Design or
revolution
Is
socially
responsibledesign^
an oxymoron?
specialclinic
is tackling
this very issue
By Esther Zandberg
framework
not met
for needs that
are
market,
by the private
the state
or
local authorities,
with the commucooperating
nityand developingenvironrevolution. These
days interior design is
synonym
for gaudinessand hedonism.
Designerswork for the luckiest of the lucky:healthyand
wealthy young people who
have everything.
Architects
glory in the large homes
they'veplanned for the rich
and compete over
whose are
more
worluxurious, glitzy,
thyof notice in the media and
"in." They have their sights
on
cities,neighborhoodsand
buildingsfor those who belong to what is considered
the privileged
class: Yuppies,
bon vivants and high-tech
tycoons.
Magazines are filled
with photosof homes that eelebrate design.
How
rare
itis
when an architect boasts of
reducingconstruction costs,
or creating
beautyin public
housingproject.
we
believe that designwill once
againtalk about
social responsibility
and be
proud to do so; that cityplanners
will once
again be concerned
first and foremost
with takingthe distress out
of poor neighborhoods.Designhad days like this in the
past,and we believe they can
But
ers
return
mental awareness.
It aims to
interfere as littleas possible
with existing
structures,
refrain from demolition
and
serve
as
for social
"catalyst
unity,"
answeringthe need to
change current designswhile
acknowledgingthat good designin world such as ours is
not
luxurybut no less than
vitalneed.
These are demanding challenges for design'snarrow
and indulgedshoulders.
revolution
quiet
And so the establishment
of the clinicisalso an attempt
by the departmentto broaden
the definition of design and
locate it as an area
"uniting
the human experience,
talent
and knowledge involved in
the ability
to suitthe environment
to physical
needs."
The appointmentlast year
as
department head of Carmella Jacoby-Volk,former
editor of the critical journal
"Block," marks an additional
step in the attempt to square
the circle of designand social
responsibility.
The clinic was
lished in vacuum,
not
estab-
although
The remarks
it is true that designand arabove were
taken from
the fiery chitecture have not changed
manifestos of do-goodersof
yet. The superstar method
stillprevails;
the wow-factor
previouscenturies, but may
be found in
of the Bilbao effect does not
positionpaper
called "Is socially
responsible yet registerand the Pritzan
designreally
oxymoron?1' ker Prize is stillnot awarded
for service to humanity,but
by architect Yaron Turel,
senior lecturer in the inteto Frank
Gehrys and their
rior designdepartmentof the
heirs. But nonethespiritual
in
less there is change in the air,
Collegeof Management
Rishon Letzion (and former
whether
in the wake of the
member
of the leftistyouth
financial and environmental
movement
Hashomer
Hatcrises or because peopleare
which was publicized
at
tired of the bubble.
zair),
the launch of
This way or that, in the
designclinic
at the college
lastweek.
discourses
of design and
The clinic, the result of
architecture, in education
collaboration between
the
and practice,
there is more
and more
talk of society,
the
design department and the
Rishon Letzion municipality,
public,democratizingplanwill operate as other such pro
ning,cooperation,low-rent
bono enterprisesdo in acaand
projects,environment
demia, providingservices to
the rest of the issues swirling
the needy,in this case in the
around under what is called
field of design,accordingto
"involvement"
and "responthe founders, who have not
sibility."
yet completely formulated
Architectural exhibits are
Esthe method of operation.
no longermerely demonstrathe clinicin the detablishing
tions of ego and power
but
signdepartmentis an attempt also include
that
projects
to restore the historicalsocial
are
not even
but
photogenic,
role designerstook on at the
which contribute to humanof
20th
the
beginning
century,
This is quietrevolution,
ity.
when
they were
occupied says Gil Mualem
Doron,
an
with improvingthe world, and
artist and scholar of urban
stars in their ranks supplied
culture and marginalgroups,
solutions for the housing of
and one of the founders of the
workers, or at least planned
clinic.Last year he conducted
them.
of
workshop with members
The goalof the designdeand he
poor neighborhood,
partment is at once ambitious,
teaches at various schools out
pretentious,
promisingand at
of an uncompromising ideobit unclear to
the moment
social stance that is
logical
the founders as well. As they
in the local landexceptional
put it,the clinic aspiresto be
scape
platform for the improvement
of dailylife "through
the power
of architecture
and design" by providing
not