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Sample Personal Statement for Industrial Design
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were required to remove the scales of a fish or the skin of a potato,
what would you do? My solution was simple—find 10 lids of bear bottles
and nail them, inside out, in two rows onto a strip of wood. The
zigzag structures would make this a handy tool, which was at once
cost-efficient and environmentally friendly as it was recycled from
waste industrial materials that would otherwise be buried in dump
hills. Though this hand-made industrial product I invented when I was
an elementary school student was not manufactured on a commercial
basis, my parents and all the neighbors liked it for its practicality.
Yet, I was deeply aware of its inherent limitations. It was coarse and
rough and did not look beautiful. I told myself that I must create a
beautiful design. Then the opportunity came. Representing our school,
I participated in a XX and, by exercising my talents in painting, I
produced a very “artistic” design which brought me a winning prizing.
In retrospect, it was my family background that triggered my creative
design impulses. Both of my parents are architectural designers and in
their studios I could meet their colleagues and friends who were
architects, structure engineers, interior designers and furniture
designers. Under their influence, my early design works already
manifested three essential elements of modern industrial
design—functional pragmatism, aesthetic appeal, and environmental
friendliness.
Now, on the verge of completing my undergraduate program in industrial
design at the Department of XXX of XX University, I have gained a
heightened understanding of industrial design as a scientific
discipline. I have not only laid a solid academic foundation by
excelling in all my specialized courses and achieving top scores in
almost all of them; I have also improved my practical design skills
through producing dozens of refined and sensitive works (please refer
to my portfolio). As a junior student, I represented my university to
participate in two international design competitions “XX” and “XX”
Through effective teamwork, we succeeded in completing our competing
pieces “XX” and “XX”
My undergraduate program is a journey of explorations and discoveries.
While developing my scholastic aptitudes and practical skills, I have
honed my aesthetic sensibility, perception of the world around us, and
understanding of human needs. It is a process of unraveling my
potentials and giving free play of my creative mind. My designs are
characterized by bold originality, tempered by meticulous attention to
even the minutest detail. In choosing industrial design, I have given
full ventilation to my artistic impulses and concern for practical
human demands.
Yet, a humiliating experience wrought an indelible memory on my mind,
triggering my determination to pursue an advanced education in
industrial design. At the end of the first semester, our department
received a delegation of industrial designers from a German
university. When touring XX, one of the delegates said to me: “I do
not see many good design examples in this oriental metropolis. The
gray buildings, with their uniform colors and contours, merge with the
gray skyline indistinctively. The street lamps, bicycles, and cars,
hardly any of them capture your attention.” I wanted to protest, but I
had to admit that the first-rate designs are those of foreign products
and the so-called good domestic designs are mostly copies of western
design ideas. Under such circumstances, how to be truly creative
becomes a question that has long obsessed me.
As far as I am concerned, the only way out of this dilemma confronting
Chinese designers is to “think globally and act locally.” Against the
backdrop of globalization, it is not that Chinese designers are not
creative; the only problem is that they have failed to channel their
creative impulses into international styles. To think globally is to
develop international perspectives that may enable them to become
leaders in a rapidly changing global culture. To act locally is to
transmute their private and national experiences into tangible design
expressions. The integration of the international thinking and local
action will lead to design works at once aesthetically appealing and
thematically eloquent. The individual experiences of Chinese designers
are significant only to the extent that they are fused with
international sensibilities.
Toward such an objective, it is necessary for me to go to the cultural
melting pot that is the XX to experience how cultural pluralism has
contributed to creative design and how the faculty and students of
different cultural backgrounds communicate and interact with one
another. I would like to explore the role that desiring, designing and
producing play in the birth of a creative work. I would like to seek
solution to two important questions—“How is it possible for me, as a
native Chinese, to imbue the Chinese cultural elements and styles with
new, modern, and global ones?” and “What’s the new role of designers
with regard to the changing economic conditions of today and
tomorrow?” I really want to become a designer who is an articulate
original thinker, demonstrates leadership skills and seeks to use
design as a vehicle for discovery and self-expression.
However, being a mere designer solely devoted to the solution of
technical issues is not my total intention. I am equally interested in
the idea of “total design program” in which the designer is not solely
responsible for originating creative concepts but also for assuming
the role of a manager who links up the otherwise discrete steps in the
creation of a finished design product. The birth of a satisfying
product is not simply determined by the pure design factors. It also
depends on inter-departmental coordination, on technical support from
engineering sciences and on marketing strategies. Otherwise, even the
most original ideas would die in their infancy. In other words, a
total design program is a perfect marriage of design objectives and
business objectives. The designer is required to play a growing role
in the management of a design program. Therefore, the idea of “design
for design’s sake” is not sufficient. Designers need to be informed of
the market feedbacks in order to deliver a total solution that
addresses the clients’ needs on all fronts, including business
details. In a word, the designer must have a clear awareness of the
business context in which the design must thrive.
In this connection, I would like to seek answer to the question “How
can I improve my skills to interact with other players in a particular
design project and even serve as an agent for both the buyer/user and
the seller/manufacturer?” I have attempted to hunt for an answer to
this question by doing an internship this summer at a local company
that designs advertisements for industrial products. It is so
encouraging to find that the M.F.A. program offered by the School of
Art & Design of the University of XX addresses this issue by treating
the often overlooked “distribution” as a major component of a
comprehensive, articulated process of creation. In order to ensure
that creative work ultimately engages an audience in some context,
your program teaches students to explore intentional distribution
options, as well as issues of economic feasibility, information
communication technology and social networking.
Through your program, I will be taught how to expand the intellectual
reach of creative work and to utilize a comprehensive process for
bringing creative work into the world. Apart from coursework, your
program encourages students’ free exploration of creativity by
involving them in summer collaborative projects, culminating
activities including public exhibitions, creations in individual
private studios, and group presentations of creative works. I believe
that my prospective education in your graduate school will be an
unparalleled opportunity for me to broaden my perspectives, improve my
comprehensive skills, and prepare for an exciting career. But the most
important outcome I expect from my embarking on your program is that,
by capitalizing on my cross-cultural experiences, I will be well
equipped to chart new directions in tomorrow’s creative work. |
