Eric Faggin

Eric Faggin may or may not think too much.  With degrees in philosophy and engineering, he works as a designer.  But he doesn't consider himself to be a designer.  Or American.  Or Italian.


Are you Italian or American?

I have a hard time describing myself as fully Italian or American. I am both.  I was born to Italian parents, and all of my family is Italian.  I however, was born in the United States, and for the most part was educated in institutions there.  I feel that all interaction with different cultures rubs a little bit of theirs onto you, or at least you are somewhat at liberty to take what you like from those cultures.  There are many things I like about being Italian, and many others I like about being American.  It would be nice to be able to create from there, and not feel like it is either one that defines who I am.  Most of my experience comes from America.  Much of the experience I have to refer to, or that resonates with me is tied to Italy.  There are others as well.  I think people influence me more than culture or nationality.

There's a great Woody Allen film called Zelig in which the character is so desirous to fit in that he actually physically transforms into the person he wants to become.  I don't want to say that I'm a chameleon and transform myself into what my surroundings are, however, whether I'm feeling more Italian or American very much depends on where I am and with who I am.

How would you compare the two countries?

America and Italy are extremely different.  America has grown to impose itself, it looks at itself and affirms, "this is good".  It can also look at itself and say, "this is not good," and set about trying to make a change.  America is young and is finding its place to fit into the world, then again, America is comprised of the whole world.

Because America is a sort of blank slate as far as its history is concerned, America has been able to attract people from all over, mostly those who have felt weighed down upon by their environment and culture.  At the same time, America is rooted in a "get it yourself" mentality, that in a more fast-paced world, leads to some pretty horrible consequences.  The contrasts in America are always far more marked.

Italy, as a nation, is quite young too.  However, the Italians are ancient.  They know their way of life, and although they know it is a way of life that is difficult to sustain in the face of the rest of the world, they remain steadfast to it.  I find that our generation in Italy hasn't really questioned this very much. Italians manage to stay sort of resigned to the fact that they can't and maybe at the same time don't want to change.  However, when forced to they respond to it, often in seemingly inchoate ways.  Those who find themselves questioning the state of Italy quickly leave the country to find their work or their voice elsewhere, because once the comparison arises, it seems that Italy is so far behind that you would have to be quite stupid to live here.  This contrast arises from a lack of a global awareness as to what progress means.  If progress means solely trying to compete on a global market and secure wealth for the country, then Italy is severely lacking with respect to what the global trends are for markets that can bring about the most amount of wealth in the shortest amount of time.  America looks very much to this, and many times this neglect brings about atrocious consequences both for its own people and for the world.  If progress means actively seeking out the best for one's citizenry in terms of their well-being in the face of changing needs, then Italy seems to be doing this in a very different manner than America.

In any case, this rant basically points to the fact that I think America is too concerned with kicking shit to secure wealth and affirm itself, and Italy is far too dishonest and lacks in long term vision, while their  goal seems less to affirm itself than to preserve itself in the face of a world that is becoming more and more "Americanized."  The contrasts that arise out of this on a personal level affect me in very different ways.

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With degrees in philosophy and physics, how did you find yourself working as a designer?

I find myself working as a designer because I came into contact with design through my work as a field applications engineer.

What is a "field applications engineer"?

Field applications engineer is a fancy term for someone who is an interim between the engineering and sales and marketing departments within a company.  An FAE is supposed to be able to take care of product integration within projects that are immediately underway, while the engineers take care of the more long term development, or in solving the more complicated problems that occur in the normal lifespan of a project.  What this means in practice is that many times you find yourself trying to buy time with a client until the real engineers find time to devote to solving the problem, but in the meantime you give them all they need to know to solve the problem, if you can't get to the solution yourself.

In the course of this work, I came into contact with the field of industrial design.  Having always been inclined toward the arts, but having focused my studies in a more technical field, I felt that ID could become a bridge between having a chance to make art, and applying myself to continued study in the sciences.  So far it has been neither.

