The CODE-X series catalogs a vast codex of source codes (aka “signs”) extracted from past audits.

The object of study in semiotics is not the signs but rather a general theory of signification; the goal of each “audit” is to build a model demonstrating how meaning is produced and received within a category or cultural territory. Signs on their own, therefore, only become truly revelatory and useful once we’ve sorted them into thematic complexes, and the complexes into codes, and the codes into a meaning map. We call this process “thick description”; the Code-X series is thin description.

“INTERRUPTED FLOW” NORM: Pain puts kinks in the smooth flow of my daily life.

“INTERRUPTED FLOW” FORMS: Mostly a female-oriented code, in which we see women as depicted as busy multitasking persons for whom maintaining a “flow” state is crucial. Depictions of products and processes that are flexible, resilient, adaptive — they flow, like waves. Shapes and lines are “feminine” — curved, flexible.

From a proprietary 2019 study of the Back to Normal space within the Pain category (US).