2.1 Innovative Thinking
2.1.1 Ceramic Art
Created with water, fire, and soil, ceramics has a long history originating from the
Neolithic Age. In ancient times, ceramics was a necessity in people’s daily lives,
representing their need for esthetics and practicality in life [7]. After long-term practice and evolution, ceramics has become an important symbol
of traditional culture and modern art [8]. With the development of ceramic art, it has gradually transformed from a daily necessity
into an important tool for expressing emotions and carrying ideological and cultural
values. Ceramics gradually developed its own unique artistic esthetics and social
value [9]. With the continuous development of ceramic art, it has gradually become an innovative
cultural form. Due to its stable and unchangeable characteristics, ceramic art has
now been used in various artistic creations, thus fully reflecting the humanistic
and economic aspects of ceramics.
Ceramic art has continuously developed throughout history. From simple ceramic vessels
to exquisite porcelain, from ovens to machine manufacturing, and from ancient to modern
times, it has been loved and pursued by a large number of people. Among them, ceramics
is not only a traditional form of art, but a cultural inheritance. It not only continues
the craftsmanship and creative spirit of ancestors, but becomes more rich and profound
with the changes in dynasties, thus making ceramic art an important symbol of an era.
The development and evolution of ceramic art in its unique forms showcases an understanding
of society and culture, and reflects the state of social and cultural development
as well as the living habits and standards of people at different times.
Ceramics combines practicality and esthetics, creating a pleasing sensation through
shape, color, materials, and inherent beauty. Practicality is the foundation of pottery,
while esthetics and symbols are the soul of pottery. With the development of society,
quality of life for the masses continues to improve, and people have new requirements
from both spiritual and cultural aspects. For ceramic art, people are no longer satisfied
with its esthetic and symbolic nature, but pay more attention to innovation in design
thinking. On the basis of improving existing ceramics, enterprises continue to develop
new varieties with higher requirements for the design of ceramic products.
2.1.2 Design Innovation
Innovation thinking emphasizes putting people first in the designs, paying attention
to people’s needs and expectations, while fully considering factors such as customer
personality, behavioral habits, and social environment in order to achieve the perfect
value from design. Design thinking is a kind of creative thinking [10]. Innovation in design thinking includes original design, improved design, and vacancy
design. Original design innovation requires designers to integrate creative ideas
and thinking into the design process, while also considering the needs of social development,
so that the ultimately formed creative works can meet the needs of consumers. Improved
design innovation requires designers to improve existing products in order to achieve
better product performance and user experience; vacant design innovation refers to
designers not fully considering the needs of social development. There are deficiencies
or imperfections in some product functions, resulting in defects in the use of the
product. This is also very important innovative thinking. Specifically, the important
role of design innovation thinking in ceramic art can be manifested at three levels.
a) Improving Artistic Appearance
Ceramic products on the market are identical, and people often hesitate to buy. Therefore,
designers need to change their design concepts and strive to incorporate innovative
elements. Designers can create different shapes based on the age of end users, and
design new shapes for different ceramic applications to provide customers with more
choices and promote the sale of ceramic products.
b) Enhancing Value
The reason ceramic products with extremely high historical value have attracted more
attention lies in the methods used in the design process, which can fully demonstrate
the cultural characteristics of their era. Therefore, innovation in design thinking
can effectively enhance the value of ceramic products and make them more contemporary.
c) Enhancing Practicality
When using ceramic products, people often pay more attention to their practical value,
which requires designers to continuously personalize and innovate designs while meeting
consumer needs. In this process, as long as ceramic products are closer to meeting
the needs of the end users, people have greater recognition of the design. For example,
ceramics used in daily life are relatively bulky, so designers should pay attention
to comfort in using ceramic products when designing them. At this point, designers
should fully consider the impact of ergonomics. For example, when designing a pot
handle, it is important to consider the length of the handle and comfort in the grip.
In addition, more attention should be paid to the smoothness in the connection between
the handle and the body in order to improve the user experience.
