Macnab - Decoding Design

The desire for the spiritual is deeply embedded in our DNAand represented in the meaning of numbers, colors, symbols and fables created by our ancestors and ourselves, all providing clues to the perennial question Why?

Designers incorporate the elements of the mystical in their designs, often oblivious to the significance of their actions and unaware that there is a mathematical relationship that results in harmony. Historically, enlightened designers created a dynamic system tied to some very specific proportionsspecifically those based on the Golden Mean, a ratio which appears in nature in innumerable ways as well as in the monumental designs of the Pantheon, the Pentagon and Stonehenge. Designers who are aware of the significance of the Golden Mean have historically honored the relationship and meanings of iconography as well and for the same reasonbecause it connects us with the universe.

But in the late 1900s trends in design started to gravitate toward meaninglessness: Designers started to mix up a garbled stew, creating chaos that entertains and shock for the sake of awe.

Designers embraced their newfound tools: the computer, the Internet, millions of typefaces. Their tools were now limitless. And, as a result, there was a rebellion against the old guard philosophy in design that required rigidly applied grids and rules. New design was about throwing out the recipe.

But the ingredients of symbolism are eternal and indestructible: The harmony of the trinity; the union of two; the balance of the yin and yang; the magic of the ether. These concepts cross over cultural barriers; they are part of our common language. We are so painfully aware of disharmony in the world; we need to get back to harnessing the power of symbolism to get back to clear communication.

I visited northern India in 2002 and was thunderstruck by the power and prevalence of primal symbols embedded in every culture of that ancient land: I felt I had come home. By contrast, the modern West was a jaded, sterile and joyless world.

The principle of reductionism (typical in modern Western cultures where science often trumps spirituality) distills the world to zeros and ones and, in the process, destroys the indefinablethe Godof nature. Whereas Eastern holism accepts that there is something more in the whole, as Aristotle observed, than the sum of the parts.

New Mexico, where Maggie Macnab lives, is a unique balance of holism and reductionism. The yangLos Alamos National Laboratory, where the first nuclear weapons were bornis nestled right alongside the yinthe Sangre de Cristo mountains, which is home to some of the most ancient, most holy land on earth including Chimay, considered the Lourdes of America. Maggie's longtime immersion in symbolism is a way for designers to demystify the universal language that is theirs to useto decode design and embed clear and universal meaning in their work.

DK Holland

New York City, New York