Caption: Rings and dots with more comfortable proportions
Back to the title: “If Aaron Nieh wasn’t Aaron Nieh, Aaron Nieh might not be Aaron Nieh.”
It started with a friend from the design industry on Facebook stating that Aaron Nieh designed a set of VI for Tsai Ing-wen, which was being mocked by the Blue camp. A netizen on PTT said they were “very angry” and claimed that “their design industry” gave this VI high praise, calling it a rare good design.
I want to ask this netizen: if this design wasn’t by a celebrity like Aaron Nieh, and it was entered into any totem design competition, would it have any chance of being selected? Or are you going to say that Taiwanese society doesn’t understand the beauty of this design… (laughs).
Then I’d love to hear exactly where the beauty lies, but please don’t passionately try to convert others to your faith, and don’t just use “innovation” as a catch-all explanation, otherwise you fall into what people recently call the “evil of art” in the cultural and creative industries.
Caption: That light from Apple
And Microsoft’s XBox…
Caption: Motorola~
However, a capsule is not a basic geometric structure; it’s a shape created through human processing. Such structures are rare even in nature—it’s a non-natural pseudo-geometry (most insect eggs are spindle-shaped; have you ever heard of a capsule shape? Okay, maybe they exist, and it’s just my lack of knowledge).
Caption: Multiple basic shapes
Next, in another set of designs, Chen Xunji stated: “The top right is actually a computer power symbol. The yellowish-green circle symbolizes starting up and lighting up. The overall design can be imagined as the social structure rotating like gears, or the dialogue between the people and the government connecting.”
But the symbol in the top right he points to is not a power symbol in my eyes! It looks more like a safe’s dial lock.
If you insist it’s a power button, the original imagery of the power symbol represents 1 (ON) and 0 (OFF). That point would make sense—serving the people with non-stop rotation. But regardless, I personally cannot agree that something missing half its function can be called a “switch.”
Caption: Cute shape design
I understand that design itself cannot be reviewed in a few simple sentences. Often it just satisfies the designer’s thought process at a certain moment; no amount of explanation can fully describe facts that didn’t exist in the first place. So back to the original point: I personally think the proportion of this ring is—very strange.
Sometimes an overly unique design isn’t because others didn’t think of it, but because it has flaws that others noticed.
Caption: Tsai Ing-wen’s ring with the head cut off
Finally, borrowing the name of a social media site Chairperson Tsai founded four years ago for the election, I’ll advise Ms. Tsai Ing-wen: think again. An image that deviates from values might be because of internal problems. For example, when this big design is scaled down onto objects, what’s left? Apple’s light above was clearly very successful in this regard. Please, Ms. Tsai, don’t fall into the value-added thinking trap of celebrities in the eyes of the youth.
Every time I hear a spokesperson from some “industry,” it reminds me of something from the past. Once, while debating a policy on Facebook with a friend, a friend of my friend suddenly interjected to disagree with my claim. Her first sentence was: “I’m from the fashion industry.”
I just don’t get you at all!