Design vs Art

It seems major influences in todays modern design world have come about because of the De Stijl movement that exploded on the scene in 1917. Theo van Doesburg and Piet Mondriaan the most influential of the movement wanted to express a new utopian ideal of spiritual harmony and order, pure abstraction showed universal absolutes that underlie reality.

Theo van Doesburg was intersted in reconcieving the entire living environment and instigated his theories in architecture and furniture. These influences can b seen today in a lot o the buildings that we have and in a lot of modern design theory. Because of advancements in technology, artists were becoming aware of the possibilities to design and mass produce, it was artists mainly who were bringing their fine art practise into the area of design. Now we have artists who are trying to reclaim fine art by extracting themselves from what we know as design.

"In architecture, Functionalism meant the elimination of ornament so the building plainly expressed its purpose, and the principle led to the idea of designing buildings from the inside outwards, letting the essential structure dictate the form and therefore its external appearance. Functionalist ideas about design became the dominant design philosophy and language of the first half of the century." - http://www.qdesign.co.nz/designhist_destijl.html

What is it i am trying to do? im not sure, thats what im trying to figure out. A lot of the time i hate art. 'fine art' that is, the kind of art that is ugly and takes too much intellectualising to figure out. If its art that you look at and are not captivated by it, and all you get from it is "what the hell does that mean?" then i get really frustrated and vow that i dont want to be an artist. So i thought that i could do better to be a designer, to make work that was visually stimulating yet could still hold some depth of concept. And then i went to Singapore and was immersed in a design world, and now i vow i dont want to be a designer. The designer is also creating something for the elite, not the intellectual elite, but elitism of the rich. The designers job is to tell the people what to think, to inform them of what colours are hot, what clothes they should wear etc etc, and only the rich can afford it.

This seems to be one of the big questions these days, what is the line between design and art? And my lecturers have asked me what do i think about that, and where does my art practice fit in the art world. I really dont know...
I can relate my art easily to the De Stijl artists and to some of the Abstract Expressionists, because of their philosophies to do with colour and design relating to spirituality. But it was these artists who had major influences in the design world. maybe itsjust that the design world has degraded....

Anyways i dont just want to base my ideas on these people before me, and likewise neither did they. Mondrian took a lot of ideas from other movements like Futurism and Cubism and the Fuctionalists of architecture, he experimented with them before inventing a new movement.
I guess this is what i want to do as well, i want to start my own avant garde.
Van Doesburg was interested in reconceiving the entire living space, i am also interested in that but not just on the physical level, i want to extend these philosophies into the living area of the spiritual. While Mondrian would only use straight lines and primary colours to talk about a universal spirituality and utopian ideal, i think the circle holds more weight to engage the spiritual. So im building on and expanding to create my own philosphies of a new style of art making.