Interview with Mikell
Over the past few months I have had the opportunity to interview some very talented designers/artists across a wide range of visually creative fields with the purpose of understanding how each views him/herself within the context of the visually creative fields.
Interview 1 (an excerpt): Mikell Fine Iles - Design director at Noise, an interactive agency geared toward young adults.
Q: Do you consider yourself an artist or a designer?
A: I would say I’m definitely a visual artist, I can think like an artist but my occupation is a designer. I’m a graphic designer by trade, that’s how I earn my paycheck.
Q: if you had to narrow it down to a few sentences what would you say is the fundamental difference between being an artist and being a designer?
A: I think designers are artists in their own way. They just have more parameters, constraints, rules, guidelines, specific briefs, marketing plans, and objectives.
Artists have their own set of constraints, objectives, goals but it’s less about making something that’s going to solve a problem it’s more about raising questions.They leave it open, sort of up to the viewer’s imagination. But designers want to be clearer in their message or their goals typically.
Q: Does a designer have a responsibility to society? If so, what is it?
A: Absolutely, if you think about societies, communities, or cities that are functioning most efficiently or have the highest quality of living, they are highly designed, they are smartly designed, everything from signage to city planning to architecture to graphic design, branding, furniture design, all that is thought through and is considered. Socially there are a lot of opportunities to make an impact through design. It plays a huge role and it’s quite underestimated.
Q: How does it differ from a “fine” artist’s responsibility to society?
A: I think an artist’s impact on society is less quantitative. A designer is more involved in messaging, tangible products and useful functional things that can have a more direct impact on society. But no good society is without a strong art scene and without artists you don’t have creative energy and spirit and all the great things that come with it.
