"The artist gives tools for people to view reality more acutely." –Marc-Olivier Wahler

Could you name 3 interesting and meaningful areas or concepts in which art and science meet?

Marc-Olivier Wahler:

1. Science fiction

Remember when Blade Runner had to decide whether he was a replicant or a human being? I think it’s exactly like art. Visually, there was no difference between a replicant and a human being so his decision was totally subjective. From the moment he decided that he’s not a human being anymore, he completely changed his state of mind. And when you decide that for instance a table is a piece of art there’s no going back either.

2. Quantum physics

Quantum physics is concerned with multiple realities – or according to another interpretation there is only one reality but an infinity of universes. If parallel universes existed, it would mean that in those everything would be visually identical while aspects such as gravity and density might vary. I like to picture a replicant of our universe, society, environment and art where gravity is slightly different.

3. Electromagnetics

One of the main topics of my curatorial practice this year. I think that the visitors of Palais de Tokyo mostly focus on the artworks, but for me what happens in between is totally part of the exhibition, too. What I’m talking about is the empty space or the negative space around the objects on display. In physics, this space can be called the electromagnetic field. I mean, an artwork is not only about its material form but also about the aura and the radiation it can emit.

Fiona Raby and Anthony Dunne at their London home office.

Working somewhere in between art and science, you aim to generate discussion about the relationship between technology and people. How would you define the role and purpose of design? And how do you define critical design?

AD: The question of art and design is problematic. A lot of people want to see us as artists, but we definitely see ourselves as designers trying to push the discipline forward, asking questions about design and through it. In fact, we launched the term critical design ten years ago in order to describe our work. Sometimes people think it simply means criticism; that we are negative about everything, anti-consumerist and against design. Some people relate it to critical theory; to Frankfurt school and anti-capitalist thinking. We are definitely aware of it, but then again not in that category either. Critical design is about critical thinking – about not taking things at face value. It’s about questioning things, and trying to understand what’s behind them. In essence, our objective is to use design as a means for applying skepticism to society at large.

a/b – "a sort of a manifesto that positions what we do in relation to how most people understand design" by Dunne and Raby. Typography by OK Do.

You have compared design to art, using film and literature as examples of genres that are critical yet create pleasure. What do you think design and art can learn from each other?

AD: I think that art shouldn’t need to exist. In an ideal, utopian world, everyday life would be so rich, meaningful and challenging that we wouldn’t need this separate category called art. I kind of feel that art exists because design has failed. Learning from artists, designers should become bolder, more imaginative and critical. I’m not sure if art needs to learn from design, though.

“I kind of feel that art exists because design has failed.”

Having talked about “the aesthetics of use” in your work, how would you compare this to the traditional notion of aesthetics? And how do you think the role of aesthetics changes from art to design?

AD: Rather than considering aesthetics only from a visual point of view, we are interested in the aesthetics – the poetry – of experience when interacting with products. A good example of this is the Truth Phone which can generate an adventure through a voice stress analyser revealing if the person you’re talking with is lying. I think that the best experiences bust out from their medium. This applies to art and literature, and it should apply to design, too.

In your books, you also mention placebo projects and the engineering of poetic products. Could you open up these concepts a little bit?

AD: The placebo effect is based on the idea that, instead of changing reality, the perception of reality is changed. This also relates to the idea of designing “poetic” products that modify our perception of and relationship with life. Our aim is to activate the imagination and to juxtapose poetic design and ways of thinking with the more traditional problem solving approach. We are interested in questions like why does art have to be separated from everyday life, or why can’t objects generate philosophical experiences on a daily basis?

We think that your work shows interest towards the invisible but also the unexplained. Do you agree? What do you feel is the importance of exploring the unreal in addition to the real?

AD: Yes. As a student I became interested in the aesthetic possibilities of electronic objects. In the early 90s, designers were still thinking of them as typical objects that just needed to have a nice shape and a convenient choice of materials. Through research, we discovered that electronic objects are special in that they transmit and are surrounded by electromagnetic fields which are invisible yet concrete. We thought: why not design products that draw attention to these fields in a poetic way – in a way that inspires people? In general, our work is considered unreal by many. But how do you define reality? Do real products need to be mass-produced and sold in a shop? The relationship between “real-real” and “unreal-real” is something that we are very interested in at the moment. Who decides what’s real and what’s not? And why are conceptual products less real than non-conceptual products? One can argue that even hallucinations are real in one person’s mind.

