Focusing on specific examples, describe the
way that modernist art & design was a response to the forces of modernity.
Modernism began in 1908, but did not
receive the true admiration until the 1920’s. It is not a static concept &
is influenced through a set of fixed rules. Although modernity is just a small
fraction of history the rapid chance created an overwhelming advancement and
therefore left a constant search for renewal within society. Modernity is
signified as the most powerful movement in design during the 20th
century. And the movement included ideas that derived from the Industrial
Revolution. The decade running up towards the World War 1 observed people
losing their jobs due to machines taking over, with mass production become more
viable.
‘Modernisation, modernity and modernism
- three concepts around which thought about the modern world and its
culture has tended to revolve' (Harrison, 1997, London, pp6)
In this quote by Charles Harrison, he
says that physical structures are changing around individuals. Modernism
development can be connected to the procedure of Industrialisation &
Urbanisation. Paris amongst other cities has become a location for a ‘modern’
experience and therefore brought sightseers from outside of the city, to come
and visit & feel the new visual culture & therefore find work while
they are visiting the country this is know as the period of Internationalism.
People arrived to contribute into a
fast developing civilization period of this time. Everyone wanted to gain as of
the inexperienced life, with a need to progress and re-correct & better
their life. This is was modernity was about and this is what they had to do to
progress on from earlier accouterments. Another response to the forces of
modernity is the modernization of Paris, and the revolutionary alterations
Georges Eugene Haussmann created. Haussmann was bitterly known as Baron
Haussmann, he was linked to the rebuilding of France. This is also superiorly
known as the process of Haussmannisation
All the radical changes throughout
Paris architecture were related to Haussmann and he was liable for the
fundamental changes within the city. Such as the huge boulevards destroying the
medieval small boulevards, and therefore the poor and the crime having to
retire to the outskirts of Paris. This wasn’t marked in the metropolis and was
a signal for change within the urbanized society that was launching to advance.
After World War 1, particularly in
Europe, there was a desire for agreement and a communal society, with war
veterans wanting to change the world for the better. Germany became very
deprived due to the amount of debts they needed to repay, therefore created
depression that mainly the worse felt on Germany, consequently other countries
felt threatened as they thought Germany would become very powerful and restart
the war. To pay & service the large debts the German government owed. The
German reserve bank began printing money to the position where money became
worthless. This dropped the country into a deeper depression this we now refer
to as the Great Depression. As money was short in the society people could no
loner afford the expensive items, which was mainstream before the Great War.
Designs were stripped back therefore to accommodate for the cash flow of the
community. A good example of this is Marcel Breuer’s Wassily Chair
(fig. 4), which will be talked about in
further detail towards the end of the essay. Modernism arose & and tried to
stipulate a robust vision for the populace. Designers wanted to create mass
producible goods that everyone could access, which also would have a widespread
appeal. Which therefore would have to excel everyone’s preferences &
difference in taste. This is why they wanted to control the machine, which
where before it has defeated. To achieve
the universal appeal they used the result of geometrical abstraction &
removal of ornamentation. Forms was stripped their essentials only,
highlighting the inventions basic characteristics.
Formerly came Internationalism this is
debatably one of the reasons why modernist design is pursued after & also
why it’s so highly priced as it attracts to all in society in present times.
This is all due to the age of modernity as new materials & machines are now
available to create novel designs that were once impossible to manufacture. The
Industrial age provided designers with a chance to revamp the city’s metropolis
in a new mechanical method, where machines now represent everyday life. This
developed various disagreements as modernity changed the way designers thought.
Now designs where based upon grips and geometric shapes and therefore it would
be timeless and posses the same refinements as geometry. This connects back to
the impression of internationalism & likewise is able to create a timeless
piece.
Alongside
modernism came an aim ‘A vision of how the designed world could transform human
consciousness and improve material conditions’. (Greenhalgh, P, 1990, pp3). During the era of economic
crisis the growth of industrialisation was expanding largely and therefore came
the need of mass production, in which the Bauhaus (fig. 1) took the opportunity
for the designers to develop this process during the industrial atmosphere by
the construction of the Bauhaus using basic materials and simple structure.
The
Bauhaus (fig. 1) largely influenced the 20th century design through
its promotion of modernism. Walter Groupius designed the Bauhaus (fig. 1) structure
himself, the design morals that have been used are ‘truth to materials’ &
‘from follows function’ intending that it has been stripped down to reduce it
to the most minimal form for only the essential needs, doing its envisioned
intention, therefore is not built to look effective within the aesthetics. The
materials they used to build the structure was not extravagant as they wanted
make it easily accessible to the whole population, and also affordable. This is
therefore closing the gap of class division and bringing them together in one
institution. The colour of the building is also an important factor to the
classical modernism structure. They needed to connote transparency &
tenuousness the application of colour was aided through the materials used on
the building and the use of rough & smooth textures. This is emphasising
not only the functional
building for the location of the spaces, but also in the sense of practical
use. The building is not static as it may seem that it’s made from concrete but
it’s only the skeleton of a building.
