My thesis investigates an interdisciplinary narrative of the transatlantic migration of Surrealism to Mexico during the 1940s. I focus on the ways exiled European Surrealists approached notions of Mexican material culture in a hybrid society where local traditions coexisted with a global modernity. Looking to popular and print culture outlets, I concentrate on how Mexican material culture was perceived, promoted, and marketed through a Surrealist lens. Specifically, I consider the collaboration of the German pharmaceutical company Casa Bayer, S.A. and exiled Spanish-born Surrealist Remedios Varo, who produced a series of medical advertisements during her first decade in Mexico City from 1943 to 1949. Through an examination of Varo’s work, my thesis explores the changing boundaries of fine and commercial art that resulted from the efforts of artists who participated in modern mass culture and consumerism. I investigate the significance of her Surrealist advertisements for Casa Bayer as a material culture bound on one side with fine art and the other side with the development of Mexican advertising. This case study supports my argument that Surrealism, as a transnational aesthetic, was one alternative way of demonstrating the new cultural meanings of advertising in an ambiguous, modern Mexican society. Examining Varo’s illustrations in light of the movement of western Europeans to Mexico and the country’s commitment to modern progress explains why the artist negotiated her past avant-garde sensibilities with her Mexican present. / Art History

Lucidity is a novella set in the near future of a man living in a city in the United States as a successful businessman. The novella criticizes the idea of consumerism through Aurora, a character who believes that a drug is being introduced into the water and food supply by the corporate-backed government. Characters find advertising to be almost irresistible, experience strange cravings for things like cheap beer, and are generally preoccupied with the latest products. James Simmons, the protagonist of the novella, finds himself in the lap of luxury. He has a job that pays well, a penthouse apartment, a fast car, and women. Even though he has the material riches that society tells him he needs to be happy, he knows that something is missing, something is wrong with the world in which he lives. For reasons unknown to him at the time, James is fired from his job and sets out on a journey to discover why. Over the course of his journey, he is finally able to begin piecing together the nature of deeper questions about himself that he never had a chance to answer.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

Building on current methods used in the field of interaction design, this thesis aims to explore how surrealist art techniques could be applied to the fuzzy front end of a design process. This is done to inspire and expand the current range of user engagement methods. The premise is that all people are creative, but they might need tools and techniques to express themselves. This creative potential could be harnessed more in design processes. The techniques conceived by surrealist artists could serve as generative tools that empower users to create, discuss, be playful and reduce their self-censorship in expression.The process conducted follows a research through design approach, as the aim is to explore the application of methods rather than solve a specific problem. Within the process a literature review, expert interviews, workshops and experiments are conducted. The experimentation with surrealist techniques takes place mostly in the context of Malmö City Library, imagining future uses and scenarios for the library with users. The outcome is a knowledge contribution to the field of interaction design, comprising of qualities for user engagement defined in the process and techniques that seem to have potential as user engagement methods.

This is (Not) a Textile is a surface pattern design project made with tools from motion design. The aim is to bring textile design into a new digital context, and explore how crossing these two fields can help to develop a new method of designing dynamically changing print. The process begins with hand sketching using automatic drawing methods inspired by surrealism. Then, the pattern elements are animated and constructed in the Adobe After Effects program using multiple layers of compositions. The result is a collection of animated patterns that each express a unique quality of digital changeability: building pattern layers, shifting light and color, and moving tessellation. In the future, designs like these may be applied to the real world with the help of augmented reality technology. In addition to influencing how design in the textile field can be reformulated with digital processes, this project pushes the boundaries of what textiles are and how they can be communicated and transformed through digital technology.

No description available.

A series of chance encounters with the city of Cleveland leads to a non-objective reading of this place. It is an intuitive approach, an attempt to understand the complexity of a city in fragments and to change the city's perception of itself. This thesis is a reciprocal play between conceiving and creating, revealing their close interrelation. It is an inquiry into how our imagination transforms our built and not-built environment. To be an architect is to dwell at the interface between the imaginary and the real, to draw from both worlds. / Master of Architecture