Jan van Toorn is one of the arch-fathers of the debate in the Netherlands and abroad on the social and cultural responsibility of designers. Since the late 1960s, he has consistently advocated a design culture which takes into account that information cannot be neutral: a design should show where it comes from, the designer should reveal who’s talking, and which interests guide the message. Van Toorn focused on meaning rather than smooth stylistic expression and developed critical alternatives to the usual design world conventions. Van Toorn aligned himself with the reflexive tradition of art and communication exemplified by Brecht and Godard.
