Computational Compositions: Aesthetics, Materials, and Interaction Design

As computation progressively takes place outside of the box, design increasingly occurs at the boundary between the digital and physical. Or, as Hiroshi Ishii explains: “At another seashore between the land of atoms and the sea of bits, we are now facing the challenge of reconciling our dual citizenships in the physical and digital worlds” (Ishii, 2008). Reconciling a dual citizenship, however, presumes that the worlds of atoms and bits are fundamentally apart. From this vantage, the job of the designer has been to craft the relation between categorically distinct matters. The cascade of approaches resulting from this assumption can be historically traced. Graphical user interfaces use metaphors to cast a relationship between everyday life and information architecture. Ubiquitous computing disguises sensors and processors inside everyday objects so that they contribute function, but show no form. The hybrid quality of tangible devices, which explicitly connect atoms with bits, brings this presumption into even sharper focus. By treating atoms and bits as categorically distinct, however, these approaches proliferate precisely the aesthetic problem they intend to address. Rather than presume the need to bridge atoms and bits, we advocate shifting interaction design towards valuation of compositions. Inspired by a current moving through a multitude of design disciplines including materials science, product design, interface design and architecture, this paper places aesthetics at the center of a movement towards new computational forms (see Robles & Wiberg, 2010). Our first step in presenting this approach will be to critique the ontological distinction between atoms and bits. Drawing on aesthetics of interaction research (Dalsgaard & Hansen, 2008; Graves, Hallnäs, & Jacob, 2008; Löwgren & Stolterman, 2004; Redström, 2008; Rullo, 2008; Wright, Wallace & McCarty, 2008), we advocate a vocabulary that helps organize design relationships to achieve a range of effects. Computational compositions require an aesthetic language to guide and analyze new designs. This language should speak effectively at the intersection of social and material worlds and across a range of digital and physical substrates. Our approach differs in that we