comma
We visited “COMMA,” Google’s presentation at DESIGNART TOKYO 2019. The venue was Gallery 3 at 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT.
This installation was produced by Google Hardware Design Studio, led by Ivy Ross, who oversees Google’s hardware design. Lidewij Edelkoort, a leading figure in trend forecasting, was brought on as a collaborator.
Dutch trend forecaster Lidewij (Li) Edelkoort was named one of TIME magazine’s “25 Most Influential People in the World.”
At the opening, in a relaxed manner, she spoke about the thinking behind the title “comma.”
We call these moments — the ones present in everyone’s daily life — “comma.”
The concept behind this project resonated with us deeply.
Perhaps what we need is a way of living that takes the “,” (comma) into our daily lives, refusing to be carried away by the pace of contemporary society, and instead giving ourselves permission to pause.
The fabric work, which reads both as the “g” in Google and as a “, (comma),” feels like a sign inviting one to take a breath, and its many layers are woven both multi-layered and multi-dimensionally. By taking one’s time to view it, the subject reveals itself from many angles.
In the message “,” (comma), proposed by Google — a company at the frontier of the digital industry — we sensed many elements that we, as modern people, ought to reconsider.