"In
the words of Wolf von Eckardt, the Bauhaus 'created the patters and set the
standards of present-day industrial design; it helped to invent modern
architecture; it altered the look of everything from the chair you are sitting
in to the page you are reading now."(Postell, 2012,pp348)
Postell
illustrates the power and significance of the educational ideas on the world we
live in today. Because we are a class so preoccupied with both our own
originality, and the brute world around us, the approaches by which we project
into homes and possessions, is very important to our knowledgeable progression,
level of stability, and comfort while in our surroundings. This is why the
ideology detained by the Bauhaus school are so valuable, because to our present
culture they have influenced the way we view our society by connecting art with
craftsmanship, and bringing the attractive, practical, and principle into the
reality of our environmental world.
The
concept of functionalism is also brought through within the design as you can
see the interior from the exterior due to the full glass wall. And finally
there is no curves or complicated forms within the building as they are all
flat panels joining together with right angles. The completed Bauhaus, with its simple
cubic forms and glass surfaces, was seen to have announced a new international
architectural style. This deprived style of the modernist design gave an
uninteresting design connoting internationalism for its universal appeal its
wants to achieve.
In Germany, the Bauhaus was changing
the way they taught art & design they replaced the traditional teacher
pupil working with group of artists working together bring each industry
together and therefore replicating the modern day life. The Bauhaus movement
arose when architects & artists began to rebuild their relationship after
the Great War in Europe. The Bauhaus established the tone of modernist design
and what it would finally become on either side of the Atlantic for partial of
the 20th century.
“No
designer experiences disciplinary boundaries when they work” (Newark, 2007,
pp118). This statement is a perfect example of the designer Herbert Bayer who
rebelled against the typographic traditions, in the typeface ‘Universal’ (fig.
2) as typography usually has a variance of strokes & curves originating
from calligraphy. Instead Bayer has created his typeface through using the obliterated
use of uppercase letters as he considers the function of them to be
unnecessary, as capital letters do not expose any difference in speech. The font
has been invented through the arrangement of circles and straight lines, using
a consistent thickness in strokes. This form demonstrates a highly functional
approach through the use of a radically basic font. Bayer’s prevalent
avant-garde thinking about form follows function, due to his obstinate &
erratic typeface.
'in
classic times capital letters (the only letters in use) were drawn with a slate
pencil and incised with a chisel. no doubt their form was intimately associated
with these tools. lower case developed in the early middle ages from the use of
the pen, and therefore inherits the characteristics of handwriting.' (Bierut,
Helfand, Heller & Poynor, 1999, pg61)
Bayer’s
argument has elaborated through his awareness of print at industrial scale. The
steam powered rotary printing press & mass production of printed work
brought Bayer’s typeface to be modern by the reason of social & economical
understanding. In his thesis he explains that the typewriter would benefit from
the lower-case typeface as it would reduce the cost due to the lack in
mechanisms and the shift key, and also raise the speed in which people
type. As where mass production is
concerned Bayer writes that the lower-case alphabet would benefit the economy
by only having a single case alphabet as it would reduce prices in typeset
& printers establishments would be saving space due to the smaller type
sets, this solution shows a typical social modernist view. It was effective communication that was the
most important to the protagonist of modernism, and therefore this typeface was
visualised to be at an ideal standard. As the society shrunk due to the
industrialisation & transportation the way in which graphic designers
communicated with people needed to strengthen the idea of social change was an
enhancement to society. Bayer understood the limitless application & the
cumulative significance of graphic design in the social environment, he noted
that people was reading more than before and therefore appreciated that
contemporary needed to be legible & readable. Bayer also went to add on
that typography needed to be read from far afield without difficulty, which is
also reflecting the rapid pace in society. Supportive of the san-serif fonts
Bayer implies that roman typefaces are inappropriate for the quick paced city
setting.
Bayer
was not the only designer to use the system of geometric lettering. And Josef
Albers also used this method as he built out letters out of replicated
geometric constitutes to create his typeface named the stencil (fig 3). This
follows a very similar direction of using geometric principles. He created a
tool for reproducing the forms of the letters through a glass stencil, this is
a more rigorous approach than Bayer’s universal alphabet (fig. 2). They shared
the same constructivist and de
stilj esthetic for design. Although Alber’s typeface (fig. 3) carries a key
fault of which the main function is for reading and therefore needs to be
legible as he wanted it to be more stylistic typeface he sacrificed the
legibility & the use of it been an everyday font. They both are largely
promoting the increasing economic pace of the modern world, and are both
downgrading the typefaces to the essential components.
