Objectified: Dissecting Design
What cinema vérité and toothbrushes have to do with the truly transformational.
Imagine picking the brains of the world’s most innovative, influential, brilliant designers. The ones who transcend the realm of greatness and rise to the level of genius.
Now imagine not having to imagine that.
From Helvetica director Gary Hustwit comes Objectified, a new design documentary that delves into the magic of what is loosely known as “industrial design” — a term perhaps poorly suited, in its crude connotation, to a field that gives us anything from inspired toothbrushes to revolutionary tech gadgets, all held together by the common thread of being something more than mere objects to those who use them.
Objectified picks apart notions like creativity, identity, consumerism and sustainability — terms tossed around rather frivolously these days, but truly grasped and appreciated by few — examining them through film vérité and revelatory conversations with some of the world’s most influential designers.
The film features legendary designers like Karim Rashid and Naoto Fukasawa, world-changing design studios like IDEO and Smart Design, and some of our own deeply, deeply revered design idols like MoMA curator of design Paola Antonelli.
We’re rather excited for Objectified — because besides being deeply inspirational by way of exposure to pure genius, the film also makes us commonfolk look within ourselves for that peculiar force that makes us relate to the world and to each other through objects, using beatifully designed artifacts as extensions of ourselves, as badges, as fundamental pieces of self-definition.
Objectified premieres worldwide in March. Grab the production’s RSS feed or jump on the email newsletter to stay in the loop.
Thanks, Alek.
- The Genius of Design: A BBC Design Retrospective New five-part documentary series exploring the broader history of design, from the Industrial Revolution through the Bauhaus of the 1920's, the swinging 60's, the fetishism of the 80's, to today....
- One Designer, Two Designer: Vintage Australian Animation From the archive of the Design Council of Australia, a wonderful animated short film from 1978 comically exploring the role of industrial design in society....
- Design-Off: Top 3 Live Design Competitions Cardboard monsters, digital marathons, and why design is just like tennis....
- Paola Antonelli on Design & Innovation An excellent talk by MoMA curator of architecture and design Paola Antonelli....
- Famous Designers on Design: Top 5 Book Covers What the hate of Helvetica has to do with Nine Inch Nails and a three-legged lemon juicer....
very good! looking forward to torrentload the movie on my harddrive
See, I’m all for P2P filesharing (as you can see), but I do draw the line at indie productions. Because I think studios and major labels are fundamentally broken and unfair business models, but independent work by artists of all types is well worth the modest financial support of “fans” — so I always pay for indie stuff, be it music or film.
[...] objectified turned out to be a very good thing. The story of stuff burst some serious bubbles in our [...]
[...] year’s cinematic design obsession was indisputably Objectified, director Gary Hustwit’s fantastic documentary about industrial design and all the ways in [...]
[...] have a soft spot for documentaries about design — from Gary Hustwit’s Objectified to the BBC’s The Genius of Design. And while industrial design may seem like a relatively [...]