Over on Rhizome, there is an interview with the amazing collective, Temporary Services. The interview does a good job of providing an overview of their work, so I won’t repeat the information here.

I’ve long been impressed by their work – it’s provocative and compelling and engages politics and the political in an astute manner. Moreover, their work raises interesting questions for design, and public design specifically. Much of their work could be taken as design – to be sure they design objects and systems, and they regularly make use of existing design objects and systems for social critique and action. But they contextualize their work as art, and it’s within art world (or at least certain circles of the art world) that their work is recognized, discussed, and exhibited.

Its curious that we don’t see more work like this in design. Why is that? Where is that line drawn between such forms of collective / social practice / critical arts and design? Who draws that line and why? Does it serve a purpose, if so, what purpose? Can and should we erase that line of demarcation, or at lest smudge it?

As a starting point, see their project on Prisoners Inventions. Not only does it reveal a world of products (as both inventions and hacks) that escapes design and design studies, but their engagement with the prison population and with the politics of prisons and working with the incarcerated is insightful and notable.