D R A F T
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Design lives in the world, on the street, in the neighborhood. The designer can introduce neighbors who have never met and can create a new way of framing a community idea. Through her craft, a designer can offer community members a way to relate to shared ideas in new ways. My work as a designer is integrated with my work as a citizen.
Contemporary communication design practice has evolved out of the use of printing techniques for advertising of goods and services. Throughout this history, there has been an ideological push back from designers who wish to use those same techniques for the good of their communities, not business interests.
In the community, a designer can use her tools to question the way we relate to one another and can suggest new modes of doing so. Designers can initiate an exchange of ideas and other resources where there was not such an exchange before. We can use communication to question existing power structures or to suggest alternate ones. We can disarm traditional stereotypes and empower, rather than exploit, community members.
This thesis engages in invitation, disruption, gift-giving, and the creation of communication systems to create and strengthen ties between community members. These projects set up physical and virtual spaces within which citizens of different communities can exchange ideas and resources with one another in relation to common concerns, interests, and conversations.
With one foot in the studio and the other in the daily life of Providence, this thesis explores ways to serve a community using the tools of graphic design in partnership with community members. Design can be a kind of activism, but it is also a way of being active in a community. My interest is in exploring and defining the role of designer as local citizen.
