Author: aylin.aktas

I recently went to the National Gallery and wanted to write about my visit. At first, I didn’t really know how to connect it to my master’s thesis, or even what exactly I had learned from it. This time, I simply started writing down my thoughts and by the end, I realised that it’s possible to make a connection between almost everything.

One of the first things that still amazes me is that the National Gallery like so many important museums in London is free. You can just walk in, no ticket, no obligation, and suddenly you’re standing in front of some of the most famous paintings in the world. That alone already says something about access, value, and who art is for. There’s no barrier or expectation. You’re allowed to wander, to stay five minutes or five hours.

And five hours might actually be too much.

The gallery has so many rooms that after a while all the paintings started to blur together. This feels almost wrong to admit, because these are obviously some of the most important and celebrated artworks in history. Each painting, when looked at individually, carries such rich stories, political contexts, personal tragedies and fascinating details. Knowing the story behind a painting completely changes how you see it and how much it moves you.

I noticed this especially when I was looking for The Execution of Lady Jane Grey. I already knew her story, and I had been deeply moved by it before even seeing the painting in real life. Standing in front of it felt almost like meeting a celebrity you’ve admired for a long time. In that moment, the painting didn’t feel like “just another artwork on the wall.”

But those moments became rarer the longer I stayed.

After a while, the quantity of paintings started to work against them. Room after room everything slowly flowed into everything else. I started wondering if “too much” can actually make things lose their value. Not because they aren’t valuable, but because we, as viewers, reach a limit. It reminded me of how after scrolling on TikTok for two hours, everything starts to feel the same and not because the content is identical, but because our capacity to truly engage gets exhausted. And maybe this doesn’t only happen with digital media, maybe it happens in museums too.

There was also something about the way the paintings were displayed that made this feeling stronger. The lighting, for example. This might be controversial, but I really didn’t like how Van Gogh’s Sunflowers looked. The colours felt lifeless and I hate saying that, because it’s Van Gogh. But it made me realise how much context, presentation, and atmosphere shape our experience of art. Even the most powerful work can feel distant if the conditions around it don’t support it.

Walking through the gallery, I kept thinking about attention and how fragile it is, how easily it slips away. And maybe this is where the connection to my master’s thesis begins to form. I’m becoming more interested in how meaning is created, sustained, or lost depending on scale, quantity, and context. How can we design (physical or conceptual) to allow for slower and deeper engagement?

Links:
https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/
https://www.hrp.org.uk/tower-of-london/history-and-stories/lady-jane-grey/
https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/visiting/virtual-tours/google-virtual-tour

For this Impulse blog entry, I wanted to share my insights from my lectures at Kingston University. After my first lecture, I felt so inspired that I went straight to the library and started doing research that would eventually lead me toward my master’s thesis topic.

On our first day, we got to hear about the career path of our lecturer, Cathy. She talked about moving through different creative and political spaces, from being part of a rebel music group to convincing students to create an alternative art school as a form of protest against London’s high tuition fees. The way she told these stories was incredibly engaging. With her comedic timing and honesty, it felt much more like sitting in the audience of a stand-up show than attending a university lecture. Of course, because it was my very first lecture in London and I was already buzzing with excitement about learning new things, I was probably way more impressed than everyone else. For the other students, it was likely just another rainy Thursday morning.

What I appreciated most about this lecture and the course in general is how seriously the university prepares students for their dissertation. This entire semester is dedicated to finding and shaping a topic, and they really take the time to guide us through that process. All the research we do is meant to lead toward a final project, supported by workshops that help us along the way. We work in groups, talk openly about our ideas, and constantly reflect on where we are and where we want to go.

One piece of advice Cathy keeps repeating really stuck with me: “Start with something small, you can always go bigger.” It’s exactly what I’ve been struggling with. I have a tendency to aim straight for big, complex problems that realistically require way more power, time, or resources than I currently have. Cathy explained that it’s often much more effective to start with something small and specific, and then slowly build on it. Over time, that small idea can grow, expand, and take on more layers. That’s what I’m trying to focus on now: collecting smaller ideas, letting them develop naturally, and then gradually adding more literature, references, and sources.

