Conference Paper

Creative imaginings: a model of imagination in design.

Authors:
To read the full-text of this research, you can request a copy directly from the author.

Abstract

The paper aims to develop a model for conceiving an important part of creative processes in design: human imagination. Whereas most creativity models focus on methods for enhancing creative work for example in collaboration with others, the approach of the paper is to contribute to design epistemology and to attempt a philosophical-phenomenological investigation of the inner dynamics of human imagining. Thus, the paper does not set out to peer inside the designer's mind but to investigate the construction of meaning in design structurally through the notion of Schematization as it unfolds on the interface between consciousness and the material world. The paper argues that knowledge about creativity in design can be informed by a look behind the factors of its dynamics.

No full-text available

Request Full-text Paper PDF

To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.

Article
Full-text available
Abstract Only critical distancing let Godard value the premonitory potential of film, and at the same time, point out the incapacity to register the realness that it generated. The filmmaker has always believed that “film is prophetic, it predicts and announces things”, and that this condition corresponds to its essence as a record. Rancière in a lucid reading of Film History says that for Godard: “film is responsible for not filming fields in their time; great for filming them before their time and guilty for not knowing how to recognize them”. This article begins with these clear political propositions, as well as proposing some variations.
Article
Full-text available
The great icons of industrial and architectural design are cornerstones of our material culture. They are referred to again and again in education, research, and cultural debate, and as such they have become nodal points of human discourse. The knowledge embedded in such artefacts has often been referred to as “silent knowledge”. Drawing on the one hand on an analysis of the elements of the design process and, on the other, on a simple model for knowledge construction as such, taken from the world of scientific research, this article discusses the nature of such silent knowledge. It is argued that the structure of any new knowledge contribution is the same regardless of field, be it art, philosophy, or science, whereas the phenomena involved are different.
Article
Full-text available
Analysis of results of design protocols of novice and expert designers, although based on a limited number of designers, has shown that there are differences in the balance of cognitive actions between them. In this paper, we investigate the possible reasons for this imbalance in cognitive activity between the novice and expert designers in the rate of information processing driven by their relative experience in drawing production and sketch recognition. We use the theory of mental imagery to explain these differences.
Article
Full-text available
The paper begins by outlining some methodological problems, concluding that to understand design expertise we will need to recognise that such practice includes the roles of teams, communication and shared experiences and understandings. It explores the significance of experience in expertise focussing on the way precedent stored in the form of episodic schemata is used by experts to recognise design situations for which gambits are available. The paper combines evidence from new empirical data on the perception of drawings with interviews with expert designers and research on expertise from other cognitive fields. The paper concludes that design expertise cannot be understood by studying actions alone but that our research needs to concentrate on perception and recognition and that we will have to examine conversations and memories as much as drawings.
Article
The imagist conception is popularly linked to descriptions of designing. It is generally taken as `seeing with the mind's eye'. Thus, a designer may develop a design through an iterative procedure; the imagistic materials from the mind's eye form the basis for sketches, drawings, models etc. which can then feed back to furnish more images which can then in turn be used to further develop the design work. However, this description is misleading in that it invites a comparison between imagery and design which both mislocates the significance of these phenomena and also fails to give an insightful account of them. When we disentangle these misconceptions, we can construct a model of design activity which puts the notions of imagery, observation, perception, sketching, drawing and modelling into a more illuminating perspective.
Article
