John James Marshall thesis.pdf - OpenAIR @ RGU - Robert Gordon ...

6.5 Outcomes
This research project has successfully positioned itself over or between
disciplines and has developed its own methods to pursue this enterprise. It has
resulted in insights, outcomes and contributions that are applicable across the
3D art and design disciplines. The achieved outcomes include:
• A survey of existing works from the field of enquiry. This resulted in
descriptions of new methods of working with computer-based tools in art
and design and the development of evaluative criteria and critical
language for computer-designed and/or fabricated objects.
• An indicative model of the phases that art and design practitioners go
through when they integrate computer-based tools into their practice was
produced. This was derived from an existing technology adoption model.
• A form of ‘technology-led-practice’ was identified and defined.
• A curatorial framework for a public exhibition and symposium was
developed. Qualitative data from practitioners, project stakeholders and
audiences from these events revealed patterns and themes relevant to the
theoretical framework of this study.
• An increased capacity for a ‘transdisciplinary discourse’ at the
intersection of disciplinary domains was identified.
• A contemporary version of R. Krauss’s ‘Klein Group’ diagram was
developed as means of visualising the field of enquiry and the
relationships between objects from the field and the ‘hybrid’ forms of art
and design practice that produced them.
• Contributions were also made to the literature of the field of enquiry.
6.6 Concluding remarks and future research
There is an expectation that digital fabrication will eventually allow a mass
audience to manufacture physical items at home directly from their computer
desktop. New production paradigms have brought producers and consumers
into a closer relationship. Computer-based design and fabrication can invert
the conventional sequence of product development and manufacturing and
bring about a more distributed model of digital production. All this points to
the wider circulation of objects not defined by the existing values of established
design discourses. Practitioners are making use of digital tools in cultural
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