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Author: Kristina Wilson
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691213496
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 264
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Book Description
The first investigation of how race and gender shaped the presentation and marketing of Modernist decor in postwar America In the world of interior design, mid-century Modernism has left an indelible mark still seen and felt today in countless open-concept floor plans and spare, geometric furnishings. Yet despite our continued fascination, we rarely consider how this iconic design sensibility was marketed to the diverse audiences of its era. Examining advice manuals, advertisements in Life and Ebony, furniture, art, and more, Mid-Century Modernism and the American Body offers a powerful new look at how codes of race, gender, and identity influenced—and were influenced by—Modern design and shaped its presentation to consumers. Taking us to the booming suburban landscape of postwar America, Kristina Wilson demonstrates that the ideals defined by popular Modernist furnishings were far from neutral or race-blind. Advertisers offered this aesthetic to White audiences as a solution for keeping dirt and outsiders at bay, an approach that reinforced middle-class White privilege. By contrast, media arenas such as Ebony magazine presented African American readers with an image of Modernism as a style of comfort, security, and social confidence. Wilson shows how etiquette and home decorating manuals served to control women by associating them with the domestic sphere, and she considers how furniture by George Nelson and Charles and Ray Eames, as well as smaller-scale decorative accessories, empowered some users, even while constraining others. A striking counter-narrative to conventional histories of design, Mid-Century Modernism and the American Body unveils fresh perspectives on one of the most distinctive movements in American visual culture.
Author: Kristina Wilson
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691213496
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 264
Get Book Here
Book Description
The first investigation of how race and gender shaped the presentation and marketing of Modernist decor in postwar America In the world of interior design, mid-century Modernism has left an indelible mark still seen and felt today in countless open-concept floor plans and spare, geometric furnishings. Yet despite our continued fascination, we rarely consider how this iconic design sensibility was marketed to the diverse audiences of its era. Examining advice manuals, advertisements in Life and Ebony, furniture, art, and more, Mid-Century Modernism and the American Body offers a powerful new look at how codes of race, gender, and identity influenced—and were influenced by—Modern design and shaped its presentation to consumers. Taking us to the booming suburban landscape of postwar America, Kristina Wilson demonstrates that the ideals defined by popular Modernist furnishings were far from neutral or race-blind. Advertisers offered this aesthetic to White audiences as a solution for keeping dirt and outsiders at bay, an approach that reinforced middle-class White privilege. By contrast, media arenas such as Ebony magazine presented African American readers with an image of Modernism as a style of comfort, security, and social confidence. Wilson shows how etiquette and home decorating manuals served to control women by associating them with the domestic sphere, and she considers how furniture by George Nelson and Charles and Ray Eames, as well as smaller-scale decorative accessories, empowered some users, even while constraining others. A striking counter-narrative to conventional histories of design, Mid-Century Modernism and the American Body unveils fresh perspectives on one of the most distinctive movements in American visual culture.
Author: Deborah Dietsch
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0684867443
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 216
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Book Description
There is no hotter style today than the cooler than cool work of modern designers and architects from the 1940s and 50s. Endlessly inventive and emminently livable, mid-century modernism has an optimism and confidence born of postwar abundance, and a spirited elegance that appeals powerfully fifty years later. In CLASSIC MODERN, design expert Deborah Dietsch introduces readers to the basic tenets of modern design and explains how the simple yet inspired forms typical of this style were so readily disseminated into mainstream American culture. Filled throughout with enticing examples of mid-century pieces from such timeless designers as Charles and Ray Eames, Eero Saarinen, Arne Jacobsen, and George Nelson, this beautiful book recaptures the excitement of the period's brilliant designs.
Author: Marin R. Sullivan
Publisher: Scheidegger and Spiess
ISBN: 9783858818621
Category : Sculpture, American
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
An extraordinary artist and designer: a fresh view of Harry Bertoia's entire body of work. Italian-born American Harry Bertoia (1915-78) was one of the most prolific and innovative artists and designers of the postwar period. Trained at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, where he met future colleagues and collaborators, such as Charles and Ray Eames, Florence Knoll, and Eero Saarinen, he went on to make one-of-a-kind jewelry, design iconic chairs, create thousands of unique sculptures including large-scale commissions for significant buildings, and advance the use of sound as sculptural material. His work speaks to the confluence of numerous fields of endeavor but is united throughout by a sculptural approach to making and an experimental embrace of metal. Harry Bertoia: Sculpting Mid-Century Modern Life accompanies the first US museum retrospective of the artist's career to examine the full scope of his broad, interdisciplinary practice and features important examples of his furniture, jewelry, monotypes, and diverse sculptural output. Lavishly illustrated, the book offers new scholarly essays as well as a catalog of the artist's numerous large-scale commissions. It questions how and why we distinguish between a chair, a necklace, a screen, and a freestanding sculpture--and what Bertoia's sculptural things, when taken together, say about the fluidity of visual language across culture, both at midcentury and now.
Author: Jonathan Massey
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Pre
ISBN:
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 360
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Book Description
The first biography of Claude Bragdon, an early and unique, but often overlooked, advocate of architectural modernism.
Author: Leslie Kay
Publisher: Disney Electronic Content
ISBN: 1368056636
Category : Design
Languages : en
Pages : 178
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Book Description
DisneyBounding visionary Leslie Kay offers tips, advice and inspiration for how to channel your love for Disney though fashion.
