What

is Culture?
Learning, Re-learning and Crea5vity

Introduc)on to Design Theories and Culture

Week 4
Sep 29, 2017

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design
x
culture





design
x
culture



What is “Culture”?

•  Culture is acquired: people learn culture.

(In other words, what is inborn, biological or gene)c is usually regarded
as non-cultural.)

•  Culture is about learning, i.e. un-learning and re-learning.

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 culture
as
a field of
learning and re-learning
 Raymond Williams (1921-1988)

>> required reading

“The Crea)ve Mind” in The Long Revolu5on (Cardigan: Parthian, 2011),
Sec)on IV-VI, pp.33-47.

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Crea5vity and Learning

•  According to Williams, before one sees, s/he must interpret.

•  Spectators’ interpreta5on is itself “crea)ve”;

all interpreta)ons are made possible by an ac5ve process of
learning/re-learning.

•  The reality we experience is what we “create”.

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Reality as we experience it is in this sense a human crea5on…
We “see” in certain ways – this is, we interpret sensory informa)on
according to certain rules – as a way of living. But these ways –
these rules and interpreta)ons – are, as a whole, neither fixed
nor constant. We can learn new rules and new interpreta5ons,
as a result of which we shall literally see in new ways.


>> Williams, “The Crea)ve Mind”, p.36

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Crea5vity and Learning

•  Rules of interpreta)on are NOT fixed. They can be altered by

individuals within a community.

•  If new cultural rules can be learnt, then new ways of seeing

reality (and new experience of the world) are possible.

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 Cai Guo-Qiang/蔡國強;
Black Ceremony (in Doha, Qatar, on 5 December 2011) 10
We learn to see a thing by learning to describe it; this is the normal
process of percep)on, which can only be seen as complete when
we have interpreted the incoming sensory informa)on EITHER by
a known configura5on or rule, OR by some new configura5on
which we can try to learn as a new rule.


>> Williams, “The Crea)ve Mind”, p.42

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Crea5vity as an Art of Descrip5on

•  Crea)vity is about how to describe well:

- one can EITHER describe what we perceive with a known

configura)on or rule, OR

- with some new rule which can be learnt.

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old rules
RULES of GAMES
new rules





old rules
x
new rules





old rules
x
new rules





conforming
x
new rules





conforming
x
new rules





conforming
x
transforming





conforming
DESCRIPTION
transforming



Fiona Banner;
Harrier (2010)

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Urs Fischer;
You (2007)
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In 2007, Fischer hired a team of contractors to dig up most of the
floor of a gallery space, crea5ng this 8-foot-deep crater.


art space
X
ruin


art space
X
construc)on site
Crea5vity as an Art of Descrip5on

•  One should learn to give “adequate” descrip5ons of one’s

own experience, because this is a necessary condi)on for
relevant communica5on.

•  “Art” is always the art and technique of descrip)on, which

must “take place” in exis5ng communica5on systems (by
either conforming to or transforming it).

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Zevs;
Liquidated YES
(2012)

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Zevs;
Liquidated YES
(2012)

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Communica)on is the crux of art, for any adequate descrip)on of
experience must be more than simple transmission; it must also
include recep5on and response.
However successful an ar)st may have embodied his experience
in a form capable of transmission, it can be received by no other
person without the “crea5ve ac5vity” of all percep5on:
the informa5on transmiWed by the work has to be interpreted,
described and taken into the organiza5on of the spectator.

>> Raymond Williams, “The Crea)ve Mind”, p.49

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Crea5ve Communica5on

•  Communica)on must be worked out by BOTH ar)sts/designers

AND spectators (otherwise it is not communica)on). If nothing is
shared in communica)on, there is simply no “art”.

•  The spectators’ percep5on/recep5on, interpreta5on and

descrip5on of crea)ve works are crucial, and these processes
are equally “crea5ve” with those of the ar)sts/designers’.

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Crea5ve Communica5on

•  Common meanings may be reproduced (via conforming to exis)ng

rules), or new meanings created (via transforming exis)ng rules by
giving new descrip)ons).

- the distance between the new meaning (created by ar)sts) and
the common meaning (shared by everyone in the community) is
significant as to how the crea)ve work is interpreted.

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Crea5ve Communica5on

•  Common meanings may be reproduced (via conforming to exis)ng

rules), or new meanings created (via transforming exis)ng rules by
giving new descrip)ons).

- The “distance” or “gap” between the new meaning (created
by ar)sts) and the common meaning (shared by everyone in the
community) is significant as to how the crea)ve work is
interpreted.

- How crea)ve designers/ar)sts are depends on their
capacity to play with this distance/gap.

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Ai Weiwei/艾未未; Study of Perspec5ve (1995-2003)
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Ai Weiwei /艾未未; from Bird’s Nest (2005-2008)
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Ai Weiwei/艾未未; Study of Perspec5ve (1995-2003)
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Yohji Yamamoto

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a field of
learning and re-learning


designing
objects



designing
culture



designing
learning



design
x
culture






design should be pedagogic




design
x
crea)vity





a design is crea)ve if,
and only if,
it is pedagogic



Francis Alÿs;
The Green Line (Some5mes Doing Something Poe5c Can Become
Poli5cal, Doing Something Poli5cal Can Become Poe5c) (2005) 52
Francis Alÿs;
Some5mes Making Something Leads to Nothing (1997)
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