Tiffany, using the term 'visual communicator' may help you sell your services to clients, for whom 'communication' sounds more valuable than 'making you look better': in which case, more power to you. Call yourself whatever you want if it will convince people to pay you properly to do your work, but how you think of yourself should be a matter of critical consciousness, and probably won't be reducible to a tidy label.

What type of cheese are you ?
http://cupped-expressions.net/cheese/quiz/

I have to say that I'm glad I asked the question. Thanks for all the responses. I'll respond again later.

But just quickly, in regards to John's recent post: John I am anti-label actually. Your remarks about why "visual communicator" isn't valid makes sense to the left side of my brain, but my right side has turned a deaf ear. Paul used the term "problem solver". I think that covers it best as it doesn't limit me simply to design, but could also include management, cleaning services, lunch coordinator, receptionist, typesetter, IT, and seat warmer. I wear too many hats to have one title and so try to avoid any title at all. Unless I'm joking around and then I call myself "Design Goddess".

The question, the original post, came about because of a remark someone with whom I was chatting made. They made it sound as if they were an "artiste" and as a reaction I laughed. Turns out I misunderstood them, but I had already started the thread.

How about "typographer" or "typographic designer" ?

> Bruce Mau: 'heaven is a place with no text'

That's actually sort of believable, considering my personal view of how most people seem to envision Heaven: boring as hell.

hhp

Hrant,
"Heaven is what you make & hell is what you go through."
that is a part of a rap lyric from the WuTang.
Big up to C.R.E.A.M." and "Bring the Pain" !

P'z to all the designers, artists, moms & dads out there !
AS

John wrote:
> My type designs are very much like the cast iron Japanese tea
> pot that is sitting on a shelf near my desk: it has a function
> that it shares with all other tea pots, and which it is designed
> to perform well, and it is also a distinctive object that
> embodies ideas of form and decoration from a particular
> culture and a particular mind. That, to my mind, is what type
> design is all about.


John, your example of the pot is great.

But the tea pot is visually communicating, even if you ignore it.
It's not trying to seduce you like a Phillipe Starck pot might. It's
not winking at you like a Michael Graves pot might. It's sitting
there, humbly communicating that it's a Japanese tea pot. The
function needs a form and to me that's not trivial.

That said, I'm not one to put "Visual Communicator" on my
business card, but I think about what my work communicates all
the time - what is this image/color/point size saying and just as
importantly, what is it not saying.

John, I may have gone too far with my affirmation about type design, and I agree that the verbal channel has an unmatched hability to efficiently transmit with great concretion simple as well as complex and abstract information.

I guess my point is that communication isn

I've been arguing, perhaps over-strenuously, against 'visual communication' because I think it is something that too many people take for granted without really analysing, and also because I believe language is of an order of communication many times more sophisticated, more adaptable, more generative, than anything possible in visual, non-linguistic modes. But this is in part because the kind of communication that interests me is communication of ideas, and I'm quite strict that communication, properly understood, requires a significant identity between the message broadcase and the message received, which I don't think is reliable in visual media: heck, it is often difficult enough with language, which is why most effective communication involves a two-way transmission that clarifies meaning via discourse.

There is, obviously, a common and less rigourous use of the term 'communicate' that is often applied to the impression that we get from a visual cue, such as a particular arrangement of form and colour in design, a gesture or facial expression, or, as Hector notes, the way someone is dressed. I think Erik Spiekermann is correct when he says 'We cannot not communicate', if that is understood to mean 'We cannot not create an impression'. And most graphic design is about creating impressions (often false ones, it must be said). Impressions are important: what psychologists call 'thin-slicing', rapid intuitive judgement or inductive reasoning based on very short exposure -- the proverbial first impression that is often correct -- is an important method for navigating through life. And what is characterised as 'visual communication' is an attempt to exploit this method by creating specific impressions, usually based on cultural associations. But I still don't think you can get away from two factors: 1) the necessary correlation between what is broadcast and received, which is the basic measure of successful communication -- if the impression your design creates is not the impression you intended or hoped for, is it really communication? or is it a purely unilateral action on the part of the viewer? --, and 2) the range of impressions it is possible to suggest are incredibly crude and small in number compared to the range of complex ideas that can be communicated through language. This is why the language of advertising people tends to rely on broad and vague notions -- we want this to look elegant; we want something playful; it needs to be dynamic; etc. --: because the kind of impressions one can 'communicate' visually (inspire, really) are that crude. Thinking about Erik Spiekermann's dictum again, one can say even that design primarily creates one of two impressions: 'We suck' or 'We don't suck'.