To help us through this process, Cathy divided us into three groups: Making Public, Making Situated Knowledge, and Making Meaning. Within these groups, we wrote down all of our interests and started mapping them together with the others. This simple exercise turned out to be surprisingly powerful. Seeing my thoughts laid out visually and alongside the ideas of others helped bring some structure to the chaos that had been floating around in my head. It made everything feel a little more tangible and manageable.

Links:
DE7608 intro Graphic Design – Future Practices Slides
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1SvQrDOy-4GwHipNV4sZ7klFm0ZUWH4DDy84T-SGMcjQ/edit?slide=id.p#slide=id.
Our Mindmaps:
https://padlet.com/qr-code/lhh5tuq2qwomtmav?source=image

For my first Impulse blog entry, I wanted to start with something that has always been a big part of how I see and understand the world: film. Even though I study design, I’ve always felt drawn to cinema. Not just as entertainment, but as a way of thinking. Film is a combination of so many different disciplines: image, sound, timing, emotion, storytelling, and decision-making. Watching films, and especially listening to directors talk about their process, reminds me that creative direction exists everywhere, not just in design. It makes me realise how important it is to learn from other fields, because the questions are often the same. How do you create meaning? How do you guide attention? How do you stay true to an idea while navigating uncertainty?

I recently watched a Directors Roundtable with Todd Phillips, Martin Scorsese, Greta Gerwig, Noah Baumbach, Lulu Wang, Fernando Meirelles and it gave me a lot to think about. Not only about filmmaking, but about creative work in general.

One moment that stayed with me was when Martin Scorsese talked about The King of Comedy, which was called “flop of the year” when it was released. Today Scorsese is seen as one of the most important filmmakers of all time. It made me realise how success reshapes the way we look at people’s work. When someone becomes successful, we often forget the the failures and the moments where their work wasn’t understood. We see their career as something linear, even though it never was.

A story shared by the Brazilian director Fernando Meirelles stuck with me the most. When he was asked if he would consider moving to the US, he said: “I like to direct in Portuguese. I understand English, but I don’t feel English. If you say ‘mango tree’ in English, it’s just a tree. If you say ‘mangueira,’ it’s my mother, its scent, it’s so much.” This made me think about how language, context, and personal experience shape meaning. The same object can carry completely different emotional weight depending on how and where you encounter it. As someone interested in creative direction, this makes me reflect on how meaning is never fixed, it is always somehow shaped by cultural context.

Another idea that resonated with me was when they described production as an act of faith. Every day on set, you show up without knowing exactly what will happen. It might rain. Something might not work. The circumstances are rarely what you expected. You have to adapt constantly and make the best out of what is there. This feels very familiar to the creative process in general. You can prepare, research, and plan, but there will always be uncertainty. Instead of trying to control everything, you learn to respond, adjust, and trust the process.

Watching this conversation reminded me that creative direction is not about having complete control or certainty. It’s about observing closely and trusting that meaning will develop over time. It also reminded me that research is not always linear. Sometimes it starts with curiosity, with watching, listening, and collecting fragments. And only later do those fragments begin to connect.

In that sense, watching films and listening to the people who make them has become part of my research process. Not because it gives me clear answers, but because it helps me understand what it means to create something with intention.

Links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iLtjMwkOlg&t=2471s
https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/fernando-meirelles
https://www.indiewire.com/news/general-news/martin-scorsese-audiences-hated-king-of-comedy-1234913652/

Autorin: Kimberly Duck
Titel: WOOOOORRMMHOOOLLEESS
Erscheinungsjahr: 2025
Hochschule: Rhode Island School of Design (RISD)
Master: Master of Fine Arts (MFA) – Graphic Design
Quelle: https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/masterstheses/1430

Die Masterarbeit WOOOOORRMMHOOOLLEESS von Kimberly Duck beschäftigt sich mit der Frage, wie digitale und physische Realitäten zunehmend ineinander übergehen und wie diese Übergänge: die „Wormholes“ als gestalterische und konzeptionelle Methode verstanden werden können. Die Autorin nutzt dabei den Begriff „Wormhole“ sowohl als Metapher als auch als Methodologie, um das Erleben von Zwischenräumen, Übergängen und Irritationen in digitalen Räumen zu erforschen. Das Werkstück ist die Arbeit selbst: eine experimentell gestaltete, visuell überladene, fast performative Publikation.