“In general, our work is considered unreal by many. But how do you define reality?”

Something that we are exploring in the OK Do Science Poems project, is the role of designers in scientific processes. You have said that designers shouldn’t have to wait until scientific ideas become technology as they could engage with science in a more speculative way. Can the field of science learn from the field of design? And vice versa?

AD: Developments within science, particularly life sciences, have potential to carry such dramatic impact on our lives that not only designers but all kinds of professionals need to explore their effects. As designers, we should try to influence how science becomes technology, making it more human for example. It would also be important to have debates with the public, and even the government, about different technological features before they are actualised. We see this as a shift away from designing applications – what designers are trained to do – to designing implications.

“As designers, we should try to influence how science becomes technology.”

How did you end up working with electronics?

AD: While doing a degree in industrial design in the early 80s, I became fascinated by the challenges and possibilities that electronics were creating. However, during my BA studies, I wasn’t allowed to do an electronics project, because the evaluators were only able to assess forms designed around mechanics. It was during those days that the form and the function were becoming disconnected. One of the reasons I went to RCA was that instead of designing surfaces, I could explore products from a more complex point of view, reflecting psychological, emotional, poetic and imaginative ideas.

Nowadays it seems like everybody is having a multidisciplinary approach to design projects. Do you often collaborate with experts from different fields when you work in areas such as the electromagnetic sphere?

AD & FR: We have dialogues but we don’t really collaborate. And when we implement a concept, we consider which skills we need to outsource – these can vary from programming and carpentering to film-making and psychological expertise. Our work is mostly self-initiated, and even when we work with companies, the projects are always designer-led. However, we are very open to exchange ideas with different people.

We couldn’t agree more on your statement that design should not just ask how sleek or usable some object is, but what it actually inclines us to do. Would you say that you aim to design behaviour?

AD: I think a lot of designers think that design is neutral but the fact is that all design is constructed and ideological and there is nothing natural or neutral about it. We purposefully create unnatural, awkward, exaggerated and not-that-friendly objects in order to point out that design is artificial and it always involves decisions. Therefore, I’d say that instead of designing objects that stimulate behaviour, we design objects that stimulate questions.

AD & FR: Our objects don’t make sense and fit into the system, but instead they create another parallel world of alternative reality that makes you question the existing system and its values. We design objects that nobody wants for now. However, it’s not that we are anti-industrial. Quite the opposite, we wish to ask why people seek philosophical pleasure from art and not from manufactured design products. Is it because the industry is too narrow, because people are too boring, or because the designers don’t want to create such products?

“All design is constructed and ideological and there is nothing natural or neutral about it.”

What are you working on at the moment?

AD: One of our ongoing projects looks at the future of food. The idea is that, as the planet becomes over-populated and food becomes an issue, rather than relying on governments and big industries to solve it, small groups of people – “foragers” – would get together. These teams would include hackers, guerilla gardeners, amateur horticulturalists and synthetic biologists, and they would develop devices to externalise their digestive system in order to be able to digest leaves, grass and other things that are undigestible at the moment. Alternatively, leaves and grass could be modified so that they would suit our systems.

We like your work because it stimulates discussion on the social, cultural and ethical implications of existing and emerging technologies. Have you examined how designers and the industry have reacted to it?

AD: We have received quite aggressive reactions from designers, especially of older generations. Many of them think that design without industry is art, unreal or fantasy, and they get upset about assigning new roles to design – probably out of feeling threatened. On the other hand, we feel that the industry is, in some way, quite positive about our approach to decouple design from the industrial agenda and link it to other contexts, like the poetical one. At RCA, we do many industry projects and have figured that companies are really interested in learning to think differently about what they do and about applying fresh thinking that translates into tangible objects.

The Statistical Clock (left) checks the BBC website for technologically mediated fatalities and speaks them out loud. S.O.C.D (Sexual Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) is for people who enjoy porn but feel a bit guilty watching it, or think that it's wrong. Photo by the courtesy of Francis Ware.

In Design Noir (2001), you wrote that “beneath the glossy surface of official design lurks a dark and strange world driven by real human needs”. Do you feel that contemporary products do not match people’s needs – and has this improved since you wrote Design Noir? Do you think that people are reacting to that themselves and how should they be involved in design processes?

