The Content of Our Caricature: African American Comic Art and Political Belonging

Abstract

value in design. Taylor touts examples that recall our humanity and heighten our awareness of everyday objects we take for granted. However, for a book that praises contesting the status-quo, it misses an opportunity to push inclusivity in its curation of work. Of the fifty indexed pieces within Moving Objects, only eight cite non-European artists and thirteen credit women designers. Forty-two percent are credited to designers from the Netherlands, where Taylor conducted his Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. Within this European focus, the book is impressive in its material breadth. From jewelry boxes made of hair to mass-produced plush toys sewn into seats, Moving Objects covers a surprising range of materials and technologies with varied messages and meanings. Examples are primarily product and furniture designs with brief references to graphic design, user experience design, and other fields. Moving Objects is ultimately a case against mindless consumerism. If we were not so influenced by marketability, what would we make? What would we use? Taylor proposes the strong ties between design and consumer capitalism make alternatives hard to imagine. But for designers he sees an opportunity, saying “the making of things to some degree is to make a statement about what should exist in the world” (126). If our emotions project onto our surroundings and into our work as Taylor suggests, Moving Objects provides a robust roadmap for using those emotions to shape – and view – our world more intentionally.