Towards Designing Socially Inclusive Public Art Initiatives

One the most valuable lesson I have learned in design management program is to think in terms of interdisciplinary collaboration and integration and, creating the link between the different or dissimilar elements. And most importantly, making that connection visible, at least mentally. When I started thinking about an idea for my thesis project, I was actually trying to make the connection between my non-design background in social and human capital development and my current situation as a grad student in design school.  The following shed light on some of my initial thoughts of my research related to the social impact of art and culture on society.

Outcomes of Art

There is a repeated claim in the literature that participating in art and cultural works can contribute to a range of positive outcomes. This diagram represents the potential impacts of the art on three levels:

1. On community level, arts are said to build social cohesion and foster civic engagement by boosting individuals’ ability and motivation to be civically engaged in the community.
2. Economic impacts are perhaps the most tangible benefits of the arts.  The potential economic outcomes of arts in society are that arts attract visitors and also investments. By improving a community’s image, people may feel more confident about investing in that community.
3. On individual level, arts have potential to improve health, mental, and psychological well-being, cognitive functioning, and creative ability.

The Relationships

In my research, I’m looking at the relationship between public art and social inclusion. And as a researcher, I believe that public art is more than just an art placed outside in public. Public art signifies a particular innovation practice, emphasizing on community involvement, social networking and creative collaboration.  It is an art which has its goal desire to engage with its audiences and to create spaces that reflects identity of the community and its people.

The potential role of public art lie on the fact that “taking part” in the arts can be done actively, as artist, or passively as audience. And secondly, because public art often work with themes that contain meanings and symbols, participation in the arts has more appeal than some traditional forms of personal and community development. It is likely to be enjoyable as well as valuable.

Research Goals

The intention of my proposal beyond just exploring the relationship between public art and the notion of social inclusion, is to understand how strategic design management can help create strategic and long-term vision and planning that enable public art programs to interact with the local community, address its needs, and most importantly understand the end user.

Design Management Approach

The following diagram I’m trying to show the overlapping relationships in design management approach: strategic, tactical, and operational.

1.Designing at the strategic level, the vision and agendas are defined – and it is to these agendas that design must connect.

2.Designing at the tactical level, the processes and functions come into play.

3.And finally, at the operational level, design manifests itself in a tangible artifact product. (in this case this artifact is a model for community art and cultural plan).

Bearing in mind the three levels of design management approach, this research investigation will involve: designing strategic vision, ensuring the design process and procedures of design are adding value to current practices in art and cultural organizations. And finally deliver content of the design solution.

Significance: The outcome of the project will be a model for building the capacity to design a “socially inclusive” public art from vision, to process to concept. And where design management is applied there is often a strong belief in the potential to gain competitive advantage by design. As a result, design thinking as a mental concept will becomes integrated in the corporate cultural of public art.

Research Questions

Based on the overall goal of the project, the proposal explores the following research questions:

1. What is the interplay between designing for public art and social inclusion?
2. How people use the arts and other forms of creative effort to express their attachment to places?
3. What are the new approaches, tools and competencies needed for designing socially inclusive public art initiatives?
4. What are the design implications and opportunities for using public art as strategic tool to address social issues?

Research Strategy

It is proposed that the research investigation will take four directions:

•Looking backwards – to have a historical perspective in arts and cultural participation.

•Looking ahead – to create future scenarios and explore the possible design opportunities.

•Looking sideways – to understand what else is happing based on other best practices, and to identify the forces that affect the research themes.

•Looking at people – to better know the end user, and to capture attitudes, needs, and desires.