Psychologist Karl Buehler said that there are three levels of language. First expressive-Ouch!; second communicative - run!, third descriptive - take your third left and you will see the train station.
The idea is that the later levels presume the earlier. Popper added argumentative - no, it's the fourth right, not the third, because they've moved the station entrance. Language can operate on the descriptive and argumentative levels in a much richer way than others.

But, John, when it comes to expressive and communicative levels, the visual and aural and smell and taste can do heavy lifting. Just think of how much of a movie's success is dependent on the actor's expression and tone of voice and body language. Yes, you often can't follow the plot of a movie without subtitles of a film in a language you don't understand. But dubbing destroys so much of the impact of a film compared to the tone of voice, even when you don't understand the words. As to vision, just substitute Miss Piggy for Marilyn Monroe, and you are going to get a different film, even with the same words.

With graphic design, the non-verbal elements are very important. Part is communicating heirarchy through visual relationships, as well as other conceptual relationships through visual relationships. And of course making sure words are easily readable - not easy in small sizes. And part is emotional tone and mood through color, use of space, illustration, photography.

It seems to me that a great graphic designer adds that emotional punch as well as clarity. To carry the metaphor further, you need a screenplay, but the screenplay isn't the movie. The great graphic designer is like a great director, and can turn the words into something more powerful than words alone.

I am a writer and love language, words, books - and even letters! But I know there is more to life, and graphic design is part of that more.

But the tea pot is visually communicating...

This simple observation goes some way to reconciling some of the ideas in this thread.

As Joe points out it is the tea pot itself that is communicating. One can say the same thing about anything else that we look at, including the products of graphic design: they can be said to communicate, and even if there is something metaphorical about this use of the term, it is close enough to a phenomenal description to be acceptable. Okay, so a thing can be said to communicate -- and since I gave the example of the Japanese tea pot, I have to admit that what it communicates goes beyond a vague impression: it is a sophisticated carrier of aesthetical values of a particular culture. And, of course, this was also my point about type design.

Even so, there remains an important difference between saying that a thing communicates something to the viewer and saying that the maker of that thing communicates with the viewer. In the latter construction, you meet all my previous criticisms of the unreliability of non-verbal communication, because it remains very uncertain that what the thing communicates to the viewer is going to share significant identity with what the maker wants to communicate. [To get theological for a moment, one could even make this observation on a grand scale: noting that what creation communicates to most human beings is not necessarily what God intended to communicate; hence the need for verbal revelation.]

So, Tiffany, I don't think you are a visual communicator, but what you design is. The relationship between what you might want to communicate and what a specific design actually communicates to a particular viewer may range from close identity to complete dissonance, over which you will only ever have very partial control.

__ design primarily creates one of two impressions:
'We suck' or 'We don't suck'. __

I have a wonderful black t-shirt by CTI Paper USA inc,
with

-- this could offend everyone, so good luck --

Wor(l)ds like visual communicators, communication designers, and all that IMHO come from the same inbred * source of toffee-nosed "cultured classes" that get trained for years in universities and are completely detached from reality.

The kind that cannot live without the (or their) status quo of design, where everything has always to be set in a certain way and one cannot move from that track or else is accused to be "wrong" (whatever that means).

Anyone else had that impression or is it just me?

btw, Alessandro, thanks for saving the 'g', where would we be with out the 'g'
------------
I'd also like to refer to this one without further comments:
http://www.apple.com/thinkdifferent/
------------

*) "inbred" might sound just a little too offensive so I better explain i some more. I mean it in the is context as being together only with those of the same level of knowledge and the same cultural background.</font>

Fhank Jou darling.

There was a little princess with a magic crown.
An evil warlock kidnapped her, locked ger in a cell, in a huge
tower and took away her sweet voice.
There was a window with bars. The princess kept smashing her head
against the bars hoping that someone would hear the sound and find
her. The crown made the most beautiful sound that anyone ever heard.
You could hear the ringing for miles. It was so beautiful, that
people wanted to grab air. They never found the princess. She never
got out of the room. But the sound she made filled everything up
with beauty.