AD: I think the internet has expanded the range of possibilities for pleasure and for fulfilling one’s personal desires and fantasies, no matter how strange you are. But this still doesn’t apply to products, which remain essentially functional. However, the background or the infrastructure of products has definitely transformed. Before, if you were obsessed about something unusual – like I was about strange radio cultures – it was hard to find any information about it.

AD & FR: Involving people in design processes relates to the do-it-yourself culture which we are not so interested in. Everyone can start making and modifying things themselves, but we believe it’s important to have experts who can do special and beautiful things that are beyond the abilities of non-professionals.

AD: I get annoyed when people think that the DIY culture has made professionals useless. However, there are a lot of independent – yet professional – designers out there who offer radical products they create on their own.

FR: They are like activists; bottom-up designers. We like the story of activism, that there is room for free inventors. A good example is designer Panamarenko, who creates alternative flying machines that are conceptual yet functional, in theory.

We think that the line between a DIY designer and an independent professional can sometimes be quite difficult to draw. How do you define a design professional?

Someone who is committed to the highest possible standards (technical, aesthetic, ethical) and the huge effort it takes to achieve them. Professional design is also about being aware of a bigger historical story than yourself and analysing how your practice contributes to it and extends it. It’s about getting paid for what you do, rather than doing it as a hobby.

What is the motivation or reason for the corporate futurologists to “keep us in place” instead of exploring new territories and approaches that, according to your ideas, might make people more engaged through “complicated pleasure”?

AD & FR: The reason is that their job is to enforce the capitalist system and make sure that the sales remain high. Creating something unusual would be risky and expensive. In some areas, like furniture, this kind of experimentation might take place – Vitra’s Slow Chair designed by Bouroullec brothers is a good example – but not in electronics. Apple is active in some sense, but quite stuck to its aesthetics as well. Too many companies are driven by geeky men. If women had more power in the field, electronic objects would be more compelling.

“Too many companies are driven by geeky men. If women did more in the field, electronic objects would be more compelling.”

Why do you think electronic objects and systems are such an effective vehicle for expressing our desires and needs, and making existentialist choices?

AD: Our everyday life is mediated by social interaction much entangled with technology – for better or worse. The electronic objects and systems have integrated themselves so intimately into our lives that they have become a very powerful media. We do interact with chairs and tables as well, but the social impact of electronics is stronger: they work their way into our systems, conversations and relationships. They have become very entangled with our deepest selves.

FR: At the same time, electronics are overtaking human qualities and the potential of technology is often exploited for efficiency and profit.

AD: For example, it’s quite rude that you can be sent email at any time of the day.

Technology is often seen as either the opposite of human or as an extension of human. Many people feel embarrassed about using a certain technology, like online dating services, or about using technology too much. What do you think is the relationship between technology and identity?

AD & FR: We don’t think that the young generations view technology as something external anymore. For them, technology is an invisible media for living. And this internalisation actually becomes a platform for new type of activity that might, for example, be uninformed about life before the internet. Today’s generations make new assumptions such as that everybody has the right to photograph or videotape anybody else – and if you don’t approve that, you are a freak.

MOW at his Palais de Tokyo office.

The Gakona exhibition is named after a small village in the center of Alaska, home to the American High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program (H.A.A.R.P.), and the title of Spy Numbers draws on the mysterious series of numbers (secret messages) read out on radio waves. What about Chasing Napoleon, what inspired its name?

Chasing Napoleon got its name from the suspense of chasing someone who has disappeared, like Napoleon did. The name also relates to The Battle of Berezina, the end of Napoleon’s great army, which has given another name for disaster in French. Chasing Napoleon is about the berezina of our everyday life logic. It’s an exploration on disappearing.

After Gakona and Spy Numbers, the electromagnetic spectrum and the infra-thin, Chasing Napoleon explores the margins of the visible. All the exhibitions seem to be connected to each other through an interest towards the unexplained and the invisible. Do you agree, and is this where you left off as well?

Last year, we had a programme about the excess and logic of the visible. We were showing super spectacular artwork. So this year, we wanted to explore the absence of the visible instead. With Gakona, Spy Numbers and Chasing Napoleon, we went outside the spectrum of visibility – into the electromagnetic spectrum.

Would you say that the exhibitions also draw inspiration from the possibility of mapping out new routes to the real through combining scientific research with creative experiments?

