Flat design as a marker of hypermodernism

Abstract

The subject of this research is flat design as the basic sylistics and visual expression of the era of hypermodernism. Since modern design no longer corresponds to the characteristics of postmodernism, an assumption is made on the advent of the new period in design – hypermodernism. Hypermodernism is the term that implies the enhancement of design trends founded in the era of modernism: orientation towards modernity, design for manufacturability, split with the past, and absence of aesthetic hierarchy. Flat design is a style that visually expresses the aforementioned trends. The research material includes the final research projects in graphic design, interior design and industrial design, completed by the students of the department of Design of the Moscow Power Engineering Institute and the department of Graphic Design and Visual Communications of the Russian State University named after A. N. Kosygin. The article employs the method of semiotic analysis, which allows determining the key attributes used in flat design explicating the essential characteristics of flat design. The conclusion is made that flat design reflects the basic request of the era of hypermodernism – democratization of mentality, leveling of any differences up to the destruction of individuality. The idea of leveling of social differences, underlying the design of modernism, in hypermodernism reaches the idea of erasing any differences, any hierarchy, including the aesthetic. The presence of aesthetic hierarchy in design suggests the use of expressive means – index signs, iconic signs, and symbolic signs. The deconstruction of aesthetic hierarchy leads to the use of unexpressive signs – simulacrums. Most unexpressive sign is the fourth-stage simulacra – the sign, which relationship to any reality is reduced to zero. Flat design uses fourth-stage simulacra as the main form, thus meeting the demand of hypermodernism.