Alessandro,
I guess we all must suffer for beauty.

ChrisL

PS: I still owe you a crit on your logo

In response to this quote:

"I mean, how can we expecte to be considered serious professionals as lawayers or medics if we keep calling ourselves artists. Not that I have something against art or artists, but we are talking about business."

Why not call ourselves artists AND expect to be considered professionals?

That is what organizations like AIGA do. They advocate the VALUE that Graphic Design brings to business and to life.

If we as designers continue to downplay our role in business by classifying ourselves as so many different things (multimedia designer, print designer, communication artist, information design repair-er), our potential as collaborative LEADERS in business and society will never be seen.

In their eyes we will remain pixel-pushing, color-separating, letter-spacing monkeys that will bend over backwards to work for spec. ;)

...our potential as collaborative LEADERS in business and society will never be seen.

I'm inspired: my next business card will identify me as Typenfuhrer.

haha! I like it.

Hail Design.

You wouldn't believe my findings! Oh this is soooo very exciting!
I found proof of existence for both terms now, just look at the picture for reference!

Diversity in Design
The Journal of Inclusive Design Education
[Beth Tauke & Alex Bitterman]
http://www.ap.buffalo.edu/idea/diversityindesign/currentfea.htm

To come back on John point about visual language, i'd say that human language isn't only a tool for communication, but a way to produce signification. Meanings, new knowledge about things

I have been at the sea yesterday,
that wood & the shade looks like a 'z.'
AS

Guillaume, I entirely agree, and I think my exchange with Héctor and Joe about the tea pot is precisely about this idea of signification, of things as carriers of meaning. My point is only that this does not necessarily constitute communication, which is the transfer if meaning, between the maker of a thing and the beholder of a thing. Which is why I question the idea of designers as visual communicators: the term implies a certainty that is largely absent from the practice. But note that while I do not think visual communication is anything like as powerful or reliable as verbal communication, I do not think signification -- the investment of meaning in a thing -- is in any sense less phenomenal than communication. Indeed, I wouldn't be much of a Catholic if I believed that. Signification may, in fact, be much more powerful and effective than mere communication, or it may be as banal as the emptiest verbal expression: to a very large degree it depends what is being communicated or signified, Pace, McLuhan, the message is also the message.

John, I usually find myself agreeing with you in this forum, but on this issue you are just flat wrong, and significantly wrong for this issue at hand.

In the first place, 'communication' does not imply the certainty that you claim. According to the Concise Oxford Dictionary one meaning of this word is 'd. impart (feelings etc.) non-verbally (communicated his affection)'. So non-verbal communication is one normal understanding of this term, including its ambiguity.

What the philosophical term 'signification' means is in fact probably a lot fuzzier than the normal English 'communication', which is ambiguous enough.

I think you are confusing communication with description. I mentioned Karl Buehler's distinction above, and I think it is valid. Verbal description is a way to communicate, but there are many other ways. For example animals communicate a lot, but do not describe, with the possible exception of the dance of bees and apes who have been taught sign language. If Buehler is wrong, tell me why.

Typefaces are abstract shapes with no direct descriptive reference, and so they are quite ambiguous. One can be more decorative, one more spare, and so on, and then there are historical associations and memories of where the same kind of face is used. Hence typefaces by themselves can communicate, but are quite limited in what they can communicate by their design.

However, typefaces are only one ingredient or one tool of the designer's trade, and the good ones are going to use every visual means to communicate effectively.

What is most important to understand, is that non-verbal communication is often emotionally more powerful and persuasive. It is not for nothing that most designers are paid in one way or another for advertising. But this goes for any communication.

And the messages are much more specific than 'this is good' or 'this is bad'. Let me take two examples from what I am work I am doing now. First, by the design of my book 'Sayings of the Sages' (I am author and designer, but not publisher), I am trying to communicate: "These sayings are a precious legacy, which you would want to know, but they and the discussion of them are warm and accessible and not threatening."

To get the 'precious' and 'classic' feel I am using a classic design, with red and black on ivory paper, using Jenson. To keep it welcoming the book is not too fat, and each set of sayings with all of its explanation and discussion guide is on one set of facing pages. There is also a fair amount of white space. I hope the cover will have some of the clean black and red Jenson, with a gold filagree frame, and everything will have classic repose and beauty.

