United Micro Kingdoms: A Design Fiction (2013), Critical Design FAQ (2007)

Abstract

The United Micro Kingdoms (UmK) was a design experiment commissioned by the Design Museum, London, UK, from 1st May-31st August 2013.

Collections like the Wellcome Trust, Pitt Rivers, and London Museum hold everyday objects from past or distant societies. When we see a strange shoe or ritualistic object we wonder what kind of society must have produced it, how it was organised; what values, beliefs and dreams motivated its citizens; if it was wealthy or poor; democratic, feudal or totalitarian. We become conceptual window shoppers, trying things out in our minds, imagining how we would interact with them, use them, wear them, and how they would affect our interactions with others.

It requires a lot of imaginative effort from the viewer, but it leaves room for individual interpretation. If rather than looking back in time, we presented people with hypothetical products from alternative versions of our own society, or a near future, would people begin to relate to them in the same way—a sort of speculative material culture, fictional archeology or imaginary anthropology?

The Library Table

10.1.1 Fiction

Oryx and Crake. Atwood, Margaret. 2003. London: Bloomsbury.

Kingdom Come. Ballard, J.G. 2007. London: Flamingo.

The Space Merchants. Pohl, F, Kornbluth, C. [1952] 2003. London: Gollancz.

The Book of Dave. Self, Will. 2006. London: Bloomsbury.

Rule 34. Stross, Charles. 2012. Orbit.

10.1.2 Design

Design as Politics. Fry, Tony. 2011. Oxford: Berg.

Superstudio: Life Without Objects. Lang, P, Menking, W. 2003. Milan: Skira.

The BLDG Blog Book. Manaugh, Geoff. 2009. San Francisco: Chronicle Books.

Hertzian Tales. Dunne, Anthony. 2008. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Design and the Elastic Mind. Antonelli Paola. 2008. New York: MOMA

Thinking: Objects—Contemporary Approaches to Product Design. Parsons, Tim. 2009. AVA Publishing.

10.1.3 Theory

Dream: Re-imagining Progressive Politics in an Age of Fantasy. Duncombe, Stephen. 2007. New York: The New Press.

The Whale and the Reactor: A Search for Limits in an Age of High Technology. Winner, Langdon. 1986. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

10.1.4 Futures

The Rough Guide to The Future. Turney, Jon. 2010. Rough Guides.

Next Nature: Nature Changes Along with Us. Van Mensvoort, Koert. 2011. Actar

10.1.5 Utopia

Utopia & Contemporary Art. Gether, Christian., Høholt, Stine., Laurberg, Marie (eds). 2012: Arken.

10.1.6 Method

The Pig that Wants to be Eaten: and ninety-nine other thought experiments. Baggini, Julian. 2005. London: Granta Books.

Lab Coats in Hollywood: Science, Scientists and Cinema. Kirby, David A. 2011. Cambridge: MIT Press.

10.1.7 Science

Physics of the Impossible. Kaku, Michio. 2008. London: Penguin Books.

10.1.8 Speculations

After Man: A Zoology of the Future. Dixon, Dougal. 1981. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

New Engineering. Yokohama, Yuichi. 2007. Tokyo:

Codex Seraphinianus. Serafini, Luigi. 1983. XXXXX: Abbeville Press.

The Dictionary of Imaginary Places. Manguel, Alberto., Guadalupi, Gianni. [1980] 2000. San Diego, New York, London: A Harvest Book Harcourt, Inc.

Philips Design. Microbial Home: A Philips Design Probe. 2011.

Solution 239–246 Finland: The Welfare Game. Kalliala, Martti., Sutela, Jenna., Toivonen, Tuomas. 2011. Berlin: Sternberg Press.

Solution 11–167: The Book of Scotlands: Every Lie Creates a Parallel World. The World in Which it is True. Momus. 200X. Berlin: Sternberg Press.

Solution 214–238: The Book of Japans: Things are Conspicuous in Their Absence. Momus. 200X. Berlin: Sternberg Press.

Critical Design FAQ (Dunne & Raby 2007)

• 1. What is Critical Design?

  Critical Design uses speculative design proposals to challenge narrow assumptions, preconceptions and givens about the role products play in everyday life. It is more of an attitude than anything else, a position rather than a method. There are many people doing this who have never heard of the term critical design and who have their own way of describing what they do. Naming it Critical Design is simply a useful way of making this activity more visible and subject to discussion and debate.

