Modernism in Art and Design
Bibliography
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Final Reflection
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Final Draft
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Artist/Image Research
Charles Rennie Makintosh
Charles Rennie Mackintosh
While working in architecture, Charles Rennie Mackintosh developed his own style: a contrast between strong right angles and floral-inspired decorative motifs with subtle curves, e.g. the Mackintosh Rose motif, along with some references to traditional Scottish architecture. The project that helped make his international reputation was the Glasgow School of Art . During the early stages of the Glasgow School of Art Mackintosh also completed the Queen’s Cross Church project in Maryhill, Glasgow. This is considered to be one of Charles Rennie Mackintosh most mysterious projects.
Queens Cross Church Interior ( Picture 1 ) ( Charles Rennie Mackintosh)
Mackintosh’s architectural designs often included extensive specifications for the detailing, decoration, and furnishing of his buildings. His work was shown at the Vienna Secession Exhibition in 1900. Mackintosh’s architectural career was a relatively short one, but of significant quality and impact. All his major commissions were between 1896 and 1906, where he designed private homes, commercial buildings, interior renovations, church, and furniture.
William Burgess
William Burgess
Burges was born on 2 December, 1827, the son of Alfred Burges (1796-1886), a wealthy civil engineer who undertook work in Cardiff for John Crichton-Stuart, 2nd Marquess of Bute, himself the father of Burges’ later, greatest, patron, the 3rd Marquess. His family’s wealth enabled Burges to devote his life to the study and practice of architecture, without requiring that he actually earn a living.
Burges entered King’s College London in 1839 and remained for four years before joining the office of Edward Blore, surveyor to Westminster Abbey. Blore was, by then, a prestigious architect, who had made his reputation as a gothic revivalist. However, it was not Blore but Augustus Welby Pugin who made the greatest early impression on Burges. Pugin’s championing, almost leading, of the Gothic Revival provided the inspiration that fuelled Burges’ life’s work.
Speech Room, Harrow ( Picture 2 ) ( William Burgess )
This list of his buildings is fairly, but not fully, comprehensive but the list of furniture is selective. Good examples can be seen in the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), the Cecil Higgins Gallery , Bedford and Manchester Art Gallery. No listing is given here of his extensive creations of jewellery and glass. JMC has a very full and useful list of works with an indication as to whether the work is still in situ, was never executed, has now been removed/demolished or where the present location is unknown.
William Morris
William Morris
William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was an English architect, furniture and textile designer, artist, writer, and socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement.
Augustus Pugin
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Gothic Revival Research
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Art Nouveau Research
Art Nouveau, also known as Jugendstil, is an international movement and style of art, architecture and applied art especially the decorative arts that peaked in popularity at the turn of the 20th century (1890–1905). A reaction to academic art of the 19th century, it is characterized by organic, especially floral and other plant-inspired motifs, as well as highly-stylized, flowing curvilinear forms. Art Nouveau is an approach to design according to which artists should work on everything from architecture to furniture, making art part of everyday life.
Although Art Nouveau fell out of favor with the arrival of 20th-century modernist styles, it is seen today as an important bridge between the historicism of Neoclassicism and modernism. Furthermore, Art Nouveau monuments are now recognized by UNESCO on their World Heritage List as significant contributions to cultural heritage. The historic center of Riga, Latvia, with “the finest collection of art nouveau buildings in Europe”, was inscribed on the list in 1997 in part because of the “quality and the quantity of its Art Nouveau/Jugendstil architecture”, and four Brussels town houses by Victor Horta were included in 2000 as “works of human creative genius” that are “outstanding examples of Art Nouveau architecture brilliantly illustrating the transition from the 19th to the 20th century in art, thought, and society.” It later influenced psychedelic art that flourished in the 1960s and 1970s.
Arts and Crafts Movement Research
What is the Arts and Craft Movement?
The Arts and Crafts Movement was a British, Canadian, and American Aesthetic Movement occurring in the last years of the 19th century and the early years of the 20th century. Inspired by the writings of John Ruskin and a romantic idealization of the craftsman taking pride in his personal handiwork, it was at its height between approximately 1880 and 1910.
John Ruskin?