All this is a quite specific impression I want to create, and whether I succeed or not, this is exactly one important kind of thing that good graphic design can do. Actually I could go through every design decision, and tell you how it is designed to give a specific message, or to increase easy of access and understanding. Of course, beauty is one goal, but that is because it serves my purpose.

A related kind of challenge is in a chart I am now working on of the Sages, including a time line. Here I am trying to include a great deal of information in a way that the reader can easily grasp. This is the kind of problem that Edward Tufte discusses in his books. Here the designer is using 'visual logic' to match the concepts that are you are attempting to communicate. And the design decisions are also not value neutral. For example, events of the outside world and the dates of the sages are prominent in my design. For Orthodox Jews this is subversive of the idea that all the sayings are in fact 'mi-sinai', from Sinai, from God, and timeless. And I mean it to be subversive; it's a conscious decision designed to be persuasive of a point of view.

Now graphic designers also regularly use illustration and photography with text also, which again can communicate even more specifically, and often with great emotional power.

I don't like the term 'visual communicator', which has no poetry, or is the opposite of poetry. But Tiffany is right on target concerning the task of graphic designers. It communicates to me, clearly and verbally!

>I do not think visual communication is anything like as powerful or reliable as verbal communication

Powerful and reliable are two different things. Right on 'reliable', wrong on 'powerful'. I will give you an example.

A lady I knew liked my work and had me out to talk to her community about applying traditional ethics to modern life - in fact she had done a Master's thesis on this topic, I learned.

She was very friendly, then I didn't hear from her for some time afterwards. Well, I blew that, I figured. Then I spotted her at a conference, buying a book. She saw me out of the corner of her eye, but seemed reluctant to acknowledge me. Ah, well. Then she turned suddenly, blew me a kiss, and rushed off. There was no mistaking the sincere affection, but what was that all about? Two months later I read of her death from cancer. This was her kiss goodbye. I cherish her memory. Would an e-mail; 'sorry I haven't been well, best wishes' have done the same as that blown kiss that haunts my memory? Did it communicate? With ambiguity, but what power.

One addition. I didn't mean to oppose 'verbal' and 'non-verbal' communication. They are most powerful when both go together, each with maximum affect. Marrying words to the visual appearance that is best suited to convey the purpose of the words is the task of the designer.

It seems that verbal language must have originally come about by gesturing at objects and drawing pictures then associating sounds with the images. The gestures and pictures were early forms of communication--visual communication which initiated the creation of language. I guess there would never have been verbal communication without there first being visual communication?

ChrisL

Well I guess that my problem with being called artist is that the general perception of artists doesn

In the first place, 'communication' does not imply the certainty that you claim. According to the Concise Oxford Dictionary one meaning of this word is 'd. impart (feelings etc.) non-verbally (communicated his affection)'. So non-verbal communication is one normal understanding of this term, including its ambiguity.

But William, I never once denied that there was such a thing as visual communication: I questioned whether it was reliable enough for someone to describe herself, professionally, as a 'visual communicator'. Because that phrase seems to me to be a kind of guarantee It says 'I can communicate your message', and I don't think that is a guarantee that any graphic designer can make: the ability to communicate something visually is very dependent e.g. on what needs to be communicated and to whom it needs to be communicated -- much more dependent than verbal/literary communication which, among other benefits, can operate with a degree of independence, creating its own frame of reference rather than relying on existing associations in the mind of the recipient.

Of course there is visual and gestural and other forms of non-verbal communication. And as H

> I questioned whether it was reliable enough for someone to describe herself, professionally, as a 'visual communicator'.

Well, we are now on the same page. Your point about the greater ambiguity of visual communication is generally sound, as I have acknowledged. However, no graphic designer claims that they are going to communicate for their client by visual means alone, without language. What is rather conveyed is that the designer will help make the visual *dimension* of the communication complement the words, so that the overall communication is more effective and persuasive than words alone would be.

Designers never claim to substitute for the writer, so your argument is misplaced. You don't acknowledge that using the visual dimension to communicate text more effectively is in fact the task of a graphic designer - which I take to be Tiffany's point.