2.1.3 Requirements Evaluation
The key to ceramic art design lies in the artistic conception and creation, and every
design should be a new realm. Design work cannot be static. However, due to the wide
audience and development direction of ceramic art, its design must take into account
the practical issue of market demand. This leads to a contradiction between independence
in design innovation and identity from mass production. Therefore, designers need
to spend time combining artistic esthetics to think about the original meaning of
the product, while also adapting to the practical problem of industrial production.
Original design refers to the fact that when designing ceramic art, designers must
adhere to the principle of identity reproduction. That is to say, ceramic art designers
must integrate their own creative thinking and design into every detail of ceramic
art works to make them artistic and esthetically pleasing. Therefore, ceramic art
designers should pay attention to creative thinking and design that not only takes
into account the artistic and esthetic aspects of ceramic works but factors such as
functionality, economy, and modernity to ensure that ceramic artwork has stronger
practicality and higher ornamental value.
a) Functionality
Products without practical value cannot succeed in the market. The same goes for ceramic
art, which is closely related to people’s lives. People need ceramics because they
can better meet people’s daily and esthetic needs. If a product can meet certain requirements
and achieve certain functions, it can be said that the product meets the principle
of functionality. The starting point in designing ceramic products is centered around
functionality. Without function, any creation would lose its meaning. Outstanding
ceramic artworks often focus on practical functions when they are created. Many good
ceramic designs not only have innovative creativity but also pay more attention to
a functional role. In terms of styling, many works change shape to increase and highlight
functional features. Therefore, in ceramic design creation, functionality should be
focused on, which is also the basis and premise of innovative thinking in ceramic
art design.
b) Economy
Ceramic art is a commodity that prioritizes meeting people’s daily needs, and it serves
a wide audience. Therefore, in ceramic art design, both the relationship with people’s
lives and economic factors should be considered. In this sense, economy refers to
the design of products that need to be popularized and affordable for the public to
consume. If the production process of a ceramic art product is complex and expensive,
even if it has a unique design, it will still be difficult for the public to consume
and will lose market share. Therefore, in the innovation of ceramic art design, it
is necessary to consider economic factors, especially the production process. Otherwise,
even well-designed ceramics cannot reflect economic benefits and popularity if the
production process is cumbersome and costly. Therefore, the principle of economy should
be implemented in ceramic art design, which is also of universal significance in contemporary
design.
c) Contemporaneity
The modern information society has promoted rapid updating of esthetic ideas. In ceramic
art design, it is necessary to fully consider the impact of the rapid development
of modern society on people’s esthetic concepts, and to face the current trend of
high-tech and information technology development. During the creative process, the
contemporary nature of ceramic art requires designers to consider the uncertain factors
that are inherent in the work itself, and the new ideas brought about by the development
of science and information technology. In contemporary ceramic art, it is necessary
to integrate these uncertain factors and new ideas into its creation, and to combine
inheritance and innovation to ensure that the designed work has strong vitality.
2.2 Artificial Intelligence
AI is an emerging technology that simulates, expands, and upgrades the principles,
technologies, and application systems of human intelligence. The concept of AI mainly
includes two levels: intelligence and artificiality [11]. Between them, artificiality means that is goes against nature. The term intelligence
encompasses a broader category. With the development of modern society, AI technology
plays an increasingly important role in the field of art and design [12,13].
Currently, there are two ways to research AI. One is based on information technology,
with the goal of achieving machine learning and memory; another approach is to use
methods such as artificial neural networks to simulate biological intelligence and
obtain intelligence features [14]. Man is the only animal with intellectual characteristics. Studying the structure
and working methods of the human brain and neural networks is an important direction
for the future development of AI [15]. With the development of AI theory, interaction technology is also undergoing tremendous
changes. The principle of interaction technology is that the operator inputs relevant
instructions into the machine through an input device in one or more modalities, and
then the machine feeds back the information to the operator through an output device
or display device. Interaction technology is the most direct means of communication
between humans and machines, which enables operators to quickly obtain information
and control machines more effectively. At the same time, interaction technology can
also achieve human-machine interaction through interfaces, thereby improving intelligence
in the machines. With the rapid development of computer networks, AI, and other technologies,
the intelligence and automation in machines are becoming increasingly high-level.