This paper offers a speculative account of the way in which architectural design problems are ‘solved’, and of the significant ways in which such problems are constructed by the designers themselves. Deliberately retaining pro tem the traditional ‘problem–solution’ language frame, the paper questions this viewpoint by positing a distinction between two categories of problem: the ‘problem as given’ and the ‘problem as design goal’. While the first represents a conventional understanding of the problem presented for solution, the paper speculates that this is not the problem that the designer seeks to solve. A second category is therefore introduced to delineate the problem that is actually solved. This problem, termed the ‘problem as design goal’, is created by the imposition on to the ‘problem as given’ of a range of designer preferences, expectations and prejudices which not only define the ‘actual’ problem but, at the same time, establish the means and requirements for its acceptable solution. Such ‘problematization’, different for each designer and for each project, is posited as being central to architectural design, informing and constraining both the design activity and the final outcome in ways that are not determined by the brief itself.
Article
The paper introduces the concept of not-yet-embodied or self-transcending knowledge. The concept of self-transcending knowledge proposes a distinction between two types of tacit knowledge: tacit-embodied knowledge on the one hand and not-yet-embodied knowledge on the other hand. The distinction is relevant because each of the three forms of knowledge – explicit, tacit-embodied, and self-transcending – is based on different epistemological assumptions and requires a different type of knowledge environment and learning infrastructure. Moreover, the differentiation among markets with decreasing, steady, and increasing returns suggests that, in order to successfully compete for increasing return markets, leaders need a new type of knowledge that allows them to sense, tune into and actualize emerging business opportunities – that is, to tap into the sources of not-yet-embodied knowledge.
Article
The search for scientific bases for confronting problems of social policy is bound to fail, becuase of the nature of these problems. They are wicked problems, whereas science has developed to deal with tame problems. Policy problems cannot be definitively described. Moreover, in a pluralistic society there is nothing like the undisputable public good; there is no objective definition of equity; policies that respond to social problems cannot be meaningfully correct or false; and it makes no sense to talk about optimal solutions to social problems unless severe qualifications are imposed first. Even worse, there are no solutions in the sense of definitive and objective answers.
Article
In this paper a ‘creative design process’ is proposed, based on an integration between a modernised consensus view of both the design process from engineering design and the creative process from cognitive psychology. In addition, a composite definition of a creative design output is also formed, taking elements from the different design types proposed in engineering design and the creative outputs proposed in psychology. This integrated process and the composite definition are further linked, thus providing a descriptive model the different design operations are linked to the types of design output produced.
Article
Anticipation indicates the capacity to act in preparation for a certain effect or future state of the world. Although the link between anticipation and design has not received particular attention in design research, it is a fundamental one. In the paper we review the concept of anticipation and discuss its meaning for design research. We further argue that in order to develop an anticipatory view of design it is necessary to move beyond long-established paradigms and abstractions such as those of machine, evolution and control. Based on a conceptual and methodological framework proposed by Robert Rosen we elaborate such an anticipatory view that establishes the uniqueness of design compared to these paradigms.
Article
Our growing body of design theory risks being infected by more inconsistency than is justifiable by genuine disagreement among design theorists. Taking my cue from C. S. Peirce, who argued that theory inevitably rests on basic metaphysical assumptions that theorists ought to be critically aware of, I demonstrate how 'insidious inconsistency' may infect design theory if we ignore his admonition. As a possible remedy, I propose a method by which the philosophy of design may develop sound metaphysical foundations ('worldviews') for design theory - and generate philosophical insights into design at the same time. Examples are given of how the first steps of the method may be carried out and a number of candidate worldviews are outlined and briefly discussed. In its own way, each worldview answers certain fundamental questions about the nature of design. These include the ontological question of what the subject matter of design might be; and the epistemological question of how designers can rely on their predictions about the properties of a potentially novel artefact. The purpose of the paper is not to attempt any definitive answers to such questions, but rather to draw critical attention to the metaphysical (pre-empirical) and conceptual foundations of design theory. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Creative Imagination
  • J Engell
Le langage indirect et les voix du silence
  • M Merleau-Ponty
Theory U: Leading from the Future as it Emerges. SoL (The Society for Organizational Learning)
  • C Scharmer
Wake of the Imagination
  • R Kearney
Neuroaesthetics. Foundations and Frontiers of Aesthetics
  • M Skov
  • O Vartanian
A Defence of Poetry Shelley's Poetry and Prose
  • P B Shelley