Kshitiz Anand

One of the things I have often wanted to during a photo-shoot is analyze why I enjoy doing it. There is a lot of the experience factor associated with a) clicking the photograph and b) viewing the photographs later.
Now, I have traveled wide across India doing photography and had similar interesting experiences over and over again. One of the shoots that I recall well is the street photography on the streets of Kolkata, India. I had always wanted to find an answer as to why they call Kolkata the “City of Joy.” This album resulting from the photo-shoot is a result of that quest.

Kolkata 2007

Everywhere around me when I am clicking I am seeking to get a good experience of doing the act (of taking the photograph). I try to capture the elements that would at a later stage give me as close to the same experience I had while clicking it.

There were many factors that lead to the overall experience. Each moment that was experienced was expressed in the form of a photograph that can be said as an expression of that instantaneous experience. Today whenever I re-look at that photo album I am able to relate to the time I had, and the experience I had. For every shot I took there was a story associated with it and it was these individual stories or expressions that made up the entire experience a memorable one. These stories which are culturally constructed expressions, would be beneficial in a person recalling the experience, as well as to the people who are not familiar with the culture.

These photographs allow me to make a better sense of experience by virtue of connecting of the cognition (of what’s there in the mind from the past), the feelings associated with it (the present) and also the expectations (the future).
After analyzing each photograph in the album, one is transcending the narrow sphere of experience by interpreting the expressions, as Dilthey would put it. These cultural expressions (photographs) consummate to the overall experience of the city, as seen by the outer self and perceived by the conscious or the inner self. Here each photograph is a story that has a beginning and an end. These multiple expressions transcends together, in a temporal flow to give us the experience.

These stories presented in the photographs touched the heart, and hence we could call it of an inner felt experience. It is a testimony to the lived experience (Dilthey). The elements in the frames, the aesthetics associated with each frame compel us to have the “an experiences” in a similar manner across viewers. In most of the cases the expressions here would be the same.

The ability of photographs to be more powerful than a narrative, results in we being able to identify the context better. Photographs do a better job in trying to re-showcase the reality and an indication of the experience had. The elements in the photographs allow one to interpret the experience in a similar manner by different subjects. Having said that it is interesting to see how the experiential factors differ from culture to culture. The notion of the exotic Other, as evident in the style of documentary film making and ethnography (and anthropology) allows for the experiences to differ across cultures.

The photographs here are the reminiscence of the existing conditions in the city. Kolkata is also known as the City of Joy, but when one visits there it’s hard to find the joy in the experience of visiting that place. Through these told expressions (the photographs) we are trying to present a reality (of what is there) of the situation as was experienced by the photographer.

Introduction
Quite often we have heard people questioning the existence and nature of design. Questions like ‘What is design?’ ‘Does design mean art?’ Is designing an object similar to saying beautification of the object? Some even say, design is common sense; and comes from intuition. If we go a bit deeper into these questions, we get to know answers to many more questions like, what role does Aesthetics play in having a good design? What are the factors to which a design owns is success? Is it pleasure it mere satisfaction? Does good design come from experience of proper understanding of a concept? Do the cognitive faculties of the human mind play a role in deciding the quality of a good design? Should a good design mean ‘globally acceptance’? Does design depend upon the culture and context? Do environments pay some role? How is a priori synthetic judgment possible?

In this essay we will see the relation of beauty, aesthetics, art and design. We will see the factor that makes an object pleasurable, and how it aesthetics is a valuable source for designers. The philosophy of Immanuel Kant, and excerpts from his essays Critique of Pure reason,Critic of Judgment, Claims of Taste have been put in; in order to give a more explainable answer to these above questions.

Concepts and Knowledge
According to Kant, concepts came from pure understanding and not from experience alone as had been put forward by David Hume. Kant says that all speculation about the nature of things in themselves, beyond the phenomena of perceptual experience , is devoid of all meaning, and cannot even in principle attain the status of knowledge. Kant speaks of metaphysics- that body of knowledge that is both ‘synthetic’ and ‘a priori’ , rather than that body of knowledge which pertains to the fundamental natures of things.

By ‘synthetic’ he means – it involved an actual addition to our knowledge, rather than a mere analysis of the meaning of concepts. By “a priori’ he means – it proceeded independently of perceptual experience, rather than by gathering imperial data. It is derived from some source other than experience. He says that though we cannot know the objects as things in themselves, we must yet be in a position to think them as things in themselves; else we will land in the absurd conclusion that there can be appearance without anything that appears.

