The current state of our world and the recent developments of yet another war in our midst made me question how we as designers can change the narrative of hate in our environment.
As, is generally the case with me, one thing leads to another and yet again I went down a rabbit hole of research and discovery, thoughts and ideas, which in turn led to more pondering and more reflection in terms of action required.
So, looking at history, interestingly most visual representation we see of peace in symbols like the peace sign, the dove, the white poppy, broken rifle, the ‘V’ sign along with many posters from history, ‘peace’ is represented as the anti-thesis of war – this is what is referred to as ‘negative peace’ as opposed to positive peace which is based off attitudes and structures that create and sustain a peaceful society.
My point here is how can we was design educators get our students to Design for Peace – and this thought made me go further with designing a short workshop, looking at the stereotypes, symbolism, storytelling and appeal to emotion in reference to the whole idea of positive peace.
Like always, it all starts with a mind map and lots of writing in my notebook, drawing connections and one thing leading to another. Changing mind-sets and attitudes that have been so entrenched is not easy. How do we decode and re-write what peace means? What can be the visual language to express ‘positive peace’? Based off the understanding and decoding of the current language and ideas, looking at semiotics and history of propaganda posters and symbols used diachronically, working with the idea of Design Activism.
Questions that need to be asked and analysed is how do we define Peace? What does Power look like in our world today? How can we design for peace, without the inclusion of war? How do we propagate ‘positive peace’? What if we flip the narrative and design for ‘Peace Propaganda’?
Some of the ideas of Peace found in our visual language today and from the past.
The peace sign – created by Gerald Holtom, a designer and a pacifist. He believed that an icon being carried by thousands in a peace march, will have a better impact in bringing the message across. The symbol was adopted soon after by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and anti-war protestors. {read more on this symbol on my Instagram post of March 08, 2022 – https://www.instagram.com/sheerazwania/]
The Dove – Pablo Picasso’s Dove was chosen as the symbol for the World Peace Congress in 1949, historically links to the bible with the story of Noah sending out a Dove to check the waters.
I stand for life against death; I stand for peace against war. Picasso 1950
Some peace posters through history that connotation peace merely as the absence of war.
It is important to look at all the levels of peace [Dayal de Prewitt A, 2012]- Image 1 and understand the different paradigms of peace and not let one paradigm dominate.
I am hopeful this course [or a project] as a start can get the ball rolling. After all a journey of a thousand miles begins with a small step [Confucius].
Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, tooImagine all the people
Livin’ life in peaceYou may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one
[John Lenon – 1971]