John Ruskin
John Ruskin (8 February 1819 – 20 January 1900) is best known for his work as an art critic, sage writer, and social critic, but is remembered as an author, poet and artist as well. Ruskin’s essays on art and architecture were extremely influential in the Victorian and Edwardian eras.
Ruskin’s range was vast. He wrote over 250 works which started from art history, but expanded to cover topics ranging over science, geology, ornithology, literary criticism, the environmental effects of pollution, and mythology. After his death Ruskin’s works were collected together in a massive “library edition”, completed in 1912 by his friends Edward Cook and Alexander Wedderburn. Its index is famously elaborate, attempting to articulate the complex interconnectedness of his thought.
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Principles of the Art and Crafts movement.
The Arts and Crafts Movement began primarily as a search for authentic and meaningful styles for the 19th century and as a reaction to the eclectic revival of historic styles of the Victorian era and to “soulless” machine-made production aided by the Industrial Revolution. Considering the machine to be the root cause of all repetitive and mundane evils, some of the protagonists of this movement turned entirely away from the use of machines and towards handcraft, which tended to concentrate their productions in the hands of sensitive but well-heeled patrons.
Lecture – Mass Consumption
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Reflection
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Lecture – Mechinization Takes Command
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Lecture – Brave New World
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Lecture – Modern Graphic Design
This lecture was specifically aimed at the Graphic Design students, however the principles can apply to all areas of design, so it was reccomended that we participated in this lecture.
Reflection
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Lecture – Reactions to the Machine: Art and Industry
There are a variety of different reactions whenever something new is brought into peoples lives, it is our nature to question change, this same principle applies to ever advancing Industrial revolution, with a wide range of new technology available to both the consumer and private organizations, furthermore the goverments growing interest in prevent problems such as crime through the use of technology, such as speed cameras.
Just as there are different reactions to new technology, so there were a range of different reactions to the process and impact of industrialization for those who owned factories, the workers, consumers.
What is the relationship between Art and Industry?
The indsutrial revolution sparked ner design methods, Art Nouaveux.
Late 18th century design, Wedgewood/Chippendale, were seen as embodying the virtues of refinement, good taste and simplicity similar to neo classical designs. Also produced using semi-craft techniqeues that were not completely mechanized as they can be in alot of today’s designs.
But the growth of indsutrisation seemed to hold back those earlier qualities and gradually over the generation, industry was no longer seen as such a source of progress and improvement by everyone. IT came to be seen by many as stultifying both artists and artisans, destroying englands culture and traditional way of life.
Basically, as industry grew bigger, there was a lacking presence of progress shown to the point where the markets were becoming saturated with basic/similar designs, this problem till wildly exists today, only slight improvements are made towards aesthetic standards towards modern industry equipment, which is mostly fueled by market appeal and ofcourse money, many enthusiasts across the GAMING industry for example, feel the same way about games saturation, the lack of inovation and design is leading the rehashes of products, and dumbing down of products for broader appeal for financial gain, purely as an example that I experiance on a daily basis.
In 1835 a Select Commitee was set up to inquire into the arts and principles of design among people. It highlighted the lack of originality in design and also the lack of an effective eductional system. As a result schools of design were set up to concern themselves with “the Direct practical application of the Arts to Manufacturers, an attempt to marry art and indsutry. – Victoria and Albert Museum
The most visible Expression of a broader reaction to industrialisation in many ways a pessimistic movement that tried to halt the ever advancing enemy of industrialization.
(IMPORTANT) The most significant individual connected with this revival was WILLIAM MORRIS. His pre-occupation was not so much with taste as the role of design in society, as part of a much larger issue of taste. (IMPORTANT)
“It is not this or that tangible steel or brass machine which we want to get rid of, but the great intangible machine of commercial tyranny which opresses the lives of all of us.
Division of labour had led to the alienation in work and therefore careless ornament, saw lack of unity between ornement, function and form.****
“Art will make our streets as beautiful as the woods, as elavating as the mountain side; it will be a pleasure and a rest, and not a weight upon the spirits to come from the open country into a town. Every man’s house will be fair and decent, soothing to his mind and helpful to his work.
