Visual communication of design principles in a complex kinetic construction

Abstract

Design students need to be able to build a bridge between their own practice and the various receivers of their messages. Studies in design practice confirm that visualisation is a powerful communication tool often used by artists and designers. Despite these studies, a knowledge gap was identified concerning how design principles of concepts and quantitative structures can be communicated to engineers concerning complex and kinetic art constructions. Through a case study of a cross-disciplinary collaboration, a complex and technological public art sculpture was developed cooperatively with various professionals. The main concept for the sculpture project was to use the airflow from two ventilation systems. Based on this process in a real-life situation with objects that can lead to a situation of failure in the materialisation of a project it is discussed how two different disciplines can have discipline specific languages and further it is discussed what kind of competence that can contribute to communicate in a productive way. The discussion concerns the representation of an idea through a tangible model in different traditions and cultures. Such a communication process was visualized as a pedagogical concept for cross-disciplinary communication. Students can benefit from being prepared for these kinds of situations in collaborative design practice