The Art of Visual Design: The Rhetoric of Aesthetics in Technical Communication

Purpose: By recognizing the importance of aesthetics, which have infused technical communication for centuries, designers can more effectively meet audience expectations and achieve key rhetorical goals, including heightening audience engagement, arousing emotion, and enhancing credibility and persuasiveness. Designers can integrate aesthetics into technical communications by deploying visual conventions generated by larger cultural forces, by applying design principles that foster beauty, and by inventing novel forms. Methods: Aesthetic theory, both ancient and modern, and insights from practitioners create a foundation for defining beauty; research and usability studies examining audience preferences provide empirical evidence about the functional value of aesthetics; and aesthetic developments in the nineteenth century and the subsequent shift to Modernism serve to illustrate the cultural influences on design. The Design Methods Movement affords a springboard for exploring the design process and the nature of creativity. Results: Although theorists and practitioners hold conflicting views on the role of aesthetics in functional design, many consider it an important factor that makes designs attractive and engaging to audiences. The pursuit of beauty continues today through the application of culturally based conventions and design principles associated with beauty. Conclusion: The cultural knowledge embedded in visual aesthetics operates silently, even imperceptibly, as technical communicators deploy aesthetic conventions to meet audience expectations and to streamline their design processes. At the same time, technical communicators need leeway for creativity and novelty as they adapt visual elements to specific rhetorical situations, often seeking audience feedback about their aesthetic preferences to create engaging, persuasive, and usable designs.