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Reflection
Industry comes with its wide range of benefits, mass production helps keep costs low for the average consumor, however from an artistic point of view I could see why people would be angry, as mentioned above in my notes, I notice this lack of innovation and artistic designs in most modern Video Games, with a few rare exceptions, the same types of games are being produced over and over again, in many ways alienating long term gamers, who liked hard games, by making the games easier and “shallow” for a much broader appeal, thus commercially successful.
I have found the information about William Morris and his impact very useful for question one, I will note this later on in his research section.
The principles of the Art and Crafts movement are justified in my opinion, and some progress seems to be made in many industrys over the years, intellectual design and aesthetic has improved across a broad range of technologies, however, I feel that the problem is mainly down to financial issues…. and that the world could never really be the way William Morris invisioned it, mainly from lack of resources to do so.
Lecture – Power of Photography
The aim of this lecture was to look at key areas where analogue photography has been used, giving some historical examples but ask wether you consider whether each facet of photography still exists, in this digital age. The invention of photography bolstered the primacy of vision and became the ultimate witness to an event. It offered evidence and without it, something was not authentic. Photography is a meticulous witness of what is before the lens.
Susan Sontag quote – Photographs furnish evidence. A photograph passes for incontrovertible proof that a given thing happened. The picture may distort, but there is always a distortion that something exists, or did, which is like what’s in the picture
US Ambassador says ‘ You can see for yourself…’ even though his photograph is barely decipherable, shows little detail, and the Libyan in acknowledging the power of the photograph, he doesn’t dismiss the photograph as meaningless, but as false evidence. that it’s real but been fabricated and manipulated.
Different to painting in this sense:
Bazin quote – photography as a trace of reality. A transference from the thing to its reproduction
Photographs are simply ‘records of things seen’ that photographers have decide to be worth recording, a photograph of a landscape, like a window pane.
Photography’s power/effect over us has been reinforced by the fact that it’s been able to record aspects of the physical world that would otherwise escape us. – Challenges art.
Exclusion of human bias has been seen as a way of eliminating subjectivity, likened to scientific procedures, surveillance, statistics, of getting at the real truth.
Painting the generic horse a horse- represents the subject but does not mean that the horse exists. Can paint angels but can’t take a photograph of them!
Photography, the very specific horse
Could argue that the representational range of painting is wider than traditional photography because the painter does not have to accept the causal relation between a picture and the object. Skill of the artist is how he/she successfully realizes a way of leading the spectator to recognize the subject by those who wish to keep ‘art’ above ‘photography’ Scruton.
Suggests that photographs contain lots of inessentials, but there are many intentional acts in taking photographs, sometimes photographers accused of deliberate deception
***** Lewis Hine, 1909
The paradox of photography
A document of the world which we rely on to tell us something about the world – at the same time they are unrealistic’, intentional constructions.
Take from reality but are unrealistic
still/moving
While photographs may not lie, liars may photograph.
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Reflection
Photography, to me personally is just a tool, for recording memories/events too look back apon, or to capture the beauty of an object to enjoy whenever I feel like. However, everyone has different preferences when it comes to photos, some people do not like the reality a photo offers even though to others think they are great, a perfect example of this is someone who automatically hates photos of themselves, while that person can look really good within the photo to others.
As far as the facets of photography go, just like above, its down to preference, they co-exist together, the age old debate applies to other apsects of art, such as traditional vs digital.
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1 Industry and Utopia: Research responses to the industrial revolution in Britain from the Gothic Revival to the Arts & Crafts Movement, as reflected in architectural and/or design for print and/or illustration 1850-1914. Choose a piece of work from FOUR prominent architects/designers/illustrators and compare and contrast the key ideas that drove their practices.
See: Charles Rennie Mackintosh/ William Burgess (Cardiff Castle, Castell Coch) / Augustus Pugin/ WilliamMorris and the Kelmscott Press/ William.Heath-Robinson/ The Great Exhibition of 1851/ Aubrey Beardsley /
SPARKE, Penny, Design in Context, London, MacDonald Orbis, 1987
RAIZMAN David, History of Modern Design, London, Laurence King, 2003
FORTY, Adrian, Objects of Desire, London, Thames & Hudson, 1986
SPARKE, Penny, An Introduction to Design and Culture: 1900 to the present day, London, Routledge, 2004