In a very text-heavy setting, a lot of that effort will not be emotional, but pragmatic: making the text easy and comfortable to read. But even in text-heavy environments, the emotional dimension is very important, because you want to increase the chances that you are going to be read, and have the emotional tone of the visual match the tone of the text.

Also even in text-heavy environments the visual design can be critical to understanding. Maps and equations are examples. The graphics of these communicate much more effectively than verbal explanation of the same thing. And effective visual presentation of information just from the point of view of quick comprehension is a field in itself, as Tufte's books illustrate.

When there are fewer words and more graphic elements, then the visual will play a stronger role, but still in service of the client's message in words, with their persuasive purpose. For example, I think of the great theatrical posters that Christos Tsolerides has put up on Typophile for critique. These could have just had the name and location in large Arial letters black on white, no illustrations, and verbally communicated just as well. But they certainly would not have been as inviting to the potential audience.

Now as to the power of the blown kiss. I took this example to acknowledge your point about the ambiguity of visual communication alone, but to make clear the additional power that the visual element can add power that is not in words alone. First of all the blown kiss, with the expression on the face, did communicate affection and good will powerfully; you are just flat wrong that it failed to communicate. The full sad meaning, it is true, only became clear when I learned more. But my point is that I could have the same information from e-mail messages, as I said. The blown kiss was way more powerful than words alone.

>Well I guess that my problem with being called artist is that the general perception of artists doesn

When PageMaker was introduced, part of the gist of the marketing effort was that now anyone could use this fabulous new software to create, with ease, marvelous things that before required hiring a design professional. Yes sir, and we can also sell you a word processor will make you write like Tolstoy, in flawless Russian, no less.

Tools help with the process, but they aren

William, I think the power and 'full sad meaning' of your experience is really an example of the importance of the interpretational context. This is what changed between the blowing of the kiss and your eventual understanding of it.

But I don't want to analyse to death what is obviously a profound personal memory for you, so I'll clarify what I meant when I wrote that I don't consider 'visual communication is anything like as powerful or reliable as verbal communication'. I'm clearly not referring to emotional power: I'm talking about the power of language that comes from its flexibility, sophistication, its productive ability to create context, i.e. power as effective ability, not direct force. I'm not saying that the raw impact of visual media is less powerful than that of language; obviously this is not so, and this is why people rely on visual means to attract attention, inspire a emotional response, and communicate impressions within a framework of cultural associations (such as your example of a 'precious' and 'classic' feel). Visuals do all these things well. But what I've been talking about is the power of language to communicate, especially to communicate ideas, especially complex ideas; again, this is power in the sense of effective ability, of 'having the power to do more'. I come back to the example I raised earlier: this discussion could not be had visually. In terms of communication, language is more powerful because it has more effective ability to convey ideas from one mind to another.

"In terms of communication, language is more powerful because it has more effective ability to convey ideas from one mind to another."

Visual communication is a language. ;o)

Darrel, start reading at the beginning. The idea of a 'visual language' is a metaphor (a point on which my friend who is both a painter and a philosophy professor is adamant). Human language is a unique activity that is only vaguely and inaccurately paralleled in other forms of communication. The difference between the conventional and culturally-bound 'systems' of meaning in art and design and the centrality of natural language to human thought and to self-consciousness is huge. Indeed, the former is only understandable by virtue of the latter. As soon as you start to consciously think about something that you are looking at, it ceases to be visual and starts to become thoughts in your mind that are formed through language.

John, to recapitulate: your initial claim was that "much of what graphic designers do is not communicative at all; it is at most evocative ..." Thus your view that what graphic design can do is only "to make our environment more pleasant and interesting to inhabit" and that claiming to do "visual communication" is "bogus".

I think my disagreement with you here is that I think you are setting up a false dichotomy between precise description in language, and vague positive or negative emotional evocation. The falsity of that dichotomy is significant because the work of graphic design actually does fit in the real middle ground between these poles.

Take a very simple example: the skull and cross bones on a poison label. Just the word

William, going back to my 'initial claim' now is a bit unfair, since I hope it is obvious that I have modified and developed my ideas since then. I still think that using the term 'visual communicator' as a kind of professional label for graphic designers is very questionable, because to me the term 'communication' implies more than graphic designers can reliably deliver. I don't think I need to disagree with any of your well stated points about the role of design in assisting communication, in 'conveying messages' to 'move the other person to act in some way' (usually involving a credit card), in order to maintain this position.

