Post Modernism

Post Modernism was a movement that started in the late 20th century. It is a term applied to a diversity of arts, including literature, art, philosophy, architecture, fiction and cultural and literacy criticism. Its focus was on questioning the harmony of form follows function and uses all methods; materials and colours. It rejected modernism and played a huge role in what was called "the plastic arts".

"Post" because it rejects any ultimate principles, and lacks optimism of the "modern mind" characteristics, such as there being any scientific, philosophical or religious truth explanation. Philosopher Richard Tarnas once stated that post-modernism "cannot on its own principles ultimately justify itself any more than can the various metaphysical overviews against which the postmodern mind has defined itself."

Scorpion Teapot designed 1984 by Peter Shire, United States. Made out of glazed earthenware, 16-1/4 inches high. Shire used to work with the Milan-based Memphis design group. He was one of the first proponents of what is now known as Post-Modernism. This piece is an excellent example of his fractured, constructivist style.

Post-modernism is still an inspiration to designers today. The aluminium lamp above was designed recently by a modern designer and is said to come in different shapes and sizes. 

not mentioned. (2013). aluminium lamps. Available: http://trendsupdates.com/aluminum-lamps-hark-back-at-the-era-of-postmodernism/. Last accessed 20th november 2013.

not mentioned. (2007). eccentric teapot. Available: http://www.abbeville.com/interiors.asp?ISBN=089659923X&CaptionNumber=02. Last accessed 20th november 2013.

What is Design?

Design is everywhere you look. It is the initial sketching ideas, finished products, a building, a decorative pattern.. Designer Richard Seymour once said that it is "making things better for people". It is emphasized by people's behavior and quality of living. It is fundamental because everything around us was once designed. We take it for granted because it a part of our everyday lives, but founder of international consultancy Bill Moggridge reminds us that "A lot of trial and error goes into making things look effortless."


Some main principles to keep in mind when designing are;

Creativity
-A design has to fulfill a need. The more creative, innovative, different and impressive it is, the more there's a chance the user will want it. The common sense solution is not always the right one, a designer needs to feel the need to explore every idea that pops in his mind, even the queer ones. 

Design in collaboration with the Public
-Design can be used to improve a lot of things in the public sector. It can be used to make sure that the services and products designed accommodate the needs of the user, bringing innovative new perspective to the public.

Design in collaboration with Business
-Before the idea of producing something, designers need to ask themselves if the product they're going to design is really needed, if it is going to sell, if it is really innovative or if it has been already designed, if it is cheap to manufacture or not, if it is ergonomically-designed and so on. 

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The international Style

The International Style

-Started in Western Europe in the 1920's

-Using geometric shapes, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropus and Miles Van der Rohe tried to create a new modern twist to architecture.

The flesh Corbusier

Le Corbusier architecture

Walter Gropius Building

Walter Gropius architecture

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Miles van der rohe building

Mies van der rohe chair





Identifiable features (as building in this era were very different to others):

     1) rectangular forms having round projections

     2) flat roof

     3) lack of ornamentation (no decorations)

     4) ribbon windows

     5) curtain walls of glass

     6) cantilevered surfaces

     7) smooth wall surfaces

     8) asymmetrical facade

International style architecture characteristics

-More popular in Europe rather then in the United States. (1920's and 30's)

-1930: American architects begun experimenting with the international style, building upon the early 20th century American trends.

-An influential modernist style in architecture that developed in Europe and the United States in the 1920's and the 1930's. Characterized chiefly by regular, unadorned geometric forms, open interiors and use of glass, steel and reinforced concrete. 

Characteristics: perception of architecture as volume rather than mass

               : regularity instead of symmetry 

               : avoidance of extraneous ornamentation

Hitchcock and Johnson

In 1932, an exhibition of Modern Architecture took place at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Hitchcock and Philip Johnson were two of the three organizers of the exhibition. They decided to call the exhibit 'The International Style'. After that, the name stuck. Some of the architects that took part in the exhibition is liked the idea of their buildings fitting in only one style genre. However, this was the way Modern architecture was heading in.

The Bauhaus

Walter Grupious founded the Bauhaus in 1919. It was a school that combined arts and crafts together. It is most known for the way it approached, publicized and taught design. nIt was closed down by Nazis in 1933.






