Law 8: Trust
Law 10: The One
Some things can never be made simple.
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on Sunday, July 23rd, 2006 at 4:38 pm and is filed under laws, 9/failure.
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5 Responses to “Law 9: Failure”
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NOTE: I reserve the right to edit or delete inappropriate comments. But I'm also a believer in free speech. Keep it simple.
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I was wondering whether you have written at all about “delicacy” and how it relates to simplicity?
the sense that alot of care has gone into the conception or making of something
that its materiality is teetering on the point of being barely noticable
that it evokes a sense of transience or fragility.
It’s a concept I heard the Japanese architect Kengo Kuma mention recently in relation to his work. He kept using the word “delicate” rather than “simple” or “elegant”. I didn’t understand him at first but I think he was getting at a “fragile simplicity” as a way to make somebody more self-aware and thus dematerialize his buildings.
I think also this fragility is emphasised by his preference for weak materials such as rice paper, plastic and wood. Rather than discard the possibility of their use, he understands the physical and aesthetic properties of these materials so well that he can strengthen them in a precise way with another material.
Daniel
Fragility is certainly an important topic. Thank you for bringing it it up. I find that the beautiful polished and perfect lacquer surfaces of old-fashioned Japanese containers are a bit odd ideal to achieve in the consumer landscape. Because one little scratch or misuse and it’s suddenly rendered imperfect.
The companion to fragility is care, which in this case is human care … or maybe that is always the case. In regards to your point about how fragile can be unexpectedly strong, if you haven’t looked at it already Soetsu Yanagi’s book The Unknown Craftsman covers these elegant matters beautifully.
excellent points made, but since when is wood a “weak” material?
Great points and conversation folks
This law on the surface seems to contradict law 4. If we grok the knowledge shouldn’t it seem simple? Granted that Sting Theory is something which could never be simplified for me but then again I could be a simpleton.
A good point. and if it is like that you probably have to shift your thinking and approach completely.
Open new opportunity spaces. Using a “white wall” like an artist to create the open space to go beyond your “blind spot”.
See http://www.ottoscharmer.com/docs/articles/2003_TheBlindSpot.pdf for more info.
Sometimes the best solution is not easy to see;-)