Yes. For me, this is a very essential question, and it has to do with analytical philosophy. I mean, can we speak about a museum with the language of a museum, or art with the language of art? I don’t think it’s possible anymore. We have to jump outside the sphere we are studying – in the same way as important discoveries in science were possible because scientists were using techniques, grammar or logic borrowed from other fields. For instance, with PALAIS /, the magazine of Palais de Tokyo, which works as a supplement to the exhibitions, we never work with art historians or art critics but rather with people from different fields: scientists, strategists, linguists, anthropologists, etc. All different fields of knowledge imply a certain way of looking at things, and by transferring those grids of interpretation into the art world we can cast new light upon the content.

What is the significance of questioning the dominant realities for you? And do you think that scientists and artists are best equipped to do that? In your opinion, what are the principal similarities and differences in their approaches to exploring reality?

Art, for me, is a tool. Artists give tools for people to view reality more acutely. It’s not their task to change it or come up with new inventions like scientists do.

“Artists give tools for people to view reality more acutely. It’s not their task to change it or come up with new inventions like scientists do.”

How did you become interested in people such as Nikola Tesla, an inventor in the field of electromagnetism or Theodore Kaczynski (aka Unabomber), the notorious mathematician known for his disbelief in modern civilization and technological development – the two lodestars of the exhibition series?

I have many friends who are very interested in the Unabomber and we’ve had many discussions about him. And Tesla… Well, I think he’s one of the greatest inventors of all times but he’s not really recognised. He lived in the margin – as did the Unabomber, too. I like people who try to disappear in order to reappear in a totally super spectacular way.

Palais de Tokyo, Paris.

We find that the exhibition series successfully explores the relationship between people and technology, which often involves ambiguity, mysteries and even fear, yet remains fascinating at the same time. Is your goal either to make technology and its mysteries more familiar to people or make people more curious by dealing with the mystical side of technological spheres and systems?

I’m not trying to explain technology or art or anything; it’s about tools. If you understand electromagnetism, you may also have a chance to understand art in a special way. And if you understand quantum physics, for example, you might possess a tool for understanding contemporary art very well. In science, there is no such thing as one true solution. A logic of selection doesn’t exist – instead of yes or no or black or white it’s all about yes and no and black and white. One can’t exclude a solution for it being paradoxical or antagonist. I think a good artwork is like that, too – the more “schizophrenic” reactions and the more dense discussion it arouses, the more efficient tool it is. It gives way to multiple interpretations while the core of it remains autonomous.

“Art is all about linking things.”

How did you find the right pieces of work and finally work with the artists?

I never do a theme show. Instead, I tell a story which enables many interpretations. I start with the space and three or four artworks in mind that form the skeleton of the exhibition. Then, I build up on that. It’s all about feeling and intuition, not about logic that much. It’s only after the exhibition is gone that I realise what I actually did.

Micol Assaël's Vorkuta, a walk-in refridgerator, reflects the living circumstances of a Siberian ghost town where nature reconquers man. Photo by the courtesy of Palais de Tokyo.

Paul Laffoley, an architect turned artist, explores an eclectic array of thought processes from established theories to paranormal sciences in his work. Photo by the courtesy of Palais de Tokyo.

Do you tend to consult specialists from different fields for background information when curating an exhibition? Can you tell us an example of this type of interdisciplinary collaboration in your work?

I’m always trying to listen to people. I mean, I can’t be everywhere so I need to listen to what is being said about new artists, trends and interests. When I go and have dinner, the best discussions I have are with people like collectors, scientist or artists who have an obsession of some kind. I like it when people are totally into something because it means they’ve developed a certain way of looking at things. And this is what art is about.

Olivier Mosset, a Swiss artist living in the US, once told me that if you can look at art as art then reality can stay as reality. This means, for example, looking at a red monochrome without thinking about blood or Red October or, respectively, looking at reality without filters like media or propaganda. By developing a way to see art as art, he taught me, you gain a tool to see reality as it is – not as the society wants you to see it.

Finally, how do you see the role of events in the context of exhibitions? Is it important to get people to participate?

The events are one way of getting close to new things, to new experiences, and at best they can help people approach art in different ways. However, I’m not a big fan of Relational Art [a concept by Wahler's predecessor Nicolas Bourriaud referring to a set of artistic practices which take the whole of human relations and their social context as a point of departure], I think art is what it is.