Every day around the world, women are victims of psychological, verbal, economic, administrative, institutional, physical or sexual violence. This violence is not inevitable, we can act against it by knowing how to detect it in time, identifying its mechanisms and using any means to express our rejection of it. The poster as a medium appropriates the urban space and reflects the daily struggle against this evil.
This project is born from the idea of appropriating different spaces of the city, using digital content against sexual harassment of women, by superimposing generative posters built in the Processing tool.
Specific objectives:
- Design visual pieces with different contents allusive to the fight against sexual harassment of women in the city.
- To generate awareness and reflection on the problem of sexual harassment.
- To intervene urban spaces that generate impact on citizens.
- Collect and use content published on social networks, segmented and geolocated.
Background:
Adrián Santuario, professor of Philosophy of Science at UNAM in Mexico, developed an algorithm using the Twitter API and the Processing tool, where through Machine Learning he analyzed 183,000 tweets with the hashtag #MiPrimerAcoso in a day of protest against sexual harassment in Mexico and some Latin American countries.
The analysis revealed, according to the information published, that in Latin America women suffer their first sexual harassment between the ages of 6 and 10. And this does not stop throughout their lives, remaining most of the time in impunity, feeling guilt and carrying the fear of knowing when the next time will be.
"I did an analysis of the tweets that were written under #MiPrimerAcoso. i trained the algorithm to identify the age referred to by the author(s) in each tweet. the alarming thing: most of them refer to an age between 6-10 years old. it makes me turn to another problem in mexico: pederasty." - Taken from the public Facebook profile of Adrián Santuario, professor of Philosophy of Science at UNAM in Mexico.
"Sexual harassment is a crime", CDMX
This situation is present in all types of society. In France for example, according to the Interdepartmental Report of the Observatory of violence against women in France, in 2019, 152 women were killed by their spouse or former spouse. 93,000 women were victims of rape or attempted rape, where 9 out of 10 women know the aggressor.
#NousToutes is a feminist collective open to all, formed by activists whose goal is to put an end to the gender and sexual violence of which women and children are massively victimized in France.
The demonstrations of rejection and campaigns carried out to fight against these crimes are advancing and becoming stronger, but the problem seems to be directly proportional to its solution.
It is education, the basis for the elimination of this problem. First, assuming gender equality and protecting their rights, knowing their consequences and the penalties imposed in the justice system of each country.
It is here where design as a catalyst element and having presence in all areas of society becomes a functional element that helps to convey these messages in a timely manner, directly or indirectly to the victims or their perpetrators.
Campaigns against sexual harassment in France.
Theoretical framework:
“At the end of the 19th century, in the cities in full expansion, posters were the expression of economic, social and cultural life. They competed with each other to seduce the public. They attracted the attention of passers-by by their colors, due to the progress of lithography. The illustrations, to which the text gives meaning, reflected the artistic mode of the time; they introduced a new aesthetic of simplified images, generated by the manufacturing technique”: Hollis, (2002).
The modern poster emerged in the early 1800s, mainly for informational purposes, to update the general public on news and cultural events such as theatrical performances and dances. Perhaps among the most iconic are the posters designed by Toulouse-Lautrec to promote the French dancer Jane Avril.
Posters designed by Toulouse-Lautrec - Image by Art Institute Chicago
During World War I and World War II, the poster became an effective method of political influence and propaganda, designed to inspire a sense of collective patriotism and a call to action.
The language used had a forceful tone and the posters seemed to speak directly to each individual within the masses.
Images from the International Poster Gallery
In a way, posters reflect the economic, political and cultural states of the society in which they are created and used. Nowadays, the trend is focused on consumerism and pleasure, their purposes are mainly advertising, sales, informative and decorative.
Poster design by Namrata Katiyar
“The printed poster, as the primary means of visual communication in public space for centuries, undergoes fundamental transformations. The “Poster 2.0″ is much more than a surface with typography, colors and images: it is an interactive, animated, audible, data-driven and intermediate application. It involves all senses and disciplines. And it fuses graphic design with cutting-edge technologies.” Slanted Magazine, Germany.
Through generative design and programming, the visual possibilities multiply with the execution of algorithms that control the elements and build new pieces that communicate the message, generating interactivity with the reader.
Posters interactives // Nike - Agencia DIA - 2019
“But a digital product is not the same as a print product. Digital products are displayed on screens of different sizes and with dynamic content. Digital products allow users to interact with their content and take advantage of motion and animation. In addition, digital products often have a temporal logic in which a linear narrative is replaced by a set of complex states and transitions. In general, digital products share a common trait: they are created with programming languages.” Madsen (2019)
Sediment Mars is a series of generative poster designs by Sarah Hallacher and Alessandra Villaamil. The sin()and cos()functions are used to generate an elliptical shape, which is then distorted by adding random values to it.
The Spanish designer Lucas Suarez, winner of the Gaudeamus Tecnia 2019 award, presents us with the project “Programming posters”, where he proposes the hybridization of the adaptation and development of static graphic products to dynamic technologies.
Using microcontrollers and motion and proximity sensors, it generates in its installation random and programmed responses in three series of digital signs. The basis of its design is developed in the typographic management with the animation of phrases or predesigned concepts, generating in the user a sense of control of the interface but at the same time iterating a unique response in their experience.
