and even how poetic it can be.
I love Berners Lee’s quote about the world wide web, the web should help us expand on our dreams and visions rather than further dividing us. We should collectively have positive ambitions for the internet more than negative ones. This article/reading put forth a lot of great insight to web design rather than translating it as something so technical like I am used to.
Daniel van der Velden mainly explores the role of design and the designer and how that has evolved. According to the manifesto, the function of design is changed. It does not respond to needs but rather to desires and consumerism has found a way to manipulate consumers requirements. Since design is a discipline so strictly related to society, it must keep up its changes. One of Daniel van der Velden's fundamental points is the need for the designer to redesign himself, surrendering himself to the research, becoming his own author, using proper resources and reinventing the traditional structure of the commission and the fixed papers to these associations. The designer must do so while still producing versatile work, dedicating himself to the most different areas (not always related to design) simply to have an advantage rather than with the aim of obtaining a job or proving his dedication.
I am not sure if I agree with his statement "We no longer have any desire for design that is driven by need” - while this might be true for some social classes I I believe its not a universal case.
This statement reminded me of the exhibition at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum called Design for the Other 90% - It points out now a days design is only made for the 10%. We all see design through a privileged lens and currently - what we see as design is often sold as luxury and a status symbol to serve the rich. However, there are still people pit there (specially in third world countries) that have needs that can be fulfilled with the right design. I have grown up in city where 41.3% of the people are living in slums side by side to the wealthy people. It’s a visible issue - one that people pass everyday on their way to work. Most of the rich even have help in their homes who come from these areas. However, designers and planners in the city continue to build and ideate for the rich in order to get rich and further widen the gap between them and the poor.