Gestaltungshöhe
Gestalterisch ist die Arbeit auf hohem Niveau. Sie ist mutig, auffällig und konsequent umgesetzt. Allerdings wirkt sie stellenweise überladen, vielleicht bewusst „freaky“, aber dadurch etwas unruhig. Trotzdem passt dieser Stil gut zur Idee der Arbeit und spiegelt das Konzept des „Wurmlochs“ formal wider.

Innovationsgrad
Das Thema ist originell und aktuell. „Wormholes“ als gestalterisches Prinzip zu sehen, ist ein spannender Ansatz, der das Denken über digitale Räume erweitert. Besonders interessant finde ich, dass sie Theorie, Popkultur und Design sehr frei miteinander verknüpft, aber dennoch einem roten Faden folgt.

Selbstständigkeit
Die Arbeit wirkt sehr eigenständig. Man merkt, dass sie nicht versucht, Erwartungen zu erfüllen, sondern ihren eigenen Zugang wählt. Der Ton, die Gestaltung und das Denken sind ganz klar ihre Handschrift.

Gliederung und Struktur
Die Struktur ist eher offen, weniger wie eine klassische wissenschaftliche Arbeit, mehr wie ein Essay oder ein künstlerisches Manifest. Das passt zum Thema, macht es aber manchmal schwer, einer klaren Argumentation zu folgen. Beim Lesen habe ich mir oftmals die Frage gestellt, ob diese Arbeit in einem österreichischen Kontext schon als zu experimentell angesehen werden würde, aber für eine Designhochschule wie RISD scheint es zu funktionieren. 

Kommunikationsgrad
Sprachlich ist die Arbeit sehr zugänglich und unterhaltsam. Sie schreibt fast erzählerisch, was die Aufmerksamkeit hält. Ich finde das angenehm zu lesen, auch wenn es wissenschaftlich vielleicht etwas zu locker ist. Trotzdem zeigt sie damit, dass man Theorie auch auf kreative Weise vermitteln kann.

Orthographie, Sorgfalt und Genauigkeit
Der Umfang wirkt passend, die Arbeit ist sorgfältig gestaltet. Sprachlich ist alles korrekt, aber sie legt mehr Wert auf Ausdruck und Rhythmus als auf formale Strenge, was in diesem Kontext in Ordnung ist.

Literatur
Die verwendeten Quellen sind vielfältig und passend zum Thema. Sie zitiert sowohl theoretische Texte als auch visuelle Referenzen, wodurch die Arbeit lebendig und gut verankert wirkt.

Abschließende Einschätzung
WOOOOORRMMHOOOLLEESS ist mutig, verspielt und sehr eigen. Manche gestalterischen Entscheidungen wirken etwas übertrieben, trotzdem bleibt die Arbeit sehr spannend. Für meine eigene Thesis nehme ich mit, dass es okay ist, eine persönliche Stimme zu haben und Gestaltung auch als Denkform einzusetzen, solange die Idee klar bleibt.

Diesen Satz fand ich besonders schön: „Our current reality is ruled by multitudes with varying frameworks, and the internet intensifies this exponentially. In the age of blurred lines, where the physical and the digital merge and exist in unison, I choose to be optimistically critical.“ Gerade diese Themen und Schnittpunkte finde ich selbst spannend, aber auch herausfordernd für meine eigene Themenwahl. Die Autorin hat es geschafft, ein sehr abstraktes und freies Thema präzise und greifbar zu formulieren. Auch wenn man sicher manches kritisch sehen kann, hat mir ihre Arbeit eine neue Perspektive eröffnet und gezeigt, wie vielfältig die Möglichkeiten in diesem Bereich eigentlich sind.

