Meaningful Shapes
An introducing to the project by Scott Robinson
All experience is transformative. But, how does the transformation occur, or when? During the experience or through the reflection, remembering and evaluation after the experience? Does the act of defining an experience restrict it? Can we shape a mode of engagement that opens up further possibilities and meanings?
By using four simple and familiar forms, a square, a circle, a triangle and parallel wavy lines, Meaningful Shapes informs our reflections by making evaluation itself a transformative experience.
Forms are neither discoveries nor inventions, neither Platonic Ideas nor fictions, but containers cobbled together for phenomena.
(Flusser, Vilém. The Shape of Things, p26)
In The Shape of Things Vilém Flusser argues that form is the opposite of material. It is the ‘How’ of material, as material is the ‘What’ of form. (Ibid, p26) Information is the imposition of form on a material and design is one way of informing, giving form to, matter. True information, as opposed to fiction, is when these forms become discoveries. (Ibid, p28)
Meaningful Shapes takes everyday experiences as its material. By using four simple and familiar shapes, a square, a circle, a triangle and parallel wavy lines, it asks: can these forms inform us towards new discoveries and knowledge? Can shapes give new meaning, new information and new form to our material experiences? Can this information make everyday matter? Drawing on the work of Paul J. Thibault, George Lakoff, Mark Johnson and Michel Serres, Meaningful Shapes uses simple forms to guide four meditations and self-reflections to re-inform our interpretations and discover further transformations within our experiences. These meditations loosely correspond to four titles and four questions.
Containers: How does vocabulary contain and constrain experience?
Texture: How can mapping explore new paths within the landscape of a journey and move away from a linear view of goal attainment and personal achievement?
Trajectory: Can an understanding of what has come into one’s experience allow one to consider what continues to lie outside of it?
Emergence: How does this re-information inform future experiences?
This project brings together an investigation into the expression of complex ideas through simple imagery and the extent to which imagery can be transformative. Aimed primarily at creative professionals, it is an encapsulation of my own self-reflective journey as a repeatable process to enable others to discover new meaning in their experiences. Each shape corresponds to a set of exercises which, taken together, propose a framework for better understanding one’s process, work, or place.
You can read any of the shape meditations by clicking on the links above.
Scott
