Event Takeaways

Design extends beyond commerce. Graphic design is a powerful cultural force, not just a tool for selling products or services.

Embrace the role of cultural critic. Creative professionals can elevate their work by adopting a critical lens similar to that of journalists or art critics. 

Prioritize deep reading. Serious writing and informed design require in-depth engagement with both classic and new texts.

Resist complete digital dependence. The convenience of digital tools and AI can be tempting, but don't let them replace critical thinking and the creative process.

Your choices have power. Every design project is an opportunity to exercise "soft power." Use it wisely to create work aligned with your values.

The two design veterans— one a long-term firm founder, the other a renowned critic— delved into the themes of Poynor's newest book, "Why Graphic Culture Matters."

Their exchange stood in stark contrast to the sales-driven discussion typical of so many firm-led webinars— the kind one stumbles into via a misleading LinkedIn post or highly targeted Instagram ad.

They challenged design’s pervasive commercial focus, highlighted the importance of criticism in the field, and grappled with the looming presence of automation— all within a crisp hour-long session. Let’s recap some of the event’s key concepts and takeaways. 

Understanding “Graphic Culture”

After acknowledging Poynor's impressive credentials as a design critic, professor, and prolific author, Chalmers launched straight into a central question: "What exactly is graphic culture, and why does it matter?" 

Poynor began by positioning "graphic culture" within the broader academic field of "visual culture."  The latter, he clarified, encompasses the vast range of human-made visuals, aside from fine art. Think photography, advertisements, infographics – the whole visual world we've constructed. 

However, as Poynor points out, graphic design was “oddly” overlooked in this broader field. Inspired by this gap, he champions the term "graphic culture" as a way to bring serious cultural inquiry to the subject. In his book, he defines graphic culture as “the part of contemporary visual culture formed by graphic communication and expression.”

“In its total effect, it forms a multifaceted, multimedia interface, a complex sensory environment through which we experience, mediate and navigate contemporary reality. We cannot escape from this realm; we depend on it.” 

Breaking From a Purely Commercial View of Graphic Design

As Poynor sees it, graphic design has suffered from an overemphasis on commercialization and has become subservient to concepts like branding. As a result, the field has lost touch with its roots and, to an extent, stunted its growth as an art form.  

Reflecting on his early days as a design writer, he recallsthe of graphic design publications in the '80s and remembers feeling frustrated by their transformation into business-like magazines focused primarily on "winning clients."

This narrow view— still pervasive in today’s design-focused media— left him questioning why graphic design wasn't discussed with the same seriousness as other cultural artifacts.  With this conviction, Poynor challenged himself to break from the commercial view, and instead use his writing to promote graphic design as a vibrant and integral part of our shared culture.

The Vital Role of Criticism

Midway through their discussion, Chalmers turned to the topic of design criticism. "You emphasize its general importance," he said to Rick, "but why is criticism so essential for our field?"

Criticism is essential for “thinking deeply” and pushing the field forward, explained Poynor. In his opinion, too much focus lies on the economic value of design, which is why he advocates for a more analytical and culturally aware approach – the kind found in art history and literary criticism. This deeper analysis, he has always argued, will elevate design as a discipline and help to enrich its contribution to culture. 

Interestingly, Poynor also shared how his early days as a design writer were inspired by the intellectual depth of film and music criticism. This made him aware of the need for design writing to hold itself to a similarly high critical standard. Design writers must ask themselves: “Does our writing measure up to those other subjects?” he argued. 

Why Deep Reading Matters

Poynor believes “deep reading”— actively interpreting, questioning, and connecting with a text— is the cornerstone of all good writing. "If we take reading away," he cautioned, "I don't really know how one learns to understand and critique the world." 

As a communicator by trade, Poynor explained that the process of careful  writing is where his ideas truly crystallize; and everything he writes is, in one way or another, informed by the texts he reads. 

However, Poynor and Chalmers acknowledged that the practice of ‘deep reading’ requires even greater intention and discipline in today’s digitally distracted world. “There’s only so much time in the day… if you’re determined to give hours to social media, then that’s time you won’t spend reading. You have to make your choices,” argued Rick. 

Resisting the Lure of Digital Control

Chalmers turned the discussion to the technological transformation of design, prompting Poynor to elaborate on his concepts of "digital control" and the "designer as operator."

To answer, Poynor first reflected on a time when design held a more tactile, imperfect quality. "Now, everything snaps to a grid," he remarked, highlighting how digital precision eliminates the physicality of the creative process and can limit experimentation. 

He also touched on something painfully relatable: the mounting pressure on today’s designers (and most knowledge workers, really) to constantly adapt. "There's a feeling that there's no alternative, that you must submit to this enormous juggernaut of technological change," he explained. 

Naturally, the conversation shifted to the rising influence of automation and AI, despite Ian and Rick’s efforts to avoid the highly buzzed-about topic. Chalmers worried that these emergent tools tempt us to outsource not just the act of design, but also the critical thinking essential to the discipline.

Poynor responded by sharing a humorous and telling experience: when promoting this very Design Meets event on LinkedIn, AI offered to write the post for him.  "Here we are," he remarked, "supposedly competent professionals seeking employment, and a tool offers to take over the writing for us."

Exercising Design’s ‘Soft Power’ 

As the conversation drew to a close, Chalmers brought in one final concept. He asked Poynor to expand on the idea of 'soft power' as it relates to design. 

‘Soft power,’ Poynor explained, is a term often used to describe how a nation or individual exerts influence through culture, rather than politics or economics. In the design world, this translates to how designers shape messages and influence perceptions through both their creations but also their choices— how to approach a project, what tools to use, and whom to work with. Because of this, he believes that designers should recognize their position as similar to that of journalists or filmmakers, who wield power by choosing the stories they tell and how they tell them.