Experience as a parameter for design?
Kant agrees that with the empiricists concerning the origins of our knowledge to the extent of granting that “all our knowledge begins with experience” but rejects the thesis that ” it all arises out of experience”; and is experience in other words. One can think as to how far does this hold in design? In order for a particular design to be successful, it is necessary to first launch it; wait for response, then experience the product and then make changes it required. Kant agrees to this ; but he also means to say that after the first few experiences it becomes necessary to understand it thoroughly and then design it. He does not hold that objects need to keep being experienced at; and hoping that a good design will come by.

This is what Kant says in his ‘transcendental method’: It consists in ascertaining various matters of experiences which he takes to be undeniable, and then asking; what do they necessarily presuppose? What must be the case in order for them to obtain? What id the ground of their possibility? According to him, all objects follow the ‘law of causality’; i.e. everything which happens has its cause.

Experience is viewed not simply as an unstructured stream of consciousness; but rather as a unified structure of empirical knowledge if possible. But how? Kant says that it is the mind that itself is not merely passive but active. It structures our experience in such a way that the ‘synthetic a priori’ judgments we have been holding especially in Mathematics and Sciences hold true. According to him, mere experience can give rise to no propositions which are necessarily and universally valid. Those that are; occupy a position of great importance in human thought. These propositions are not derived from experience alone; and so must be traced to some other source, which Kant calls “a priori”.

Prior to Kant the accepted view was that the objects of human knowledge and experience have certain basic forms of ordering and arrangement, which the mind receives from them. Kant reversed this around saying that in point of fact the basic forms of ordering and arrangement of these objects are derived from the nature of the human mind itself. In Philosophy the above is said to be the Copernican Revolution in philosophy.

There are multiple theories on which one could base Experience Design and could try to find answers. With the recent expanse in the domain of experience design, it is necessary that we look towards the other established disciplines for such answers.

This is a final paper I wrote for the Interaction Culture class at Indiana University.

ABSTRACT
As Interaction Designers, two of the most important things that one needs to consider are the experience and also the audience being designed for. The presentation of the cultural expression is dependent on the presentation style and a thorough understanding of the audience. This paper aims at giving a close phenomenological understanding of a highly successful photography exhibition by India’s most renowned photographer, Raghu Rai. In the later part of the paper, from these points and an overall experience point of view, it is aimed to generate points for a framework for its application in Interaction Design.

Author Keywords
Phenomenology, experience, exhibition, photography, interpretation, culture

Excerpts from the paper
Interaction Design and HCI are constantly seeking for analogies from the established fields like computer science, the cognitive sciences, and other disciplines like sociology, anthropology, critical theory and philosophy. There has also been considerable efforts in trying to get an understanding from film theory and looking at experiences in film.

Photography exhibitions on the other hand are highly subjective. It is therefore more likely that any critical accounts of such exhibitions are phenomenological in nature. There is always the vision of a photographer that is being conveyed. And more often that not there is a mismatch between the intent of the photographer and the intent with which the viewer interprets it. There is also the element of time that comes into the picture when doing an analysis of the exhibition.

Conclusion
Feelings and sensibility cannot be rationally expressed in words. It can only be experienced.
Any exhibition of this kind, not only expanded the horizons for what can be exhibited in the Indian market today, but also helped in understanding what goes on in a photographer’s mind and his intentionality. Hence the movement to shift the authority of the experience from the museum, to the visitor is important.
The experience of an exhibition is primarily phenomenological and my understanding of it would be
totally different as compared to someone else. The analysis of a photography exhibition as opposed to a film gives the extra dimension of time to analyze a frame, as the events are not unfolding real-time. This results in a more phenomenological understanding of the various aspects that I have touched upon.
As mentioned earlier, to a large extent, the levels of interaction that are evident are more on a visual and
cognitive level unlike an interaction with a website where there is more digital interactivity and of a physical product where there is physical interactions. Any artistic or designerly creation in general left in a space is open for interpretation. These interpretations are to be reinforced by the feedback from the viewers and what they have to say about it, their interpretations and how closely they are able to relate to what the photographer intended to in the first place. This implies that a thorough close understanding of
any design, art can be highly beneficial. With this I hope to have my interpretation of the exhibition
and how as an artist visiting another artist’s exhibition re-inforce the things that are in my lifeworlds and the way I think about it. It is hoped that Interaction Designers can learn a lot by the analysis of experiences of photography exhibitions.

Download Full Paper here.