Now that this phase of my research is coming to an end, the question becomes: how can all of this lead to something more tangible?

The answer, for now, is: I don’t know yet.

What I do know is that I want to keep working with fragments, randomness, and the unnoticed. I want to turn my growing archive of textures, messages, and spontaneous compositions into something. A publication? A zine? A projection? Maybe even a spatial installation? Something that feels more like a collection of evidence than a portfolio.

One idea I’ve been returning to is the “Randomness Manifesto”, a visual and written experiment that acts as both critique and celebration. Critique of overdesigned culture. Celebration of accidents, layers, and non-linear thinking. It might combine screenshots, photography, found type, short texts, print experiments. A design that reflects how we actually experience the world: not as clean grids, but as overlapping, constantly shifting impressions.

Another direction might explore design as documentation. Not designing something but noticing, framing, and amplifying what’s already there. A form of communication design that starts with observing instead of inventing.

Whatever it becomes, I know I want to stay close to the questions that guided me:
– What are we not noticing?
– What are we designing for?
– Can design help us reconnect not just with each other, but with what’s already in front of us?

Design doesn’t always need to answer. Sometimes it just needs to ask better questions. In a time when artificial intelligence can generate thousands of visuals in seconds, maybe the role of the designer is shifting. It’s no longer just about creating new things, it’s about curating, framing, and giving weight to what already exists. The designer becomes less of a maker, more of a connector. Someone who can read between the lines, trace meaning in chaos, and slow down the endless scroll of content to say: “Look closer, this matters.” In that sense, embracing the unfinished and the overlooked isn’t stepping away from design, it’s returning to its core purpose: helping people make sense of the world.

Sources:

Berger, John. Ways of Seeing. Penguin, 1972.

This semester wasn’t about following a straight path. It was about collecting fragments like ideas, images, words, impressions and trying to understand what they might be pointing toward.

When I started, I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for. I knew only that something felt off. Design felt tired. Too polished. Too predictable. Too disconnected from real life. So I started paying closer attention to the things that don’t scream to be noticed: a scribbled message on a wall, a broken tile, a flyer stapled over a hundred others. Somewhere in that visual noise, I found honesty.

Through writing, collecting, and reflecting, a theme kept returning: the value of the in-between. The things we pass by. The messy, random, imperfect traces that make spaces and media feel alive. I began to see randomness not as a lack of structure, but as a kind of truth-telling. The uncurated becomes a mirror and the overlooked becomes material.

I also began to look more critically at visual culture. Not just what we’re making, but why. Do we need more posters or do we need to read the ones that already exist more closely? Do we need to add to the noise or help people make sense of it?

This project became something of an experiment in slowing down. In resisting the pressure to produce finished, polished things and instead sit with the progress. Let randomness exist. Let fragments be fragments. Let the design be about presence, not performance.

Maybe what I’ve been doing all semester isn’t building a project, but developing a perspective. A way of seeing that values what doesn’t demand attention. And that might be the most valuable tool a designer can have.

Sources:

Certeau, Michel de. The Practice of Everyday Life. University of California Press, 1984.

Throughout this process, I’ve been circling the same question: What makes something feel meaningful, even when it’s messy, unfinished, or random? I’ve looked at the world through fragments like found textures, broken signage, screenshots of everyday oddities but now I want to take a step back and ask what this way of seeing actually is.

In her book On Longing, Susan Stewart writes about “the souvenir”, a small object torn from its original context that somehow holds emotional weight. I realize my photo archive functions in a similar way. These images aren’t “designed” but they become markers of time, place, and feeling. They’re emotionally charged, not because of their composition, but because of the act of noticing and collecting them.

This kind of collecting the quiet, emotional, inconsistent has nothing to do with curation in the classical sense. It’s not about matching colors or building a “perfect” grid. It’s about feeling something when you look at a corner of a torn sticker on a pole. Or a forgotten note in a public place. These fragments of everyday life don’t scream for attention, and maybe that’s exactly why they speak to me. They don’t try to be art, they just are.

