OM2 Lissa Barnum

Biography

Lissa Barnum was born and raised in Mexico City. She studied Communications and Arts Admin at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). In 1982. Lissa moved to Sydney with her partner Andrew after signing a recording contract to Festival Records while simultaneously running newly formed design partnership, A & L Barnum.

A&L grew into The Barnum Group, creating corporate identity and communications for finance companies like Macquarie Bank, Ord Minnett, Sydney Futures Exchange, and HSBC.

Lissa is presently a lecturer in Visual Communication at the University of Technology, Sydney as well as manager of the UTS Design Studio. Her area of specialisation is in professional practice and is currently completing research study in design with a focus on visual methodologies.

The art in design making.

An essay by L.B.

{27th of June 2005}

Legitimising visual language for and on behalf of visual communication design.

There is a narrow view within the broader discipline(s) of design and an even narrower view within our own fraternity of communication design, perpetuating the notion that design is ‘artless’. Yet, there is also a misconception, which is greater still, that design is some easily achievable adornment that can be swiftly disposed of.

These arguments stem primarily from our definition of ‘art’ and from within our own description of the act of designing. What should otherwise be considered the production of purposeful outcomes, may not always prove to be so. While design is normally the result of creating something to fulfil someone else’s needs, art also meets the same requirement in communicating and fulfilling the artist’s needs.

The distinction between art and design is difficult to make if one is attempting to define visual language solely in relation to the intention to communicate. So, should there exist a set of rules on how a message is communicated? We could ask, is communication housed in the methods of practice or in the aesthetic itself? What is it that makes the process of ‘making’ so divisive? Surely art and design both serve a purpose in their intention to communicate information as intended by the

artist/maker/designer? We tend to cherish aspects in art, its creativity, its texture; its intuitive means of expression. Yet we tend to be dismissive of ‘other’ visually created outcomes.

When Ellen Lupton [influential designer and critical writer] suggests that visual communication design open its floodgates to anyone ‘comfortable with technology and eager to use design in their own daily lives,’ there should be cause for concern. How would this affect the ‘art in making’ in professional design practice?