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The Vision Thing – Seeing and creating change through design
By John Emerson
It started out as an article about design education outside traditional design schools, but then grew into a piece on grassroots engagement with public space and the power of design to envision change. We’ve excerpted John Emerson’s article on design as populist expression from the Design Issues column of the January/February 2008 Communication Arts magazine, with his kind permission.
It’s not just in design schools. It’s not just in mentorship programs at top firms. Design and education can meet in the streets, too.
Most graphic design education points to a career as a design professional. But the same tools designers use to undertake user research, solve problems, and satisfy clients can also be used by young people to voice their opinions and meet the needs of their neighborhoods and communities. By "taking it outside", they are asserting a positive vision and owning the spaces they live in – and in the process are making these places better for us all.
Not One More Death
Memorials shape our collective memory. They are a tangible, public stake against forgetting, a manifesto to the present and a reminder of the past as a warning for the future. Put forth by loved ones after a tragedy, grassroots memorials are at once both personal and public – often filling a void where government-funded memorials leave off. Some are subtle collections of flowers and personal items, occupying quiet corners of common space. Others scream out for attention.
Rendered three-stories tall on the side of a building, the memorial mural on Butler Street and Third Avenue in Brooklyn is hard to ignore. The design is a tribute to 28 pedestrians killed by cars between 1995 and 2007 in the streets of Brooklyn’s Gowanus neighborhood. The mural depicts three young boys who were struck down by cars – in fact one of the young victims lost his life just a block from the spot where the mural now stands.
Represented as towering figures painted in ghostly blue, the boys hold up redesigned street signs with traffic-related symbols urging respect for pedestrians. The three boys are accompanied by a blank silhouette holding up an unambiguous red stop sign declaring: “Not one more death.” The effect is chilling.
The mural was initiated by Transportation Alternatives, a non-profit group founded in 1973 to promote bicycling, walking, and public transit for safer streets. TA approached the Groundswell Community Mural Project, a group that matches communities with artists and grassroots organizations to create large-scale visuals that foster social change. In this case, the purpose of the mural was threefold – symbolically, to remember the children; practically, to slow traffic and reduce further collisions; and politically, as a platform for public advocacy.
Copyright © 2000 Groundswell Community Mural Project
In the summer of 2007, Groundswell pulled together a team that included professional artists and a group of neighborhood teenagers. The 11 young men and women all hailed from housing projects in the Gowanus neighborhood, recruited from after-school programs, through tenant associations, and at a summer job fair for area teens.
The project involved three weeks of research and three weeks of painting. In this case, research meant gathering information about traffic and transportation issues and about the history of accidents in the area, which in fact is a "mixed-use neighborhood" meaning it is zoned for both residential and industrial use. Guided by the artists, the teens conceived of the mural imagery, planned, prepared and painted it.
It was a hard summer for the artists and teens who worked their way through the physically exhausting effort, painting in extreme heat on the south-facing scaffolding. But the effort has paid off – both in its reception by the community and its effect on public policy. One hundred and fifty local residents turned out for the mural’s unveiling. They were joined by a State Senator, a State Assembly Member, Police Department officials, representatives from the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office and the Department of Transportation (DoT).
In fact, the DoT – often criticized in the past for what many called a lack of action concerning what were being referred to by some as mere "crashes" in the area – reacted as never before. At the unveiling, the DoT's Senior Policy Advisor announced that the first phase of construction in the Downtown Brooklyn Traffic Calming Project will begin in Spring 2008. For the DoT to make such a pledge at a community event is unprecedented. In addition, the city has designated an extremely welcome US$ 5 million to build 101 improvements at 43 intersections.
From a design point of view, the power of this project comes not only from the compelling subject matter – the deaths of children and other pedestrians – but also its clever and multilayered design. The scale of the image is not only eye-catching, it is functional. Drivers will often slow down when triggered by a visual stimuli, say a school, bike, or unusual sign. As such, the mural itself acts as a “visual speed bump.” The teenagers also erected separately alternative street signs that were installed around the area urging respect and awareness.
And, while speaking eloquently of the responsibilities of the DoT and the local government, the mural sensitively addresses other constituencies; for instance, though the mural is about traffic fatalities, it does not blame cars or drivers. The neighborhood where the mural is located is full of car-related businesses such as automobile glass and auto body repair shops, so the designers took this into account. In addition, during their research, the teens found that local drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians all expressed concerns about each other.
Instead of taking an oppositional stance, the Gowanus mural puts forward a positive vision: it encourages mutual respect from all and the safe sharing of streets.
From this example and others, we see that design offers a different way of reading the visual environment, navigating culture, and understanding the systems that shape our world. Designers know all about the manufacture of desire and dissatisfaction, selling images and ideas. Design education puts these tools in the hands of students and creates openings for greater self-expression. This is not just expression of emotion and style, but self-expression in a fuller, richer sense – as an expression of values and of one’s own power.
Taken to the public sphere, design skills become transformative. A common theme in the story above as well as the other stories provided in the full article is the relationship between ordinary people and public space. In each case, artists, designers, and students are intervening to shape the visual and built environment to benefit their communities. Design is a powerful means of expressing a vision for what change might look like. Taking it public makes it possible for others to see, respond and even participate.
By taking design to the streets, more and more young people are learning valuable lessons in civic activism, including that they have the power to direct public policy, to inspire their communities and to shape the public space we share. They learn that engaging and creative design applies to issues that matter not only to boardroom elites, but also to everyday people – and can make the world a little bit better. Maybe there’s a lesson there for professional designers as well.
Adapted from the original article, published in the January/February 2008 Communication Arts magazine by the author’s kind permission.
John Emerson runs "Backspace", a design consultancy firm located in Manhattan dedicated to research, development, and promotion of design in the public interest. We highly recommend visiting John's website – which includes a portfolio of his work for for-profit corporations, NGO’s and unincorporated activist groups and a web log of writings and clippings on design and the public interest – to find more accounts of communities in action.
"NOT ONE MORE DEATH"
Lead Artist: Christopher Cardinale
Assistant Artist: Nicole Schulman
Youth Artists: Javonne Cardwell, Marian Chen, Terrell Cooper, Takeria Cummings, Kevin Jones, Isis McBurnie, Jarei McKeiver, Michael Pang, Epigmenio Sosa, Mujahid Thompson and Laquon Wheeler
Location: Butler Street and 3rd Ave, Downtown Brooklyn.
Community Partner: Transportation Alternatives