Fine Art Envy
28 June 2006
Fine art envy is to designers what physics envy is to biologists. For designers, that envy leads overwhelmingly to work of just one feature: sublimely staggering beauty. Like how a Rothko fools you into thinking it's more than just color field, a website can fool you into thinking it's more than just a blog. But when style exceeds substance, should we take notice?
Take for instance 9rules Network, a well-organized site claiming to 'highlight the very best web content in the world, and package it in a nice bow for you to unwrap'. In my humble opinion, 9rules emphasizes 'bow' far more than 'content'; unwrapping is generally where the experience ends. The network's content pales in comparison to the beautiful design of its sites. Not to mention, 9rules quietly prefers white, married Judeochristian writers, most of whom are far better designers than bloggers.
I'm not saying artfulness has no place in design. It can certainly set a tone or make a meaningful stylistic reference. But it should not overwhelm other concerns, like function and content. Afterall, design is no fine art... it's ephemeral.