Project Programming Posters - Lucas Suárez - 2019
“We now live in the era where digital media fully coexist with reality. The creative industries have to rethink the ways in which objects are represented today. One of the emerging ways to do this is with interactive posters. With a format that sticks to international paper sizes, interactive posters are not so far removed from the traditionally printed poster, but offer a more appropriate media for the LED screens that have popped up everywhere, including the local bus stop” Jyni Ong – IT’S NICE THAT Design Magazine – 2018.
To the question of whether interactive posters will surpass the printed poster, market trends and product positioning will always seek a more visible and forceful space, it will be the continuous transition of media supported by graphic design the best way and excuse to evolve, to reduce the consumption of printed material and to be increasingly effective and functional.
PangPangPang- Korean Design Studio / International Typographic Biennial: Typojanchi saisai 2018-19
“Interactive selection refers to the process of evolving something (often a computer-generated image) through user interaction. Let’s say you walk into a museum gallery and see ten paintings. With interactive selection, you would choose your favorites and allow an algorithmic process to generate (or “evolve”) new paintings based on your preferences.” Shiffman (2019) Genetic Algorithm: Interactive Selection – The Nature of Code – Youtube
Thus, urban interactive billboards will continuously migrate according to their needs and objectives, being more and more effective by being linked to the data we deliver daily, using our geolocation as a possible factor of interaction or purchase, and evolving or redesigning their contents according to their machine learning systems (Machine Learning) that detect our mood through facial tracking (Face Tracking).
Face tracking technology // Coca-Cola Smile
Deployment
Proposal #1
Design and development of interactive poster that uses image processing, cycles and conditionals in the JavaScript language to emulate the situation of several illustrations of “watchful” eyes that from their fixed position pursue the character of the princess.
Simulates the continuous persecution and siege to which women are subjected when they are alone in different environments.
See sketch and code: https://openprocessing.org/sketch/1575640
By means of the mouse position we set the location of the princess (character #1) and the direction of the eyes’ gaze (character #2) within the interface. After the time set in the script ends with the message “Harassment is not a game, it is a crime”.
Proposal #2
See sketch and code: https://openprocessing.org/sketch/1575782
Design and development of interactive poster that uses image processing and graphics in JavaScript language to emulate the situation of character #1 (ghost) who continuously chases character #2 (Princess).
Using the mouse position we set the location of character #1 followed by the position of character #2 which executes the lerp() function to create the movement within the path it travels in the interface.
Proposal #3
See sketch and code: https://openprocessing.org/sketch/1575886
Design and development of interactive poster that uses image processing, graphics and text in JavaScript language to emulate the writing of testimonial messages of women victims of sexual harassment taken from the Observatory against harassment in Chile (www.ocac.cl), these messages are drawn according to the trajectory and position of the character of the princess.
It simulates the testimony and narration of harassment situations to which women are subjected when they are alone in different environments.
Text: “At the time, I didn’t even realize that I had been a victim of harassment. He used me as a model for all his exercises, where he used to touch my waist or my legs. After that I didn’t want to keep quiet, my family confronted him. He stopped the car, got out and insisted: I am telling you to get in. After that I never went to the school psychologist again. I went straight to a bathroom to cry out of sheer rage and humiliation. I reported him, I quit my job because he knew where I lived. To this day I don’t know what happened to the case”
See sketch and code: https://openprocessing.org/sketch/1575898
Taking as a reference the exercise P_2_3_3_01 from the Generative-Gestaltung book that simulates the tracking of a text string to the mouse position, we use some testimonial messages that leave their trace after the movement of the Princess Peach character in the interface.
Conclusions
- Graphic design prevails in the transition of success that we live daily towards new media where through the use of new technologies, sometimes with random results, we can make the user participate in the final result.
- The user experience in different media used to be generated in a passive way, complying with the recall and appropriation of the message, but nowadays technological tools and the explosion in data manipulation gradually achieve that narratives and transmedia contexts activate and receive immediate feedback from the target audience.
- After the implementation of the generative urban posters, the metrics and reactions that seek to generate awareness and reflection on the issue of sexual harassment will be analyzed. A subsequent phase will be the review of the public’s behavior and reactions.
- The implementation and development of the code in Processing will continue to advance in order to find the best level of interaction with users, all this taking into account the feedback received in a later phase.
Sources
El gráfico sobre la edad a la que empieza el acoso en MĂ©xico – Diario El PaĂs
OrganizaciĂłn francesa Nous Toutes 44 – Colectivo feminista francĂ©s.
Informe interdepartamental del observatorio de violencia contra las mujeres en Francia
Proyecto “Programming posters”, ganador del premio Gaudeamus Tecnia 2019 España
Are interactive, digital posters set to overtake the printed poster? – It’s nice that –
Observatorio contra el acoso en Chile
Hollis, Richard. (2002). Le Graphisme de 1890 Ă nos jours – L’art d l’affiche.
Madsen, Rune. (2019). Programming Design Systems.
Shiffman, Daniel (2019). The Nature of code
Genetic Algorithm: Interactive Selection – The Nature of Code