In this six-part column, curator and cultural critic james taylor-foster explores spatial and design imaginaries through the lens of the body. Rather than looking at the systems we have constructed to understand the world, these texts explore our own visceral construction to reveal something of how we orient and experience life. This column pauses to consider the unusual relationships between the shapes of ourselves and the designed world.

Not so long ago, an exhibition — Cute — opened in London. In a description that reads like a failed GPT prompt, the show promises to “unravel cuteness’ emotive charge” — a sentence that provoked a line of thought. I’m not often described as a particularly cute individual, nor am I all that easily distracted by cuteness. Cuteness seems to me to be something that exists outside of myself; that which is universally ‘cute’— Hello Kitty, Japanese mascot culture, cats mimicking people, domesticated hedgehogs, elderly couples holding hands, toddlers behaving like adults, the Warawara, Minions — is more of a societal bind. Cute is often perceived as an accidental bonus. Those things that appear helpless, frail, and vulnerable give rise to one of the most primal forces we know.

Cuteness is not ephemeral. Its triggers are traceable, recreatable, and deeply set in the primordial brain. As such, cuteness is a design tool used to manipulate, exploit, addict, cajole, and seduce. Expressions of cuteness compel us to nurture a baby or give shelter to an abandoned animal. Over time, it has become a device — when something powerful masquerades as innocuous it inevitably becomes a tool. Even if you missed The Mandalorian, you likely had an image of baby Yoda thrown at you on one screen or another. Let’s pause at baby Yoda for a moment: the core plot of this Star Wars spin-off is, to all intents and purposes, the self-sacrificial protection of a big-eyed, tiny, green thing with emotive ears and wispy hair. A warrior melts at the cuteness of it all. Even though the baby cannot talk, it harbours powers – and is unaware of its own strength. Similarly, society sometimes feels oblivious to the potency of cuteness. A similar logic could also be applied to Pikachu, the yellow Pokémon who, despite its lovability, can discharge enough energy from its rosy-red cheeks to massacre a platoon. Both characters have been crushingly successful as self-perpetuating marketing tools. Adorability has gradually manifested as one of the greatest commodities: the merchandise is boundless.

We have become collectively attuned to infectious cuteness, at once seeking it out and then basking in the ways it bonds and satiates us. Cuteness seems to saturate every feed and facet of designed society: advertisement, typography, entertainment, foods, human-to-human interactions, and far more besides. Perhaps those that follow us, should they be around and interested in what came before, will define our moment as the epoch of cute: a period in which we succumbed on a grand, blind scale to the power of big eyes, plump cheeks, and nose boops without fully acknowledging the immensity of its influence. Some are pointing to the fact that so-called ‘cute aggression’— the desire to do harm to something devastatingly adorable, albeit harmlessly — is surprisingly common. When overwhelmed by something cute, some feel obliged to “squeeze it to death.” When I was growing up, I recall being baffled by those who looked at a child and screamed: “I just want to eat you up!” — an objectively terrifying thing to suggest.

Cuteness is slippery; things and feelings glide over and around it. The Face Holding Back Tears emoji, which I have a tendency to overuse, is somehow indicative. What it conveys is context dependent and relational but, according to Emojipedia, “may be used to express a range of emotions including sadness, anger, embarrassment, admiration, and gratitude.” In-between this odd gamut of emotions lies something else, however: a default state of distance or dismissiveness, perhaps? A desire to be read by another as all-feeling and ready to reciprocate? Perhaps it means neither of these. This is how confusing cute has become.

At the core of it all, a certain tenderness remains. The concept (or cult) of cute proves that manipulation, for good or bad, is a foundation of human connection. We may not hold it with the same reverence that we offer to the likes of love or misery but, in the end, it is just as formidable. In the opening chapter of The Power of Cute, Simon May makes a bold statement. Cute, he writes, is “colonising our world,” hinting not only towards the fact that we can all sense its “faintly menacing subversion of boundaries,” but that we enjoy it, and actively promote it in our inner lives and among friends. It’s helpful to remind ourselves that, etymologically, the word we use today is a shortening of ‘acute’ — to be clever, or shrewd. Cute has evolved from cunning through care and now, perhaps, is simply the amniotic fluid we are swimming in.

Bio
james taylor-foster is a writer, cultural critic, and curator of design and digital culture trained in architecture. They are the curator of contemporary architecture and design at ArkDes, and have developed a number of curatorial projects in Stockholm including Cruising Pavilion: Architecture, Gay Sex and Cruising Culture and Space Popular: Value in the Virtual, alongside public installations with Studio Ossidiana, Swedish Girls, and others. They curated WEIRD SENSATION FEELS GOOD – the first museum exhibition to explore the culture and creative field of ASMR, currently touring. Most recently, they worked with Joar Nango and collaborators to present Girjegumpi: The Sámi Architecture Library in the Nordic Pavilion at the 18th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Their first collaborative collection of essays, softspot, was published in 2021 (InOtherWords).

Credits:
Cover image: Martin Simonic (2023)