Students came from a range of different social and educational backgrounds. They studied materials, colour theory and more specialized subjects. They also has specialized workshops which included cabinet-making, metal working, weaving,poetry, typography and wall painting.

"Art and Industry" was a slogan the school adapted when Gropius rethought the goals of the Bauhaus in 1923. He emphasized on the importance of designing for mass production.  




Grupious designed the new Bauhas Building when it moved to Weimar, Dessau in 1925. The building became a hallmark of modernist architecture. Some important characteristics of the building were
-steel frame construction
-a glass curtain wall
The best feature was the asymmetrical pinwheel plan that had maximum efficiency space.It shared Grupious distributed studio, classroom and administration.

Marcel Breuer was directing the cabinet-making workshop, which happened to be the most popular. The worked on inconveniencing the essence of furniture and dematerializing conventional forms to their minimal existance.

The metal workshop was also really popular, and in collaboraton with the cabinet-making workshop, it was the most successful workshop in designing prototypes for mass-production. Some of the most important and well-know designers were:
-Marianne Brandt, whom was the first woman in the metal workshop
-Wilhem Wogenfeld
-Christian Dell
Some of their products were even used on campus.

Marianne Brandt Tea-set; silver and ebony; 1924.

Wilhen Wagenfeld multi purpose lamp; 1930.

Christian Dell table lamp; 1926

Architect Hannes Mayer took Gruoious' place as director when he stepped down in 1928. He continued on the last director's steps and emphasized on mass-production and stressed the social function of the design and also architecture. He preached that public good was more important then private luxury.

Architect Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe the took Mayer's place in 1930, when he resigned as Bauhaus director under pressure from the municipal government of the time. Mies kept the same basic ideas of the previous directors. He had to relocate the school to Berlin in 1930 due to the unstable political situation in Germany and also due to financial conditions of the Bauhaus. He ultimately closed it down in 1933.

Many of the main designers of the Bauhaus moved to America where they spread their knowledge and teaching philosophies. They influenced the younger generation of architects and designers. 

-Marcel Breuer and Joseph Albers went to teach at Yale university.

-Walter Grupious went to teach at Harvard.

-Moholy Nagy established the new Bauhaus in Chicago in 1937.

De Stijl

After the war in the 1920's, a group of architects and designers formed a movement and called it 'De Stijl', which is Dutch for 'The Style'.                          The fonder and leader of this group of people was an architect called Theo van Doesburg. Two other important members were Gerit Rietveld and Piet Mondrian. This movement had some ideas that were influenced from DaDa.

Bauhaus Armchair 424 Red and Blue Gerrit Rietveld 1918 - Bauhaus classic

Theo van Doesburg, Cornelis van Eesteren, Model Maison d'Artiste,1923, reconstruction 1982, Collection Gemeentemuseum Den Haag 

-The basic philosophy of the group is known as Neo-Plasticism; the new plastic art. 

-This movement was all about functionality.
-Surface decoration was eliminated.
-The only colours that were allowed were primary hues and black and white only. 
-They simplified everything to vertical and horizontal directions; designed on the principle of the straight line (the square and rectangle).
-The combination of positive and negative elements was vivid in the designs. 

Rietveld’s Shroder House

-One of the very few examples of Neo-plasstic architecture is the Schroder House in the Netherlands that was designed by Gerrit Rietveld.

-This house is extremely important to this movement because one can find multiple examples of murals, ceramic and interior installations designed in the principles of Neo-plasticism, but there are very few architectural structures. The Schroder House is the only existing example that remains to this day.

Modern Artist Bryce Hudson

Bryce Hudson is one of the few contemporary artists that is presently working in the boundaries of geometric shapes, inspired by past movements. 

-His multimedia prints and altered digital representations show influences of De Stijl and the later Minimalism movement of mid 20th century cannot go unnoticed. 

