How to hack your identity as a designer
A custom made physical persona for the user. Persona no.1 : designer.
Have you ever questioned your identity as a person or as a designer? I bet you have because it is a natural human tendency to question personhood and our ability to affect afar. In our professional careers, we are enticed by the idea that we can make a mark on our papyrus or stick that represents your status and that will have some material effect on us later. This questions the idea of existentialism. Let’s examine this dilemma with artist Heath Bunting.
You don’t exist in any real sense but only in the way that people see you or institutions see you
~ Heath Bunting
So, how do we as artists and designers hack the system and make people see what we want them to? Well, a hacker understands the system well. They then devise a key or password and become a master and move with little effort through the system. If you are a professional, newbie or potential designer, keep reading. You are in for a treat!
Humanism and Change
In a universal context, the idea of humanism gets embedded into the idea of modernism and modernization. The general belief is that as technology gets better, the human race gets smarter and eventually better. We like to believe that as humans, we are the same; we constantly evolve and that “the only thing constant in our lives is change”. Thus, this leaves us with questions like — who am I? what do I do? and how do I get there? — because there is some anxiety in not knowing the answer to these questions.
As artists, designers and primarily human beings, we constantly try to experiment taking into consideration our boundaries and our choices. When things happen around us, we are all reacting/responding to it or trying to find a solution for it. We believe that we have the freedom to make particular choices and judgments that are defensible to us in the design community and a larger world.
The Identity Bureau
Heath Bunting, a contemporary British artist, established an Identity Bureau to construct a custom-made physical person for a user, who would be able to function freely in society. Interested in the making of new identities legally, he created a series of maps for people who were new to the system/a particular position in the system where one feels lost. The series of maps (of being a student, homeless, terrorist, newcomer) would enable you to see your position relative to other positions in the system.
Highlight if you feel me:
As artists and designers, it is a raw instinct of ours to be subversive and counter mainstream ; that is how we project ourselves into the world.
There are invisible walls with invisible codes and barriers that, as artists, are extremely fascinating for us. It takes an artist to become a gatekeeper to exercise the freedom to change rules and get people to think in a different way. They then become responsible for what knowledge or information survives and what gets erased. Therefore, it is essential to pick out the dark corners of our identity as artists and designers and be provocative.
Create your own map
It took about 2 years for the learning process, states artist Heath Bunting in the Stadium Generale 2012 conference. He then goes on to making prototypes and trying to simplify the process by reducing the complexity and time required for making a new identity. I briefly tried the process on my own and tried to define a new identity for myself and my brand as a designer.
This map is made in conjunction with people who wish to be designers. It contains the definition of being a designer and the process by which you can become one. It is not only the responsibility of the individual but also the system that contributes to them being in this position. There would be a system by which they could enter and become designers. It is up to the individual to determine the same.
In the conference, Bunting goes on to inform the audience that the conclusion to his project was that people aren’t very interested in changing often they are keen on knowing where they are and what their position is. I hope this map to being a designer can at least help you determine your bearing as a professional or newbie designer.
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