What I've been trying to challenge in this discussion are presumptions, not only about visual communication, but also about the acceptance of communication as a one-way transmission of a 'message', which is a staple of our various media and of the design that services them. Yes, the job of most graphic designers is 'to communicate the client

>going back to my 'initial claim' now is a bit unfair

It wasn't clear to me you had moved off this view, which is what got me writing at length.
I certainly agree with you that there is too little genuine dialogue about ideas. I do enjoy your thought-provoking ideas, and the following discussions.

>sell us a message rather than an idea to which we might respond critically.

I think the problem is not presence of selling - for like it or not we all have something to sell. The problem is the great rarity of genuine critical discussion in search of the truth. I am totally of a mind with you on that. I have to think that the decline of reading, in particular book reading, is a contributing factor. But there is also the problem that it is a rare individual who can have dialogue including disagreement and make it a search for the truth rather than a quarrel. Our culture does not train or educate people for such dialogue. Who was it who said 'the passion for the truth is the faintest of human emotions'. Not true, but there is so much interfering with the desire for understanding that it is usually buried by competing interests and motives.

I have a friend who is writing a book on 'Conversation' - in which English history plays a central role - which touches on these issues.

Very fine posting my friends.

Is it true that reading is declining in our time? Which is our comparison point? I have the opposite perception, I think that people tends to read more everyday, people now tend to get more education and to prepare more themselves. The publishing industry has never been a biggest bussines.

Hector, I was thinking of this article when I wrote that. It is mainly about gender differences, but documents the latest declines in book reading in the US. Is a similar thing happening elsewhere?

It may be that more text is being read because of the internet. But a lot of that, with some exceptions like Typophile, is not very intellectually demanding.

"We/one cannot not communicate", is by Paul Watzlawick. Even if Erik Spiekermann made use of this phrase.

In fact, one of the most stimulating books on communication, though the title doesn't suggest it, is "Die Krise der Psychologie" by Karl Buehler. (By the way, I prefer to think of Buehler's three "levels" as "aspects".)

What John Hudson calls communication -- to "communicate an idea" -- sounds like "transmit an idea". I have some reservations against using the word "communication" that way.
To speak of "communication" requires not only somebody uttering something by words or gesture or leaving physical marks here and there, i.e. "design", but also somebody interpreting these utterances *some or another way*. Some one saying something and another one not even paying attention may be communication too -- to the understanding of a third who considers what he sees as being meaningful.
What are "ideas"? You never "have" them but must conceive of, or guess at, them. The only thing one actually "has" are the marks, the material side of signs: sounds, gestures, ink on paper, which are to be interpreted. But these marks are just as unstable as are "ideas" themselves, especially when it comes to "visual/visible language". Unfortunately, communication by visual means is not a subject taught at schools, and so there are no lessons in ethics of use. What some one considers a mark, someone else doesn't necessarily too; and not in all circumstances all aspects of the mark are of importance. (This latter aspect can be found in Buehler's writings too, he calls it "abstraktive Relevanz".)

Whether a designer regards "design" as problem-solving or otherwise is his personal choice, based on his background and motivation for becoming a designer. To me, design as problem-solving is not the worst description -- I assume that most design jobs are in fact tidying up visually things that others are incapable to lay out properly. Just like philosophy is, or can be, tidying up thought ...

> Should a graphic designer be called a graphic designer?

Good idea!

Well said.

Karsten, I'm not happy with the phrase 'transmit an idea', because this suggests exactly the kind of one-way message broadcast that I have criticised at length in this thread, and which is the norm of most of our media, and the form and matter of virtually all graphic design.

To me, the ideal of communication is conversation, particularly the free exchange and co-development of ideas among knowledgable people who express themselves well in their common language. This is why I consider visual communication inherently stunted: even the most generous parallel -- e.g. metaphors of 'visual language' -- cannot recognise anything like the common language that makes conversation possible, either in kind or in scope.

I agree with Joe that your post was very well said, and this is precisely my point: the complexity of the thoughts that you communicate, the complexity of my reading of them, the complexity of incorporating them into the overall conversation of this thread so far: all these things are only possible because of the sophistication of language. Like virtually everything else in this thread, the thoughts conveyed by your 'well said' post are not something that could be communicated visually. Complex ideas are the domain of language.