Now that we can do anything, what will we do?
“Now that we can do anything, what will we do?” Great words delivered by a great designer, Bruce Mau. Last week I enjoyed hearing Bruce speak while he was in Calgary. For the most part he spoke of his current project/book, Massive Change, asking the audience to interact with a question and answer session at the speeches end. I sat as the lights hushed and the voices dimmed, awaiting Bruce’s wisdom with a straight back of attentiveness. After the first 10 minutes, I was lost.
He spoke of design, and its utterly boundary less condition. Design as a singular method of making all things to be. Design as a global and limitless concept. Each end is there through design, whether it be planned or via the design of chance and chaos. Design of today was a way of changing the world for a better and more efficient existence
As I said, I was lost. I am currently in my second year of school for my Interior Design degree, and am about to start my first internship I can’t believe how much I have accomplished in my learnings thus far! I can create rooms, build structures, follow building codes…so much more than the choosing of colors or fabrics that is always associated with interior designers. This was real design I was learning. Actual blue printing, stud building, system planning design. And yet for all that I had and have been learning, not once did I even consider to take it on another level as Bruce had. I thought of rooms, floors, maybe even whole buildings, Bruce thought of the whole world.
Once I got into the pace of the speech, I was able to get back on track and actually digest what he was saying. His project was once of global unity, a new way of communicating, a new way of thinking, a new way of designing. From the efficiency of the car to the controversial featherless chicken, design is an essential element to produce the better product and life we are capable of establishing. Through design we can accomplish anything
The two most powerful statements of the night for me were about our future and technology. The future of man has always rested on the choices we have made. All actions have reactions, each choice we have made has lead to what we are today. That being said, we have always asked ourselves,”what now?” after accomplishing something great. Each time man achieves a significant threshold in life, a hovering silence of ” Wow, we can do that, what else can we do?” strives us to move onward without totally adjusting to the change we just integrated through the accomplishment just achieved. So, if this is the case, why ask this question now? Why ask, ” Now that we can do anything what will we do?” As Bruce so eloquently put it, the shear volume of people in communication with each other enables us to do whatever we want now. We have grown larger, the world smaller, not through population growth, but through technology. The percentage of people who can be connected today as opposed to even 3o years ago gives us a powerful resource to knowledge and abilities world wide. Man can be everywhere, reading everything, helping everyone. So the question of the day really is , we can, but what will we do?
The other statement on technology really hit home with me. I am an artist, and a romantic. I am still in love with the whole hand written love letter idea, complete with candles and wax seal. I have a problem with technology in that it seems cold, and impersonal. I have always feared the cost of what we have lost for what we have gain when it comes to technology. Bruce said that computers and technology were tools, a means to an end. Techonolgy is mans’s invention so that man could move on and progress faster and farther than without them. What we decide to do with the improvements of technology is our own fight. I totally agree and feel that I have found solid ground for the first time. The leaps and bounds that the world has made through technology are undeniable….. THROUGH technology. It is only a vessel, we have lost nothing.
So what is the end thought to this rather wordy and long blog? Design is much more than I ever thought. I knew on some level that everything is essentially designed, however I never truly understood the power of good design, and how it shapes everything. I still think I will stick to the small tasks of interior design, as you all know I like the shinnies…..But it is good to know that a large part of what I see around me is via design. Design of man, design of nature and design of God.
Massive Change is currenlty on tour and will be exhibited in Chicago from September 16 - December 31 2006 at :
Museum of Contemporary Art
220 E Chicago Ave
Chicago, IL 60611