Bryce Hudson“Experimentation and evolution are essential to the development of all contemporary artists… If I had to reduce my purpose as an artist down to its essence I’d easily conclude that my worth is based on the ability to grow and change with my surroundings, to inspire transformation and spark dialogue and thought in others, to always be mindful of what surrounds me (abstract or concrete) and to always formulate, reinterpret and reissue information into my own unique voice.“
— Bryce Hudson

De Stijl [online] http://char.txa.cornell.edu/art/decart/destijl/decstijl.htm [Accessed on 30th November 2013]

AD Classics: Rietveld Schroder House / Gerrit Rietveld [online] http://www.archdaily.com/99698/ad-classics-rietveld-schroder-house-gerrit-rietveld/ [Accessed on 30^th November 2013]

Bryce Hudson official website [online] http://www.brycehudson.com [Accessed on 30^th November 2013]

Organic Design

Organic Design

Frank Lloyd Wright

-Frank Lloyd Wright introduced the word 'organic' into his philosophy of architecture as early as 1908. It was an extension of the teachings of his mentor Louis Sullivan, whose slogan 'form follows function' became the mantra of modern architecture. Wright engaged this phrase to 'form and function are one', using nature as the best example of this integration. 
Frank Lloyd Wright did not personally take away the meaning of 'organic', he reinterpreted it by using it through ways and expressions through the human mind.
-For example: In organic design, one does not make a bank look like a Greek temple. 

-What is this era?
      -While organic architecture does describe environmental concerns, it also embodies the human spirit, transcending the mere act of shelter into something which shapes and enhances lives.
      -While organic architecture does describe an expression of individuality, it also explores our need to connect to nature.

-Nature is our inspiration: by creating a place which complements the environment, other systems will begin to re-generate. Understanding our place with nature, allows us to better observe our impact. Nature inspires our work and informs our actions.
-The design is just the beginning: the collection of individuals involved all contribution to the design process. Great design is the beginning of a lifelong educational process. The design begins with a journey which continues as you live in harmony with your design. 
-A 20th century trend in the architecture industry.

1930s/40s and 50s

Organic architecture has become of of the most widespread trends in the contemporary architecture in contrast to the technologically oriented extremes of functionalism that occurred in the mid 1930's. It is unlike functionalism and its careful consideration of individual needs and human psychology .

      

-After Wright's death in 1959, organic architecture dissolved entirely into the various architectural tendencies of the 1960's, which emphasized more efficient architectural designs. Several general principles, types of structure and individual devices developed into architecture continue to be widely wed in architectural and artistic design.

http://www.organicdesign.co.nz [accessed on 20th November 2013]

Pop Art

This movement started in Britain around the 1950's. The first time pop art was mentioned was during a discussion among artists from the Independent Group that was formed in the Institute of Contemporary Art in London. This movement was made up of the kids from the baby boom after the war, full of energy and rebellion against Abstract art. 
Some of its characteristics are:
-Recognizable imagery inspired from the media and products
-Images of fictional characters in comic books or well-known celebrities from advertisements and magazines
-Flat imagery
-Use of very bright colours

This movement appreciated "material culture". It did not criticize the excessive consumerism and materialism and all the consequences they brought. It just recognized them as a natural fact.
Notable artists of the Pop Art movement include:
-Andy Warhol
-Richard Hamilton
-Roy Lichtenstein
-Eduardo Paolozzi
-Pauline Boty
-Tom Wesselmann
-David Hockney
-Rosalyn Drexler

Fashion Plate 1969-70. Mediums used Lithograph, screen-print, pochoir and cosmetic on paper.

Hamilton was born in London, attended the Slade School of Art from 1948-51. In 1952 he helped found the Independent Group. In 1956, Hamilton created some of his most well known images. One of them was the "Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing?" collage-poster made in 1956.

Marilyn Diptych 1962. Medium used acrylic paint on canvas.

Andy Warhol was born in 1928 in Pittsburgh. He studied pictorial design at the Carnegie Institute of Technology. He worked as a commercial artist and in 1957 was awarded the Art Directors' Club Medal for his shoe advertisements.  From 1960, he started to make paintings that were based on mass-produced images from newspapers, magazines and so one. In 1962 he produced a series of easel paintings of, some of which were 'Campbell's Soup Cans', 'Coca-Cola Bottles', portraits of Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, Elvis Presley, Jackie Kennedy. He later produced other paintings of different subjects such as car crashes, electric chair and flowers. He sometimes stuck with the same image and repeated for several times. He is an iconic artist of the Pop Art Movement.