Artist Designer Teacher
apatten( at )shaw.ca
An introvert and observer I was born a designer. I couldn’t choose to be a fireman if I’d wanted to. For me, the world was a place of mystery and wonders and curiosity dragged me all through it. How things appeared or how they might be arranged and rearranged was an endless source of pleasure I used to while away my childhood years, my adult life, and now my impending second childhood. Art, graphic design, illustration, ceramics, architecture, jewelry, comics, film, alternative architecture, paper folding, lego, home made gismos, exhibits, you name it, it didn’t matter what really, as long as I was making something I was happy. If it involved making something beautiful I was deeply satisfied. Reading art and design related books and learning many systems of designing carried me deeply into theoretical as well as practical realms of construction. I’m sure I have forgotten most of what I learned then, but there were a few observations that came together finally in a different sort of understanding of design space; a simpler understanding. Being employed as a designer and teaching design allowed me to test and refine theory into a method I could share with others and from that more refinement. I have been tinkering with dilation strategy for over twenty five years now and I still am excited at the prospect of more tinkering. I’m still amazed by how well it works. Dilation strategy might be thought of as a fuel saving device for a faster, cleaner, sugar burn allowing more energy to find it’s way to the task at hand and less energy to be wasted on smoke, mirrors and uncertainty. Dilation Design Strategy is a book of good methods.
