Epilogue: Designs for the Display of Information

The following comes from the epilogue of Edward R. Tufte’s book on graphical information design, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. In his book, Tufte outlines a systematic approach to to the design of graphs and visual information, but in the epilogue warns against too much emphasis on rules and “word authority” to direct the design process or judge the final visual solution.

Design is choice. The theory of the visual display of quantitative information consists of principles that generate design options and that guide choices among options. The principles should not be applied rigidly or in a peevish spirit; they are not logically or mathematically certain; and it is better to violate any principle than to place graceless or inelegant marks on paper. Most principles of design should be greeted with some skepticism, for word authority can dominate our vision, and we may come to see only through the lenses of word authority rather than with our own eyes.

What is to be sought in designs for the display of information is the clear portrayal of complexity. Not the complication of the simple; rather the task of the designer is to give visual access to the subtile and the difficult—that is,
      the revelation of the complex.