Based on AI theory combined with interaction technology, the ceramic art innovation
design framework is shown in Fig. 1.
Fig. 1. The ceramic art design innovation framework.
In Fig. 1, we can see that the innovative thinking model for ceramic art design explored in
this article mainly consists of five parts: design goal input, design variable analysis,
data organization and classification, feature extraction, and task requirement positioning.
Among them, the input of design objectives mainly includes the design objective’s
definition, a user requirement analysis, and idea generation; design variable analysis
mainly includes creative evaluation and screening; data organization and classification
includes prototype design; feature extraction includes iteration and optimization
design; and task requirement positioning includes technical realization. Ceramic art
design innovation is a new thinking model with polynomial characteristics. It considers
$s$ ceramic art design innovation variables. Each variable has an integrable output
and input signal. The input-output relationship of design variables can be expressed
as follows:
In the formula, $x_{n}$ and $y_{n}$ are the input and output of $n$’th design variables,
respectively.
The interaction between designers and design variables is achieved through model connections.
The set of all connections is defined as $L$. $Out_{L}$ is the design variable for
transmitting output; $In_{L}$ is the design variable for transmitting input.
It is assumed that the input relationship between design variables and design objective
$d_{n}\left(t\right)$ is as follows:
The output relationship between design variables and design objective $d_{n}\left(t\right)$
is as follows:
Among them, $\alpha _{L}$ is the connection weight, and $I_{n}$ is the input connection
set for the $n$’th design variable.
Due to its non-linear nature, $d_{n}\left(t\right)$ is highly susceptible to external
interference that affects its correctness. Therefore, it needs to be optimized.
For the optimization problem with $s$ design variables and $m$ optimization objectives,
if the constraint conditions are ignored, its form can be expressed as follows:
The formula is
In formulas 4 and 5, $N$ is the vector composed of design variables, $\delta $ is
the feasible domain, and $g\left(N\right)$ is the optimization objective vector. Under
the optimization goal, the key to the implementation process of innovative thinking
in ceramic art design based on AI lies in the rational and effective use of design
software to reproduce creativity, which transforms abstract creativity into concrete
forms to achieve optimization of ceramic art design. This is a complex and detailed
process that involves multiple disciplines, including art, architecture, craftsmanship,
materials science, and so on. Designers can help themselves better understand design
ideas and make improvements by utilizing thinking models to reproduce creativity.
Specifically, in the process of ceramic art design, the use of thinking models can
achieve objective analysis of design variables. The final results not only provide
designers with more creative sources, but also expand the scope of design. This can
help designers fully consider the local effects that the artwork itself can produce,
and the possible effects that the work may elaborate on in a larger scale when creating
it. After classifying the relevant design variables and the data as a whole, designers
can extract elements from different categories and generate a set of element resources.
Designers can make reasonable applications of various types based on actual design
needs.
In addition, the innovative design thinking model of ceramic art based on AI technology
can bring the needs of end users into the design process. Combined with interactive
technology, designers can use market data to analyze consumer orientation and behavior.
At the same time, it is also possible to mine and develop potential demand data, classify
the data as a whole, extract product information features, accurately convey them
to consumers, and locate their task requirements based on a deep understanding and
analysis of the product. A detailed and thorough design process can provide clear
manufacturing ideas for later digital manufacturing, which greatly reduces the repetitiveness
of the design process and improves design efficiency. In order to better analyze end
user interactions and serve them, introducing artificial intelligence can not only
effectively and conveniently mine and analyze data, but also promotes more diverse
forms of information transmission and stronger real-time interactivity. While improving
the user experience, it also makes ceramic art and design innovation more intelligent.