Author: Susan Benjamin
Publisher: The Monacelli Press, LLC
ISBN: 1580935265
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 346
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Book Description
The first survey of the classic twentieth-century houses that defined American Midwestern modernism. Famed as the birthplace of that icon of twentieth-century architecture, the skyscraper, Chicago also cultivated a more humble but no less consequential form of modernism--the private residence. Modern in the Middle: Chicago Houses 1929-75 explores the substantial yet overlooked role that Chicago and its suburbs played in the development of the modern single-family house in the twentieth century. In a city often associated with the outsize reputations of Frank Lloyd Wright and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, the examples discussed in this generously illustrated book expand and enrich the story of the region's built environment. Authors Susan Benjamin and Michelangelo Sabatino survey dozens of influential houses by architects whose contributions are ripe for reappraisal, such as Paul Schweikher, Harry Weese, Keck & Keck, and William Pereira. From the bold, early example of the "Battledeck House" by Henry Dubin (1930) to John Vinci and Lawrence Kenny's gem the Freeark House (1975), the generation-spanning residences discussed here reveal how these architects contended with climate and natural setting while negotiating the dominant influences of Wright and Mies. They also reveal how residential clients--typically middle-class professionals, progressive in their thinking--helped to trailblaze modern architecture in America. Though reflecting different approaches to site, space, structure, and materials, the examples in Modern in the Middle reveal an abundance of astonishing houses that have never been collected into one study--until now.
Author: Michael Crow
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1440338760
Category : Crafts & Hobbies
Languages : en
Pages : 241
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Book Description
Minimalist design--maximum style! In the middle of the last century, a new generation of designers sought to render furniture to its most essential forms. In doing so, they created timeless designs that defined Mid-Century Modern Style. From the sleek geometric lines of Bauhaus-inspired design to the sculptural shapes of Danish masters, this furniture captured the imagination of the era and enjoys growing popularity today. Now for the first time, author Michael Crow has carefully detailed 29 seminal works by the era's foremost designers, including Hans Wenger, Finn Juhl and George Nelson. At their best, these spare, often sculptural designs transcend their period and are at home in a variety of settings. Each piece has been selected carefully so it can be built in an average workshop. Inside this book you'll find: • More than 100 drawings with exploded views, elevations and details for projects to fit every room in your house. • Practical advice on wood selection, hardware sources and contruction and finishing techniques. • Two step-by-step project builds. • A richly illustrated historical overview tracing the evolution of the style and exploring the designers and makers who shaped it.
Author: Monica Obniski
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300234228
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 257
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Book Description
A lively exploration of eclecticism, playfulness, and whimsy in American postwar design, including architecture, graphic design, and product design This spirited volume shows how postwar designers embraced whimsy and eclecticism in their work, exploring playfulness as an essential construct of modernity. Following World War II, Americans began accumulating more and more goods, spurring a transformation in the field of interior decoration. Storage walls became ubiquitous, often serving as a home's centerpiece. Designers such as Alexander Girard encouraged homeowners to populate their new shelving units with folk art, as well as unconventional and modern objects, to produce innovative and unexpected juxtapositions within modern architectural settings. Playfulness can be seen in the colorful, child-sized furniture by Charles and Ray Eames, who also produced toys. And in the postwar corporate world, the concept of play is manifested in the influential advertising work of Paul Rand. Set against the backdrop of a society that was experiencing rapid change and high anxiety, Serious Play takes a revelatory look at how many of the country's leading designers connected with their audience through wit and imagination.
Author: Peter McMahon
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781935202165
Category : Architect-designed houses
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
In the summer of 1937, Walter Gropius, founder of the Bauhaus, rented a house on Planting Island, near the base of Cape Cod. Thus began a chapter in the history of modern architecture that has never been told _until now. The area was a hotbed of intellectual currents from New York, Boston, Cambridge and the country's top schools of architecture and design. Avant-garde homes began to appear in the woods and on the dunes; by the 1970s, there were about 100 modern houses of interest here.
Author: Kristina Wilson
Publisher: Yc British Art
ISBN: 9780300104752
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 154
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Book Description
"During the years of the Great Depression in America, modernist designers developed products and lifestyle concepts intended for middle-class, not elite, consumers. In this fascinating book, [the author] coins the term 'livable modernism' to describe this school of design. Livable modernism combined international style functional efficiency and sophistication with a respect for American consumers' desires for physical and psychological comfort, paving the way for the work of Charles and Ray Eames and other post-World War II designers. [The author] offers a new view of modernist furnishings marketed for middle-class living rooms, dining rooms, and bedrooms of the 1930s, and provides groundbreaking analyses of many of the most popular items, including George Sakier's stemware for the Fostoria Glass Company, Russel Wrights' American modern furniture for Macy's, and Gilbert Rohde's clocks for the Herman Miller Clock Company. As the first study of the marketing of modern design during the Depression years, [this book] features an extensive array of vintage advertisements from such magazines as 'Better Homes and Gardens', 'House Beautiful', 'Ladies' Home Journal', and the 'Saturday Evening Post'. [The author] discusses the relation of modernism to the cultural and economic climate of the Depression and examines the sophisticated marketing strategies of the movement that coincided with a period of tremendous growth for print magazines and the advertising industry. Filled with fresh insights into a fascinating period in American modern design, this book provides an important new look at these designers' and design companies' philosophies, innovations, and influence that until now have been under-appreciated"--Bookjacket.
