Design in Our Lives

         Design is a part of art, and it can be separated into two categories: one has high functionality; the other one is less practical. In my opinion, the first work is designed for real world utility and people can use it every day live. Its function is to make people’s lives easier. The second kind of design has less chance to be used in our ordinary lives. Most of them show possibly as decoration. Today we are talking about four works in the Museum of Modern Art.

         Whether a design is high functionality or not, it has advantages.  A work with high functionality can   provide many conveniences for people. For example, you consider these two work s “X-IT Emergency Escape ladder” and “Rescue Board 790”. As you can see in the first picture below, the ladder is made from aluminum and fabric, and it doesn’t look like ordinary ladders that are too big to store everywhere. It can be folded and set a little room. People can put this kind ladder in every room. If fire happens, and people are trapped in the room, they can use this easy tool to save their lives. The recue board is made from papers. It can be folded and is very light to carry. It saves the time to get unconscious people or seriously injured people to hospitals. Every second is very important in the first aid. The invention of this tool will save many people’s lives.

         Although I prefer high functionality work than less practical design, less practical design has its strong points and function.  “Design for An Overpopulated Planet: Foragers” is a design that confused me. At the first moment I saw it, I could not figure out what it was. After seeing the title and checking it in the internet, I realized that it was designed to extract nutritional value from its existing surroundings. I believe that this work focuses on warning people of the serious situation of overpopulation. As for “Forks”, these forks in the picture are bent and are very different from ordinary ones. You can imagine that you use these forks to eat dinner. You may need to spend one hour to finish your steak. It is a work of ornaments. These two works both are less practical and it seems impossible to use them in real word.

         Personally, I like high functionality design very much. However, less practical design is also important in our lives. I had really good time in the Museum of Modern Art.

Title: "X-IT Emergency Escape Ladder"

Artist: Aldo DiBelardino

Ezio DiBelardino

Andrew Ive

Title: "Rescue Board 790"

Artist: Hiroyuki Tazawa

Title: "Design for an Overpopulated Planet: Foragers"

Artist: Anthony Dunne

Fiona Raby

Title: "Forks"

Artist: Bruno Munari

Illustrate a Story

When I listened to this video for the first time, I felt that it was common and normal, but I was moved and shocked by this happy family after I heard the video over and over agin. sometimes happyness doesn't mean that you have money, career or reputation, and it is that all families live together and care about each others. what my collage tries to show is about this kind of happyness.

MoMA PS1: The Good, the Bad, and the Misunderstood

MoMa PS1 was the second art trip. Although it is settled in an old school building, the arts in the museum are as wonderful a MoMa. Seeing so much great work, I really had a good time, and I found one work I like, one work I don’t like and one work I don’t understand.

The work I like

Title: It's like a jungle

Artist: Henry Taylor

Year: 2011

As I mentioned last time, I believed that good art should be creative or significant, and this work of art successfully contains these two qualities. When I saw this work for the first time, I was surprised. How did he figure out to use sticks, bottles, boxes or concretes to form a jungle? And it was an awesome idea. What he wants to convey is that that environment is polluted, and vegetation is disappearing. By this work, he calls for people to protect our earth. The purpose of this work is profound, and the way he produces work is creative. I like this work very much.

The work I don’t understand

Title: "Chicken Burrito, Beef Burrito"

Artist: Darren Bader

When we went upstairs and entered a room, the room was filled with nice music. At that time, I thought that the work might be delicate .when I saw that two burritos were laid on the windowsill, I felt that was crazy. What was the artist’s meaning? We should enjoy our lunch by listening to music. Or people’s lives in New York are too busy, that artist advise us to have a relaxing life just like those two burritos that sit for a while and admire the scene outside the window.

The work I don’t like

Untitled

Artist: Henry Taylor

Year: 2004

The artist drew a woman in the picture. We don’t know the experience of the women, but from the expression of that woman, I can feel that she is aggressive and angry. The whole picture seems a little bit in a mess.An aggressive women in the messy picture make me uncomfortable.

Sometimes art is hard to define whether it is good or not. I just talk about my opinion in relation to these arts. What I like doesn’t mean it is a good art, same for what I don’t like. It is all about my personal experience.