Overlooking the Visual: Demystifying the Art of Design - Softcover

"...this is a book designers ought to read, not least because it is a role model of how they could advocate theories in everyday prose that deals both clearly and rigorously with difficult philosophical and design issues." - Times Higher Education

"[Overlooking the Visual] is ahead of the curve in the current task of reconnecting theory to application, positioning design knowledge as embodied, accessible, and reproducible." – Philip Plowright, Lawrence Technological University

"The book fills a gap in the literature whereby it makes a very important point from the perspective of landscape. My students so far have mostly all agreed with your argument, and actually found little to quarrel with..." –Gareth Doherty, Harvard University Graduate School of Design

Making tangible connections between theory and practice, ideas and form, this book encourages debate about the artistic, conceptual, and cultural significance of the way things look. What are the metaphysical concepts at the heart of design education, theory, and philosophy? Why do we assume that design is impossible to teach?

This book challenges the traditional foundations of perception and takes an imaginative, radical approach, setting itself apart from the traditions of analytical philosophy, evolutionary psychology, and phenomenology which underpin much of current design theory and discourse. The new definition of perception produces startling consequences for conceptions of language, intelligence, meaning, the senses, emotions and subjectivity. This is an innovative, fresh view on design and how we can improve it for both practitioners and students in the architecture and design fields as well as philosophers.