I haven't made much art, and I haven't been furthering my knowledge in the sciences.  What it will be in the future remains to be seen, however, I can say that as I get a sense more for how the field operates, I am ever conscious of how I will be able to operate in it.  If I don't find it gratifying, then I'll have to change fields and find something else to do.

I don't consider myself a designer because I haven't mastered the tools of the trade.  I'm open to the field of design and fortunate to have a chance to operate in it.  I hope to become better.

It is a privilege to be able to express yourself.  It is difficult to find out what you want to say.

Describe some of your recent design projects…

My recent projects include several proposals for lamps for an Italian firm, work on the concept for a fragrance for an Italian firm, a short video for Fabrica's exhibit at Centre Pompidou, and I'm working on an album of original music, I'm trying to keep drawing and getting better at exploring themes within drawing.

I've been working on sketching concepts for a series of paintings that I want to make when I will find the time and courage to make them.  It takes courage to make art, as it is a confrontation with yourself, with your abilities, and with your conscience and consciousness.  I always used to make things simply for enjoyment.  When you choose to make it your career, your relationship with it changes.  Whether or not it should is questionable, and I would like to get to a point where I no longer feel that way.  Moreover, I haven't chosen a field that is pure art; for me design is not art.  I realize this is a debate that has been going on for a long time, and it begs me to define both fields.  That might be beyond the scope of this rant...

I'll limit myself to saying that I believe design should be focused on the problem at hand, of giving a firm a viable solution to what their product should be, which arises from careful consideration of their brand, their market, and the world.  Art, on the other hand, is a creation that is a reaction to themes of any kind, that is not correlated directly to the act of producing for a market.  For me, the true artistic drive arises not out of a reaction to where someone could insert something into a market, but from an personal exploration that begs an expression.  So called "artists" who operate by finding a theme and pushing upon everyone as an affirmation of themselves in an art market, in my opinion lack sensibility, and for me art always requires sensibility and sensitivity.  However, what they are doing is, nonetheless, art- so I cannot censure them.  In this case, maybe I will have to limit myself to saying that design operates on all markets, whereas art operates on the art market, while influencing other markets sometimes directly and sometimes indirectly.

In any case, in the project for the lamps I tried to make some lamps that fit with the company and their prerogatives.  Being a more upscale manufacturer, I decided that I could allow some liberty in using more precious materials and called reference to some luxury items within the designs.  Moreover, being an Italian company, I also allowed for reference to the history of Italian design.  Furthermore, given that the company is also interested in technical innovation, I decided to try to push some ideas that would require a bit more engineering than your standard lamp.  We'll see where those projects go.  As far as the perfume is concerned, we're really looking at breaking the "sex sells" mold that perfumes seem to take.  Perfume, while associated with attractiveness and appeal, can appeal to so much more.  I don't want to say that sex doesn't sell, or that perfume isn't also correlated to making oneself attractive or more at ease.  But, fuck!  Can't a perfume say something more, can't it become a more interesting experience?  I'm putting on a perfume, not masturbating.

With regard to the short video, I made a song about how thinking too much is counter productive, and if you just sit and think, then you're never going to get a single thing done, and you'll probably go insane.  The images are all of me doing random things while smoking.  I smoke a lot.  It gives me some thinking space.  I smoke far too much, it gets in the way of me finishing anything.  In the Kurosawa movie, Dodes'ka-den, there's a character who spends his days thinking about the wonderful, luxurious palace he's going to build.  He entertains his son with stories of this palace, and his son takes care of his father because his father is so absorbed in his musings.  Eventually the child dies of starvation because the father never bothered to feed the child.

The paintings I want to make are going to explore the torment of love.  I went to the Musee' D'Orsay in Paris and the painting that touched me most was by Toulouse-Lautrec and is called Le Lit.  I kind of have that painting in mind as a reference for what I want to make.  I have no clue what to think of love.  I think this is the case with most people.  My favorite love poem is Brown Penny, by WB Yeats.

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What’s next?

I don't know what's next, but I'm hoping to look forward to it. I'll look forward to next once next has arrived.