One of the most important contributions
of the Bauhaus is in the field of furniture design. The most legendary piece of modernist furniture
design is by Marcel
Breuer called ‘Model B3 chair’ later to be renamed
the ‘Wassily Chair’ named after it was linked to artist Wassily Kandinsky, who
had been a member of the faculty with Breuer at the Bauhaus. This is a famous due to it capabilities
of never losing its significance in the world of design, due to the capability
to be mass-produced, and at the time governments were embracing
mass-productivity.
With the creation of new materials such as metal tubing and leather, also the
aid of manufacturing techniques he has invented a fundamental change in the
trend of interior design. The chair is simple, aesthetically pleasing &
uses minimal amount of material, to create the look of basic design and
therefore widening the ideology of modernism ‘form follows function’. The
extruded nickel tubes provides a feather light effect, therefore makes it cheap
to produce and easily mass producible. Mass productions of substance allows you
to produce a large amount of goods with a small amount of time and money. The
following statement strengthens this ideology:
“Modern
man, who no longer dresses in historical garments but wears modern clothes,
also needs a modern home appropriate to him and his time, equipped with all the
modern devices of daily use.” (Wingler, 1978, pp109).
This
reflects what Marcel Breuer was attempting to do when he designed the ‘Wassily
Chair’. The fluid minimal design is complex in appearance but simple in
structure. Its sleek & functional look represents industrial aesthetics and
still carries associations & influences today within design.
The
chair itself has similarities to the ‘Barcelona chair’ created by Mies van der
roh’s (fig. 5) The ‘Barcelona chair’ (fig.5) was deeply inspired by
campaign and folding chairs of the ancient times. The frame of the chair was
made differently to the ‘Wassily chair’ (fig.4) as it was made by bolting it
together but was later redesigned using a frame of stainless steel which gave
the ‘Barcelona chair’ a prime and very attractive look. As for the material,
the pigskin that was used earlier was replaced with leather around 1950s, which
therefore is the same material used at the chair made by Breuer. The main similarity is the tubular bent
steel frame, also the slightly tilted seat that is resembled as a proud angle
and not perpendicular to the floor. Mies van der roh’s concentration on the
advancement of the ‘Wassily chair’ was the cantilever as a primary focus,
whereas the ‘Wassily chair’ has the basic four leg function. This chair was
also very expensive to make unlike the ‘Wassily chair’ (fig.5) as it was
created after the great depression.
The
comparisons between (fig 4 & fig 5) is that they both are made up largely
of geometric forms, although they have used as few as possible to create the
desired effect they have both used shapes to influence their design, which also
makes it minimalistic and sleek as there is no unnecessary forms produced.
Which leads me onto my second point of the term “form follows function’ they
both have used this to create a visual impact without lessening the function.
They have both strived for beauty without impacting the function of the design.
This was successful within (fig 4) but (fig 2) did not take after its name
Universal as it wasn’t very popular but was used largely within the Bauhaus
exhibitions, it was the main contribution to the rapid congregation of
sans-serif typefaces. Although they are both still used largely in todays
everyday society. Finally they are both very understated due to only the main
commodities used to create the design. Which is arguably suitable for the
increasing profitable pace of the modernist world, these both represent primary
efforts to reduce their design to their vital components, removing any
inessential ornamentation.
To
conclude the earlier examples in this essay have reinforced the idea of how
these designs was a force to modernity. Societies shift in cultural thinking
& machinery advancements, which helped the alterations to develop the world
we exist in today. Paris explored features within modernity including Haussmannisation,
Urbanisation & Industrialisation. New machines & materials have been
introduced and allowed design to never become out dated this isn’t created
without insinuations within Art & Design. The humble term “Form Follows
Function” is a rule to follow to not allow your design to become out dated,
this term is a result of Industrialisation due to the need of sudden &
large quantity of needs within society. With all the progressions in
development & discoveries it had to react with new styles &
functionality. This is was know as, Industrialisation and it was a large force
within the period of the Bauhaus which therefore a solution to this force was
mass production. After World War 1 it created a turning point for the
encouragement of the Bauhaus. Overall, the forces of modernity have caused an
obvious shift within the Art & Design movement that has formed how artists
& designers work today within society.
Word Count: 2835
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H, (2006) “Bauhaus”, London, Prestel Publishing.
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The Bauhaus, Germany 1919, (fig. 1)
Universal Typeface, Herbert Bayer, 1925
(fig. 2)
Stencil Typeface, Josef Albers, 1925
(fig. 3)
Wassily Chair, Marcel Breuer, 1925
(fig. 4)
Barcelona Chair, Mies van der Rohe,
1929 (fig. 5)