I think this way of seeing is deeply tied to slowness and presence. Noticing is an act of resistance in a fast world. But it’s also creative, it’s not passive. When I collect and document these fragments, I am quietly shaping my own way of designing. Not starting from zero, but starting from what’s already around me.

It also made me wonder: what if this is the material? What if randomness and leftovers are not a starting point for inspiration, but the work itself? I don’t want to just use these images as references for more polished designs. I want to let them remain raw. To find a format where they can exist as they are, where I can add just enough to let them speak.

This process has changed how I think about authorship too. When I put together fragments I didn’t create, am I still the designer? Maybe I’m not designing in the traditional sense, maybe I’m just assembling or paying attention.

Sources:

• Stewart, Susan. On Longing: Narratives of the Miniature, the Gigantic, the Souvenir, the Collection. Duke University Press, 1993.
• Manzini, Ezio. Design, When Everybody Designs: An Introduction to Design for Social Innovation. MIT Press, 2015.

In my last blog entry, I asked: How do we make sense of all this noise without losing the character of the city? This question has followed me into the next phase of my research. Instead of trying to clean up the clutter, I started observing what it actually is, how we experience it, and what it might be trying to tell us.

My goal is not creating a polished design outcome, it is about building a process or a system, maybe even a mindset.

Step 1: Building an Archive

I began with what I already had in my camera roll. Years of random photos: broken signs, wall textures, forgotten objects, public scribbles, strange alignments, and accidental compositions.

I didn’t take these pictures intentionally for a project, they just happened. So I started categorizing them:

• Overlaps & Layers
• Visual Noise
• Political Traces
• Human Accidents
• Unintended Beauty

I created a folder structure on my laptop that now serves as the base for a collection of real-world randomness.

Step 2: Researching the Vibe

At first glance, all these things like paint spills, torn stickers, blurry text seem unrelated. But the more I looked at them, the more I realized: they feel connected. I began to study creators who lean into randomness. From zine-makers layering textures and clashing type to Instagram artists who post found objects without context, it all feels chaotic, but somehow intentional.

I think if you look at it closely, everything can be political. Not just billboards or protest posters, but even the unnoticed details in everyday spaces. A restroom that makes women take the stairs while men walk straight in is a powerful message in itself without even meaning to. Or a wall where “Free Palestine” was painted over, but still faintly shines through. These things are visual proofs of how systems speak through architecture, erasure, and layers of public expression. Sometimes the most powerful statements are the ones no one planned, but no one managed to fully silence either.

Step 3: Understanding “The Dump”

I also revisited photo dumps. Not just as a trend, but as a storytelling form. The randomness isn’t random at all—it’s about rhythm, contrast, atmosphere. A picture of a half-eaten sandwich next to a blurry selfie and a screenshot of a note. It tells you who someone is without saying anything directly. That’s the kind of narrative I’m interested in.

What’s exciting is that this also applies to design. Layouts that feel spontaneous. Posters that aren’t begging for attention but make you stop anyway. Formats that don’t tell you what to think, but make you feel like you’ve stumbled into something.

A Visual Protest in the Making

All of this is slowly leading toward my “Randomness Manifesto”, a zine or digital page that reads and feels like a visual protest against overdesigned perfection. It will be layered, broken, imperfect. It won’t follow a fixed structure. Maybe it will look like a poster that’s been weathered by the street. Or a desktop folder that became a publication.

Whatever it turns into, it taught me that the beauty isn’t in controlling the chaos, it’s in curating it.

In my last blog post, I talked about visual noise and the overwhelming overload of signs, ads, posts, and designs we take in every single day. But lately, I’ve been thinking less about how we experience this as viewers and more about how we contribute to it as designers.

It feels strange: we’re trained to create, to fill space, to communicate. But at what point does that contribution start to become part of the problem?

Instead of fighting the clutter, what if we curated it? As designers, we have the tools to make sense of noise and not by erasing it, but by reframing it. We live in a world where design is everywhere. Good design, even. But instead of inspiring, it’s starting to exhaust. As a designer, I’ve found myself stuck between two questions: Why does everything look the same? and Why does it feel like too much?

