“The form of an object is not more important than the form of the space surrounding it. All things exist in interaction with other things...”
Ellen Lupton, Graphic Design: The New Basics
Ellen Lupton, Graphic Design: The New Basics
Prior to joining the Masters of Design program at UIC, I received a bachelor’s degree in psychology and contributed to several psychological research labs. One of my goals in entering the Design program at UIC is to investigate the complex, layered relationship between psychology and design. Silent Blue was an early foray into this rich cross-disciplinary arena. The panel system, comprised of recycled paper pulp, functions literally as an acoustic dampening panel. Extending beyond this core acoustic performance, the array is a dynamic, modular visual system and investigation of Gestalt design principles. This quick semester-long investigation involved a complex workflow that exaggerated the often competing forces of of design production and designer vision. The workflow involved image sketching and image-to-graphic translation, computer modeling, computer-controlled machining, molding, raw material preparation, and casting. Silent Blue is a hybrid creation, a tiled system that insists the viewer play a psychological game of lost and found among the positive and negative forms and rich array of ordered constraint and controlled disarray.
