WEEK TWO
- Angie Moyler
- Oct 27, 2022
- 4 min read
Updated: Nov 26, 2022
Application and Interactions GDE740 Ideas Craft and Context.
How UCAN. started.
How does any idea start?
With Tea and biscuits of course.
And in this case with the frustration at yet again distributing half a packet of biscuits in to the foot well of my car. Another vain effort to successfully open the packet.
And so the questioning began.
How come we can send rockets in to space and split atoms but cannot design an easy to use and sustainable package for the billions of biscuits we consume?
As a tea drinking biscuit dunking nation why haven't we been able to crack the biscuit packaging issue? That piece of red tape we are meant to grab and seamlessly open the packet ends up ripping it the wrong way invariably dumping the entire contents on the floor.
That lead to package design and the realisation that most of our biscuit packages are not yet fully recycle-able.
And so the connections and questioning continued.
SIDE NOTE;
Where do ideas come from?
Are they floating around in the ether waiting to be picked up by the special ones?
Do they lurk in our sub-conscience waiting for the planets and all things to align in order to make an appearance?
To be honest I think that is one of the great mysteries of life - of humanity. Our culture tends to put traditional art and design on an elite 'creative' pedestal which I believe to be a distracting appreciation of what creativity is. I happen to think that one of the things that makes us human is the ability to create, and to create just for the fun of it rather than for necessity. Therefore if that is the basis of thinking, then all are creative. Where creativity comes from is a thought process on an intangible aspect of our lives from which countless books have been written and phd's using long words and abstract theories have been poured over.
Our definition of creative is what has elevated some above others, created a creativity hierarchy and therefore grown a confidence crisis in the ability to generate or even to run with original ideas.
Ok - thats a bit of an opener! Worthy of another whole PhD in itself it think ... No. Don't even think about it. That will just completely destroy the joy of thinking up ideas. This MA is rinsing me enough.
I think original ideas are simply about seeing connections. About the ability to mind map an initial thought. About the 'this is because of that' and the 'what if ...?' Yes there are some who possess an innate sometimes genius ability to make connections without any effort. Usually the ones who kept asking why? when they were kids. The ones who were constantly taking things apart or being told off for day dreaming or who didn't 'mix' well but excelled in other areas.
There are some who think that creative thinking can be taught. I happen to be one of them. We all have the ability to change the way we think. Isn't there a therapy for that - CBT - Cognitive Behavioural Therapy?
If this theory is true in some areas of life then surely it's true in all areas of life.
Back to Rich Tea Biscuits.
That is where the idea for my self initiated project UCAN. started.
During this module I will show the connections and thinking which lead to UCAN., how I have developed it so far, the creative process of the idea development including research already undertaken and how I intend to develop UCAN. further.
The mood boards or visuals in this blog document my creative process and my way of thinking as I continue to develop biscuit packaging to UCAN. an evolving, inclusive, on-line community allotment project.
My starting point was an everyday, mundane problem which connected to universal issues. Or - tracking connections between the particular and the universal.
The subjects researched grew according to my thinking. The initial subjects for idea development, demonstrated in part in the following mood boards were;
The 'particular' problem
Food packaging design, cost and production.
Food packaging waste.
The impact of food packaging waste on the environment.
Sustainable alternatives.
I was then struck by the fact that thousands of people in our communities cannot afford to buy food in sustainable packaging. They do not have the luxury or empowerment of being able to respond to the environmental crisis in that way.
If you rely on food banks to feed you children you do not have the luxury to choose sustainable food packaging. Caring for the environment is way down the list - despite your understanding and appreciation of this life changing issue.
You just need to eat.
This proved to be a pivotal change of direction.
My research then took me to;
Food poverty and relational poverty in the UK.
Mental health awareness.
The scientific proof that gardening benefits mental health
The impact of community on well-being and mental
health improvement in general.
The ability of readily available technology to build real
community.
How to build a brand.
The importance of naming a brand.
The result is a project which in a small way addresses all of these universal issues.
Therefore - the particular and the universal.
The mood boards shown here seek to demonstrate my particular initial train of thought and creative process in landing on the idea of UCAN. How I got from the particular to the universal.
Creative thinking is never linear as these mood boards demonstrate. The process can be at times intensely annoying, chaotic, difficult to decipher, full of tangents (but then I would argue that there are no tangents as everything belongs) brick walls and breakthroughs.
To demonstrate the creative process of an original idea in any sort of conventional written order seems counter intuitive to conveying how it works. This is why I decided to use
type as image to communicate a level of appreciation of what working with a box of frogs, creative thought tangents and spirals actually looks like.
The resulting selection of mood boards shown here are taken from a larger creative process document of the initial creative process resulting in the UCAN. initiative.
These mood boards are best appreciated in physical form or on a tablet as their layout is an expression of the creative process. Never linear. Impossible at times. Sends you round in circles and off on tangents. Infuriating with tendencies to throw the whole thing out the window.
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