I want to take this frustration and explore it further:
How do we design in a time where everything is designed?

Here are a few directions I’m thinking about:

1. Designing for Subtraction, not Addition
What if instead of adding new visuals, we removed something? Could communication design be about making space instead of filling it? For example, creating posters or publications that invite people to erase, cut out, cover, or reuse parts leaving the final outcome unfinished, open, and collaborative.

2. Designing with Found Visuals
What if the design process began not with a blank canvas but with what’s already out there? I’ve been photographing torn posters, scuffed signs, scribbles on paper, things that are already “designed” by the city, time, and people. A project could emerge from these materials. A collage zine, a typography experiment, or even a visual system built from existing fragments rather than new creations.

3. Creating Visual Silence
In a world that shouts, maybe the most powerful thing a designer can do is say nothing. Could we explore formats that use white space, emptiness, or subtle cues to communicate? A type experiment where the type nearly disappears. A print project that works with fading ink, wear and tear. Design that invites rest.

4. Slow and Delayed Design
What if design didn’t have to be instant? What if the reader had to wait, or interact slowly, to fully understand it? We could explore this through delayed-reveal formats like risograph prints that change with layering, or digital zines where parts of the interface become visible over time.

These are not finished ideas. But they are responses. Not to solve the problem of design fatigue, but to live with it differently. Instead of asking how we stand out in a loud world, maybe we can ask: How can design help us breathe in it?

Sources

• Manzini, Ezio. Design, When Everybody Designs. MIT Press, 2015.
• Sennett, Richard. The Craftsman. Yale University Press, 2008.
• Müller, Lars. Do You Read Me?. Lars Müller Publishers, 2019.
• Ghodsee, Kristen. Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism. Bold Type Books, 2018. (Referenced in discussions around overstimulation and attention economy)

In my last blog entries, I celebrated visual chaos like torn posters, urban layering, random textures. I looked at how imperfection and noise can make design feel alive. But this week, I’ve started to look at that same “noise” from another angle. One that’s been bothering me quietly for a while.

Because honestly, I’m overwhelmed. Not just by design, but by everything designed. On my phone, in the streets, in shops, online because it feels like the world is constantly trying to get my attention. Ads, slogans, campaigns, UIs, trends, interfaces. It’s like my brain is scrolling even when I’m not.

I’ve started noticing the mental fatigue that comes with all this. Not from doing too much but from seeing too much. And it makes me wonder: how much visual input is too much? And as designers, are we just adding to the noise?

I noticed how tired I felt after scrolling. Not tired from doing something just from looking because it feels like design is everywhere and everything wants to be seen. At the same time, I walk through the city and feel the same overstimulation. Menus, street signs, neon, scaffolding ads, more layers. It’s a different kind of noise, but it’s all adding up. Not just around me, but inside me too. Like my brain doesn’t know where to look anymore.

And here comes the conflict: I’m a designer. I’m supposed to add to this world, right? Another visual, another poster, another aesthetic. But I keep asking myself: Do we need more? Or do we need to make better use of what’s already here?

I started fantasizing about a kind of mental and urban cleaning project, not minimalism, not another beige lifestyle rebrand but something that clears space without erasing character. How can we clean up the noise without wiping away the stories? How do we preserve the messy beauty of the city without being swallowed by clutter?

I’m not sure what the answer is, but I know it’s not just about subtracting things until everything looks like another minimalist café. That’s erasure, I’m more interested in editing than deleting. Like a graphic designer curating a messy layout, but leaving the good chaos in.

What if the next phase of design isn’t about making new things but about filtering what’s already there? Not with an algorithm, but with human intention. Choosing what to highlight and what not to touch.

I think I’m learning that design doesn’t always mean producing. Sometimes it means observing, organizing, even pausing. Maybe the most radical thing we can do is to “not design” at least not until we’ve really looked at what’s already existing.

Sources

Sennett, R. (2008). The Craftsman. Yale University Press.
Postman, N. (1985). Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. Penguin Books.