The germ of an idea doesn't make the sculpture that stands up... so the next stage is hard work
Mihaly CsikszentmihalyiRead
Good design is a visual statement that maximizes the life goals of the people in a given culture (or, more realistically, the goals of a certain subset of people in the culture) that draws on a shared symbolic expression for the ordering of such goals.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Good design reflects cultural values and aspirations.
This quote emphasizes the importance of design as a form of visual communication that not only represents but also enhances the life goals of specific groups within a culture. It suggests that effective design is not just about aesthetics, but about aligning visual expression with the aspirations and values shared by a community.
Themes
DesignCultureGoalsVisualExpression
In practice
Example use cases
In a design class, the professor quoted Csikszentmihalyi to inspire students to think about the societal impact of their work.
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To know oneself is the first step toward making flow a part of one's entire life. But just as there is no free lunch in the material economy, nothing comes free in the psychic one. If one is not willing to invest psychic energy in the internal reality of consciousness, and instead squanders it in chasing external rewards, one loses mastery of one's life, and ends up becoming a puppet of circumstances.
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To live means to experience-through doing, feeling, thinking. Experience takes place in time, so time is the ultimate scarce resource we have. Over the years, the content of experience will determine the quality of life. Therefore one of the most essential decisions any of us can make is about how one's time is allocated or invested.
Mihaly CsikszentmihalyiRead
It is as if evolution has built a safety device in our nervous system that allows us to experience full happiness only when we are living at 100%-when we are fully using the physical and mental equipment we have been given.
Mihaly CsikszentmihalyiRead
Our jobs determine to a large extent what our lives are like. Is what you do for a living making you ill? Does it keep you from becoming a more fully realized person? Do you feel ashamed of what you have to do at work? All too often, the answer to such questions is yes. Yet it does not have to be like that. Work can be one of the most joyful, most fulfilling aspects of life. Whether it will be or not depends on the actions we collectively take.
Mihaly CsikszentmihalyiRead
Similar quotes
I was born with music inside me. Music was one of my parts. Like my ribs, my kidneys, my liver, my heart. Like my blood. It was a force already within me when I arrived on the scene. It was a necessity for me-like food or water.
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Real people move, they bear with them the element of time. It is this fourth dimension of people that I try to capture in a photograph.
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You shall create beauty not to excite the senses but to give sustenance to the soul.
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Heartbreak can definitely give you a deeper sensibility for writing songs. I drew on a lot of heartbreak when I was writing my first album, I didn't mean to but I just did.
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Colors are the deeds/ and sufferings of light.
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The big cop-out would be to accept popularity rather than opting to try to create potent work. It's so easy to do the popular thing, the expected thing, and that's where you start to cheat yourself - and your fans, in the end - because there's an inherent dishonesty in pandering and dishing up what everyone's expecting.
The EdgeRead