So, Where Do We Go From Here?

Ultimately, Poynor and Chalmers’ conversation reminds us that design's true power lies not in pixel-perfect executions or chasing trends, but in shaping perceptions and challenging the world around us. Their conversation urges us— designers and other creative professionals— to resist the allure of shallow, commercial-first creation and instead embrace a practice rooted in critical thinking and experimentation.

So, where do we go from here? Perhaps, as a starting point, designers must ask themselves: What kind of "graphic culture" do we really want to create, uphold, and pass on?

Q&A with Rick

How do you see your work being utilized/valued for graphic design in regions/cultures which are not Latin-centric? How does one utilize your methodologies in a cross-cultural domain? -Suman B.

RP: This is tricky because you are asking me to tell prospective readers and actual readers what they should do with my work. I understand why you are asking about cross-cultural uses – though that needs a bit more definition – but I make no assumptions about uses of my writing for any language and culture, including the culture (Britain and Europe) that I’m resident within. However, I can say what I’m trying to do and then others can decide whether that might be interesting, relevant or useful to them. Why Graphic Culture Matters is a book of reflections and ideas, and that’s one side of my writing. The other side is to look closely at designers’ and image-makers’ work (for instance, I’ve done this in my Eye magazine column, Critique, for 25 years). In fact, the two sides of my writing are closely connected. Ideally, there would be a second volume of essays presented in a similar style to WGCM to make this link totally apparent. 

My aim in all of this writing is to look as closely as possible— selectively, of course— at what I notice as I move through the world, and to investigate and understand my reactions through the writing. I have always wanted to provide and discuss examples because there has been too much generalization in design writing and not enough close analysis of particular cases. I don’t think that graphic culture, even now, receives enough attention of this kind. So that’s a prompt, or even a directive, that any reader from any culture could take from the book and apply in any cultural setting where there is graphic communication. I should also add that the writing itself is a primary aim for me and any “discoveries” are made solid and persuasive, perhaps, through this process and medium. That again is a way of working that could be applied by anyone in any culture, but it is always dependent on having a platform of some kind. 

Does the demise of, or the decline of, a graphic culture have roots in concurrent social challenges— cancel culture, decolonization, emphasis on foregrounding identity, etc.? -Steven M.

RP: I don’t believe that graphic culture has declined, if by that we mean reduced rather than gotten worse. The complex contemporary world is as ‘graphic’ as a total environment as it ever was, so there is still plenty of graphic culture to talk about. That doesn’t mean the position and status of the designer hasn’t changed or declined, of course. I can’t see why decolonization and the focus on issues of identity should cause graphic culture to decline. In terms of design’s publishing culture, these developments have provided urgent issues to think and write about and people are doing that. 

But these positive critical trends are happening against a background of decline in publishing culture generally, and design publishing culture specifically. The Internet caused great disruption and then, for a few years, blogs provided significant new – although under-funded – platforms. It would take a major study to demonstrate that the arrival of social media precipitated the decline of the design blogs, but the coincidence is there. People stopped commenting and started tweeting and the popular discourse of graphic design never recovered. Unfortunately, without deep-seated habits of reading and writing, as well as many new publishing platforms, we are unlikely to get it back again.

Have you read the book What Design Can't Do? by Silvio Lorusso? Do you have any comments if you have any? l'Il be reading your book next! -Dean T.

RP: Thanks! I recently bought a copy of What Design Can’t Do. I’ve had time to read some but not all of it yet. The title attracted me— it’s a riposte to the What Design Can Do conferences regularly mounted in Amsterdam and other cities. I’ve spoken to them a couple of times and, as the title suggests, they are relentlessly optimistic and positive (or at least claim to be). A book about disillusion certainly captures the mood of the times, especially if you are one of the young designers the book appears to be aimed at. 

While design itself might seem to have failed or fallen short since 2000 after the grandiose claims and inflated self-belief of the 1980s and 1990s, we should remember that young people everywhere, in all sectors, face generational inequality, precarity and the housing crisis. All young people, indeed all people, not just graphic designers, have reasons for concern about the future: the climate crisis, the resurgence of the far right, the decline of democracy, increased global instability, and now the fear that AI will change everything and probably not for the better. Is being a graphic designer still a good career choice? I can’t say but people in many other fields must be asking the same kind of question. So, yes: disillusion, excellent timing! And Set Margins, the book’s imaginative publisher, is one to watch closely.

How do you see 'designer's authorship' when using AI as a tool to say generate sections of an image, and do you see designers becoming complacent or questioning works that they see? -Pedro M.

RP: How about this for taking a positive step? Why not make a rule for oneself saying, ‘No, I won’t use AI for my graphic design work.’ Because, really, why would you? Are you not already a competent designer? Do you think that AI tools might be able to do the job, or some aspect of the job, better than you? Are you fearful that AI will do it quicker so you could lose clients to less scrupulous fellow designers prepared to make a pact with the agent of their own eventual demise. Now is the moment to think very hard about what a human designer— or creative human of any kind— can supply and then concentrate on doing and being that. I, for one, will use your services if I need them and buy or support your product. I want your human authorship (big subject that one, of course). To that end, we need a new system of official labels guaranteeing that cultural products are AI-free and issue only from human brains. This really is a ‘turkeys voting for Christmas’ moment if we are not very careful. Sorry turkeys!

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About Design Meets

Proudly sponsored by Pivot Design Group, founded by Ian Chalmers, DesignMeets is a series of social events where the design community can connect, collaborate, and share ideas. Join us at a DesignMeets event to network, learn, and be inspired.
 

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