  Its opposite is affirmative design: design that reinforces the status quo.

• 2. Where did it come from?

  Design as critique has existed before under several guises. Italian Radical Design of the 1970s was highly critical of prevailing social values and design ideologies, critical design builds on this attitude and extends it into today’s world.

  During the 1990s there was a general move towards conceptual design which made it easier for noncommercial forms of design like critical design to exist, this happened mainly in the furniture world, product design is still conservative and closely linked to the mass market.

  The term Critical Design was first used in Anthony Dunne’s book Hertzian Tales (1999) and later in Design Noir (2001). Since then many other people have developed their own variations.

• 3. Who does it?

  Dunne & Raby and their graduate students from Design Interactions, Royal College of Art (RCA) such as James Auger, Elio Caccavale and Noam Toran, are probably the most well known, (Revital Cohen/Tuur van Balen, Tobias Revell, Anab Jain are a new generation creating their own interpretation) but there are other designers working in a similar way who would not describe what they do as critical design: Krzysztof Wodiczko, Natalie Jeremijenko, Jurgen Bey, Marti Guixe …

• 4. What is it for?

  Mainly to make us think. But also raising awareness, exposing assumptions, provoking action, sparking debate, even entertaining in an intellectual sort of way, like literature or film.

• 5. Why is it happening now?

  The world we live in today is incredibly complex, our social relations, desires, fantasies, hopes and fears are very different from those at the beginning of the 20c. Yet many key ideas informing mainstream design stem form the early 20c.

  Society has moved on but design has not, Critical Design is one of many mutations design is undergoing in an effort to remain relevant to the complex technological, political, economic and social changes we are experiencing at the beginning of the 21c.

• 6. What role does humour play?

  Humour is important but often misused. Satire is the goal. But often only parody and pastiche are achieved. These reduce the effectiveness in a number of ways. They are lazy and borrow existing formats, and they signal too clearly that it is ironic and so relieve some burden from the viewer. The viewer should experience a dilemma, is it serious or not? Real or not? For Critical Design to be successful they need to make up their own mind.

  Also, it would be very easy to preach, a skilful use of satire and irony can engage the audience in a more constructive away by appealing to its imagination as well as engaging the intellect. Good political comedians achieve this well. Deadpan and black humour work best.

• 7. Is it a movement?

  No. It’s not really a field that can be neatly defined. It’s more about values and an attitude, a way of looking at design and imagining its possibilities beyond the narrow definitions of what is presented through media and in the shops.

• 8. What are its main relatives?

  Activism

  Cautionary Tales

  Conceptual Design

  Contestable Futures

  Design Fiction

  Interrogative Design

  Radical Design

  Satire

  Social Fiction

  Speculative Design

• 9. What are the biggest misconceptions?

  That it is negative and anti-everything.

  That it is only commentary and cannot change anything

  That it is jokey

  That it is not concerned with aesthetics

  That it is against mass-production

  That it is pessimistic

  That it is not real

  That it is art

• 10. But isn’t it art?

  It is definitely not art. It might borrow heavily from art in terms of methods and approaches but that’s it. We expect art to be shocking and extreme. Critical Design needs to be closer to the everyday, that’s where its power to disturb comes from. Too weird and it will be dismissed as art, too normal and it will be effortlessly assimilated. If it is regarded as art it is easier to deal with, but if it remains as design it is more disturbing, it suggests that the everyday as we know it could be different, that things could change.

• 11. Isn’t it a bit dark?

  Yes, but not for the sake of it. Dark, complex emotions are ignored in design, nearly every other area of culture accepts people are complex, contradictory and even neurotic, but not design, we view people as obedient and predictable users and consumers.

  One of Critical Design’s roles is to question the limited range of emotional and psychological experiences offered through designed products. Design is assumed to only make things nice, it’s as though all designers have taken an unspoken Hippocratic oath, this limits and prevents us from fully engaging with and designing for the complexities of human nature which of course is not always nice. It is more about the positive use of negativity, not negativity for its own sake, but to draw attention to a scary possibility in the form of a cautionary tale.

• 12. And its future?

  A danger for critical design is that it ends up as a form of sophisticated design entertainment: 90 % humour 10 % critique. It needs to avoid this situation by identifying and engaging with complex and challenging issues. Areas like Future Forecasting would benefit from its more gritty view of human nature and ability to make abstract issues tangible. It could also play a role in public debates about the social, cultural and ethical impact on everyday life of emerging and future technologies.