OPEN_______

Author

• Eitan Boiarsky, Rhode Island School of DesignFollow

Date of Award

Spring 5-22-2026

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Industrial Design

Department

Industrial Design

First Advisor

Beth Moser

Second Advisor

Jamer Hunt

Third Advisor

Emily Cornell Du Houx

Abstract

This thesis examines how ambiguity can function as a deliberate design strategy rather than a condition to eliminate. While modern design traditions have prioritized clarity, efficiency, and immediate legibility, this work revisits Umberto Eco's concept of the Open Work and Oskar Hansen's Open Form to argue that openness is not a failure of design but a method within it.

Through a series of workshops and object-based experiments, ambiguity is structured as a design instrument that invites interpretation rather than delivering fixed meaning. Participants encounter unfamiliar forms with deliberately withheld information, producing moments of hesitation, speculation, and reinterpretation. These encounters demonstrate that ambiguity can prolong engagement and shift interpretive agency from designer to user – and that this shift can be intentionally staged.

The thesis develops this argument across three scales: the object, the encounter, and the context. At the scale of the object, form and material are calibrated to suggest use without confirming it. At the scale of the encounter, workshops and home deployments test how interpretation unfolds individually and collectively. At the scale of context, lightweight and portable forms carry this mode of participation beyond art and design environments into everyday settings. Together, these scales define ambiguity not as aesthetic vagueness, but as a structured design condition.

Recommended Citation

Boiarsky, Eitan, "OPEN_______" (2026). Masters Theses. 1544.
https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/masterstheses/1544

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.