Design is Not Art

What is art?

Art is a unique act of personal expression created for public consumption. Art is typically quite subjective because it is a personal endeavor. Additionally, because it is based on the psychology of the recipient, its attractiveness is likewise quite individualized.

Because of this, art is profound and complex at the same time. Different genres of art can elicit different responses. People can react very differently emotionally to the same song, movie, or work of literature. A person's attention, engagement, and emotional response are the three goals of art.

Our senses are affected by art, which forces us to feel or view life in a new and richer way. It translates an artist's individual vision, and occasionally internal turbulence, and displays it for the world to see. And there are times when chaos can be lovely.

What is design?

Design is not art!

In contrast to art, design focuses on putting things, concepts, or ideas in a logical arrangement. To better manage the world, we must make sense of the chaos all around us. In this sense, design serves a clear purpose, which is to address issues that ordinary people face or lessen global instability.

• Visual communication issues are resolved via graphic design.

• Industrial design successfully combines physical materials to find solutions to common human concerns.

• Architecture organizes settings and physical areas to address issues with the human habitat.

• UX Design addresses human issues in the technological field by efficiently easing access to knowledge, goods, and services.

What do art and design have in common?

Because we are building for people rather than machines, we must take emotions into account. Here, psychology becomes important. Because we want to trigger some form of emotional response and appeal to the senses of people, here is when design blends with art. By its very nature, art is a very individualized activity, and by incorporating it into our work, we give personality to our design, making it more engaging, and distinctive.

You can plan out all the logical steps in your user flow, but if you don't include an emotional touch or a personal connection, you might as well say goodbye to your users.

Don Norman wrote an amazing book “Emotional Design”. He discusses the unseen, subconscious factors that contribute to a product's distinctive appeal in its pages. These are more individualized and based on an individual's perceptions; they are less quantitative than onboarding completion rates.

Humans' capacity to comprehend and learn about the world is fundamentally influenced by their emotions. Positive experiences spark our interest, and bad ones keep us from making the same mistakes twice (or not).

The visceral, behavioral, and reflective levels are the three levels on which humans develop emotional bonds with things, according to Don Norman. To evoke the right emotions and create a positive experience, a designer should take into account human cognitive ability at each level.

Depending on the situation, a positive experience may involve either positive or negative feelings.

“Emotions, we now know, change the way the human mind solves problems—the emotional system changes how the cognitive system operates. So, if aesthetics would change our emotional state, that would explain the mystery.”

― Donald A. Norman, Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things

Observe how the word human is fundamental to all design fields. We create for the benefit of others. Ever since the beginning of time, people have been designing. The first item created by industrial design was the wheel. Design is made possible by our ability to envision a better world or an alternative way of doing things. Every time we arrange anything in our minds, we are creating something new. And for this reason, design is utilitarian: it has a clear objective to make the human activity easier.

The art and the user experience design

UX design engages both hemispheres of the brain. To compute, measure, create, and prioritize processes and objectives in your designs, you need to be rational/logical, and analytical. To give your work the aesthetic touch that will attract users, you also need soft skills like creativity, empathy, emotional intelligence, and visual sensibility.

The UX industry is now fully cognizant of the importance of artistic appeal. Art without purpose is useless. Purpose without aesthetics becomes “coarse”, rough. For a design experience to be satisfying on all levels, it must possess both artistic appeal and practical skill. The expectations will only increase as the tech sector develops further and users become more affluent. And the only way to differentiate yourself is to take into account every aspect that makes an experience truly exceptional.

In conclusion, it's important to both solve issues and makes things appealing.

User-centric design uses unbiased procedures and processes to develop solutions and lead users to a predetermined result, and outcome. Art and aesthetics deal with more esoteric issues and are less strictly dependent on efficiency and logic. Nevertheless, for an experience to be fully successful, both elements must be present. Every design that has a genuine and enduring impact counts. Start with the function, then go on to the form.

Which forces us to reconsider the role that beauty and art play in our daily lives.