SPOD #10 Entwerfen mit System

Systematic design methods played an important role in design discourses and practices around 1960. In movements such as the Design Methods Movement or the Creativity Movement, scientific and rational working methods were applied to the process of designing. Products, ideas and inventions were to be created systematically. At the same time, a shift towards systematic design methods can also be seen in the field of art.
Claudia Mareis and Michael Rottmann discuss this historical phenomenon in their publication. They ask to what extent the post-war discourse on creativity and methods in the United States equated creativity with (supposed) productivity and wether the conditions of systematic design methods have been criticized in the fields of design and art.

The open-ended publication series Studienhefte Problemorientiertes Design SPOD makes historical and contemporary reflections on the social and political dimension of Design accessible. It is a collection of irregularly appearing texts that critically examine the practical, cultural, methodological and everyday functions of Design. The problem-oriented approach aims to link design to the contradictions, potentials and circumstances of reality. Based on a critical examination of the possibilities and limitations of Design, alternative models of Design are outlined that contradict the established market-based design practice.