When Does Art Qualify As Design?

Some art, some design. Via Interiordesign.net.

“Art has to move you, and design does not,” David Hockney is often quoted as having said, “unless it’s a good design for a bus.”

Haw, haw, oh, yeah, that’s a good one, etc. Of course, even on its own terms, this dichotomy can waved away easily: Many plausible cases can be made for “moving” examples of design.

But forget about that.

Instead of “can design be art?,” I’m interested in the less familiar (to me) question, “Is art a form of design?”

To put it more provocatively: Does art qualify as, does it live up to the standards of, design? In other words, what if we flip the familiar script that art is alpha and design must forever scramble to be taken seriously? What if we ask Hockney: Does your work have what it takes to earn the distinction of being considered design?

Or, to put it in the more practical terms that a classroom tends to demand: If I ask students to write about “a designer,” can they choose to write about Hockney?

I would prefer the answer to be no. But I spend so much time pushing the “design is everywhere!” line that is quite likely familiar to you, I recently found myself unprepared to explain why, precisely, I don’t want students in a writing-about-design class to turn in assessments of paintings or sculptures.

My first instinct in sketching out some rules around this was to fall back on functionality. But my attempt to articulate the functionality of jewelry or propaganda posters (among other things I very much include in my “design” parameters) found me using terms that seemed pretty … art-y.

So here’s what I coughed up on short notice:

Making art results in something to be looked at and considered solely in the context of itself.

Design results in something that must be judged in some broader context: how it functions, what it achieves or alleviates, or how its appearance enhances something beyond itself (the wearer of jewelry, the propagandist).

The students poked some holes in this. And that’s fair. Frankly, I welcome suggestions for a better way to formulate a parallel to Hockney’s axiom. I would welcome a clean rejoinder:   “Design has to X, and art does not.”

What is X?