Pause. Re-examine.

We love our space. We love isolation, we don't love the random elbow rub from sitting on a bus. Eye contact is usually prohibited. I came upon this product design, it is extremely creative. I do enjoy the playfulness behind the idea, but of course the meaning for this design is somewhat uneasy.

 http://www.behance.net/gallery/aria/948567

In essence, this is the exact opposite of my subject. Encourage isolation. The message is the same of encouraging those to find joy in public transport, but by complete opposite methods as my own.



While listening to Spotify the other day, an advert for Audible kept playing. Audible is from Amazon, it is an application you can download to your phone, and then download audio books for listening purposes. This particular advert speaks of the joy and peace you find when you put your headphones on and get lost in Audible during your morning commute. Encouraging you to cut off from the rest of the world and surroundings.

It is no secret that I'm not a fan of Amazon. Their main goal it seems is to promote the death of printed books my any means, whether it be through the kindle or through audible. Since they have become publishers on their own, they are able to completely bypass the printed editions of books, encouraging new means of 'reading.'

What these products essentially are doing is creating the environment one has in a car during their commute and transforming that to public transport. Isolation, withdrawal, privacy, reclusion. No opportunities for interaction, for conversation, for new experiences. Sit on your own, don't look up.

Go big or go home right?

That's the American way. We're not used to doing things on a small term basis, for proof just take a look at our cars, bathrooms, and roads. Even our plates of food.

I have a large idea for my degree show, whether it will be possible or not is still up in the air. But if I shoot high, aim for a large idea, I can always cut back if it ends up being out of reach. Better than working from little and trying to add more ideas.

Bus shelters are disgusting. They are cold and uninviting. My goal is to take that idea and 'reinvent' it to something welcoming and loveable. This is directly tied to finding joy in public transport as well, make something that is old and dull and exhibit in a positive light. Finding joys in what would normally be ignored.

There are many examples of bus shelter art. Whether it's an aesthetically pleasing design:

http://www.behance.net/gallery/City-of-Moscow-Bus-Shelter-Design/3072493

Or whether it's designs that are a bit more playful:

 http://www.behance.net/gallery/University-of-Idaho-bus-shelter/392761


IKEA has also dived into the creative bus shelter world for advertising purposes:

It's a large idea: getting a hold of a bus shelter, perhaps one that is not so used and grotesque, and incorporating my artwork in and around the bus. Clearly, it would be too simple to just attach my posters to the windowed sections - but it's a simple mock up.

I do know that I want my exhibit to be interactive, I don't want it to simply be a display of work that people walk by and only look at. My subject is to encourage interaction on public transport, so why would I create an exhibit that doesn't possess the same quality?

Create interaction, peace, joy, smiles, enlightenment.

Joy in Movement

The theme/title of my degree show came to mind while riding the bus the other day: Joy in Movement.

I was sitting in my favorite seat, looking over old photographs in my phone. I came upon one from my trip back to Los Angeles in summer 2011:

Traffic, I do not miss you. Sitting in traffic alone, you suffer an isolating feeling. Yes you are surrounded by people of like minds, but you're separated by white lines, heavy metals weighing up to 2 metric tons, and personalized music that allows you to stay in your own world. It's rare to make eye contact with another, or even a smile.

It is even more worrying when one steps onto a busy Tube train, and the isolation continues. You are touching others, you are right next to many people yet it still feels as though people are dividing themselves with white lines and 2 metric ton boxes. How sad it has become that if you get a cheerful smile from a stranger once, that is out of the norm.

In the opening scene of Crash - Don Cheadle's character is quoted saying,
 "It's the sense of touch. In any real city, you walk, you know? You brush past people, people bump into you. In L.A., nobody touches you. We're always behind this metal and glass. I think we miss that touch so much, that we crash into each other, just so we can feel something."

 I feel now that this is lack of human interaction has spread widely to most large cities. With new technology of iphones, ipads, kindles, mp3 players - it has become easier to ignore those around you and get distracted with the fun toy in hand.

Now more than ever is the time to raise attention to SMILE. JOY. BLISS. HAPPY. in public transport. To create Joy in Movement.

Look up. Smile.

"Failed" Projects

I'm not always a fan of using the word 'fail,' I hope that fail could be replaced by 'pending' projects. The truth is, I do think it is vital to document your successes along with projects that don't quite work out. Here are two examples of such.

The first being how I wanted to explore outside the printed world. I wanted to send a happy random message to commuters outside of posters, billboards, etc. With this project I imagined a walking commuter, whether he or she was about to cross a street or maybe simply walking down the sidewalk to look up and find this wired word that said "SMILE." Why wire? Well because wire might tie into the urban scene more effectively, whether this be hanging from a the cross walk walking signal, or on a random Edinburgh iron fence, or a bus stop.

I'm almost embarrassed to mention just how long it took me to create this horrid looking 'S.' Let me just say much longer than it should have. *cough cough* (more than a days work). I assumed that taking that jewelry making class when I was 13 would have helped a bit when it came to bending and working with wire, but the truth is...I was far more talented with wire in my early teens than I am now. Though this is something I would like to explore more in the future, I had to make a decision: I don't have the time to perfect this at this time, especially when it's not something I'm really all that passionate about. Perhaps on free time, over break, when a deadline is not hanging in the back of my mind I could conquer this task - but not when there are other projects/subjects pending in my mind.

The second 'failed' project came from our Investigation Task with our tutor Jeanette. Well the idea came, but the fail came from my follow through. Our task was to look into [in a sense] symbols of our subject. We had to find or create images that match our subject to: Presentative, Metonymy, Synecdoche, and Metaphor/simile. The inspiration came when Sofia and I were trying to come up with a simile to bus transport and I joked about it being that of a kangaroo - sit back, relax, enjoy the ride...you'll get to your destination. Like that of kangaroo's joeys sitting in their mother's pouches, just relaxing on the journey. A bus is like a kangaroo. We found too much joy in this, probably more than the average person should - but that could be from our lack of sleep and over working...you tend to get loopy.

We then thought how much fun it would be to create a bus campaign in form of a kangaroo, emphasizing comfort and relaxing. How often do you see that message in bus campaigns? Never...exactly! So I went to drawing...

Okay, it was getting there...but it hit me hard - there is no drawing a kangaroo and joey without seeing a phallic symbol. I understand sex sells, but this was just ridiculous. From here on out, I could not draw or trace a kangaroo/joey image without seeing a phallic symbol, no matter what position the kangaroo was in. Hopping, standing, laying down...nope! It was not going to work! Again faced with the issue of time, I do think this could work if I spent much time trying stylize the kangaroo/joey and make them not so realistic. But of course with this idea coming to me at the end of the semester, time is not my friend. So yet another project that could be pending.

The Death of the Red Car System

It is of little known fact that the movie 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit?' holds a bit of truth to Los Angeles history. No, not about the fall of cartoons but rather the fall of the Red Car system (the cable car) and the rise of freeways and dependence on cars.

Nowadays when you picture Los Angeles transport, you think smog, traffic, millions of cars, and really all in all just grumpy miserable people commuting to work. But in the 1920s, the Red Car system in LA was the largest electric railway system in the world. Into the 1930s, there was such a large influence from the automotive companies, that large 'motor-ways' were built. What we know now as freeways. When traffic congestion increased, the solution at the time was to build even more freeways, with more lanes. Sadly, the cable car started seeing its death.

Throughout the year, there were many attempts to expand mass public transit but none of these ideas truly stuck around. It wasn't until the 1990s, that plans were made for LA to delve into the world of Subways. Currently there are only 4 underground lines, quite a sad number in comparison to the size/population of LA but it is slowly...very slowly becoming more popular.

Today it is best to compare Los Angelinos love of their cars to that of Americans and their attachments to their guns. 'You can't take my gun away!'

'You can't take my car away!'

I took a break from coming up with designs to make bus commuters happy, and decided to head back to the origin of my reasons for my subject. When stumped, head back to the beginning right? I've been trying to push myself out of my element so much, that I'm now in that uncomfortable phase. That uncomfortable era of 'What is my aesthetic? Where has my personal design style gone?' (I just quivered using the word style. Sagmeister has scarred me forever! In a good way of course). When diving into my typography explorations, I have picked up a vintage aesthetic. I was challenged to get away from this aesthetic, being that it is quite popular at the moment. Of course, I don't want to be a follower as a designer, I want to be a leader - how nice it would be to be ground breaking.

But when you look at my previous work, it definitely has a vintage effect to it.
www.behance.net/jocelynk/frame

What I have created thus far in this new exploration is combine these random vintage/original images with new type. I know this isn't quite ground breaking in the design world in general, but it is ground breaking personally for my own work. I'm going back to the beginning, the origin of my studies and I'm combining it with the modern world.

My works in progress: "Smile. You have public transportation."

Smile that you have public transportation. Smile that you don't have to sit in traffic everyday, that government and large automobile industries haven't forced you to purchase a car. Corporations haven't forced you to sit alone in your vehicle, making no connection to others. Rather companies are giving you the freedom to sit and interact with others. Relax, let the driver take control. You'll get to your destination.

In Amore Cotidianis

In love with the day-to-day things

Have you ever had a job you hated so much, that Sunday was the worst day of your week? This being because you knew deep down inside that Monday was tomorrow - that in less than 20 hours you would have to wake up to a whole new week and deal with 5 more days of going to that wretched place. Bring on Friday! Bring on Saturday. You keep Sunday.


I had a job that did this to me, I worked for quite the horrid corporate company in Reseda, CA. It took the majority of my strength each morning to wake up, sit in the bumper to bumper traffic and arrive with even just a half smile. It wasn't until one morning when I slowed down that I started finding joy in the ordinary. I enjoyed seeing my usual commuting friends on the 405 freeway. Coffee never tasted better than on a rainy day, and a random Peggy Lee song would calm the nerves even more.

If it is possible for an isolated Los Angelino to find peace in her traffic, it is most definitely possible for the average individual to find peace in the public transportation commute. In public transportation, you are allowed to converse with others, you are allowed to read and expand your knowledge, you are allowed to smile at a child giggling in the seat next to you. You are allowed to smile, but then why is it so difficult to do so? To just let that little grin out.

To design is to convey a message, my message is that of finding simple joys and pleasure in the ordinary of one's commute on public transportation.

http://www.behance.net/gallery/Public-Poster-Project/136966

I admire the Public Poster Project - It is conveying messages through the simple norm of posters. How often do we stop and actually read the mass amount of posters and propaganda around us? Very rarely. Yet I'd smile while reading one of these signs in passing by.

I am in no way encouraging the average individual to not get in touch with daily news, events and occurrences on their way to work. It is simply my goal to let this individual lift his head out of the newspaper, take a deep breath and smile at the simple surrounding him.

Through this blog, you will see my journey of creating travel companions (a compendium as a whole) meant for the average public transportation commuter. These companions are meant to make you smile, to make you find joy in the ordinary.

(Art by Brian Andreas)