Lecture 3
From Here to Modernity
Mies van der Rohe
Farnsworth House,Illinois, 1946-50
Is Less More?
The minimum could be defined
as the perfection that an
artefact achieves when it is
no longer possible to
improve it by subtraction.
This is the quality that an
object has when every
component, every detail, and
every junction has been
reduced or condensed to the
essentials. It is the result
of the omission of the
inessentials.
John Pawson - Minimum, 1996
John Pawson 1990s
Flowers, even salt and pepper get in the way…
John Pawson
Evolution is synonymous with the removal of ornament from objects of everyday use
Adolf Loos (Ornament and Crime, 1928)
Josef and Anni Alber’s living room at the Dessau Bauhaus, 1920s
Josef AlbersGrid Mounted1921
Anni AlbersWeaving
1929
Josef and Anni Alber’s living room in Connecticut USA, 1970s
Peter van der Jagt (Droog Design)Bottom’s Up doorbell, 1994
Utopia / Dystopia
Thamesmead, London
1960s
Things to Come William Cameron Menzies1936
Le Corbusier, Villa Savoye, 1928-31
Nathan Coley, Villa Savoye, 1997
‘The site is expansive,
bordered by trees on three
sides, and has long views
towards the softly rolling
fields and valleys.’
‘At first sight, there is
a shock of recognition - a
sense of formal
inevitability. What can be
more natural than this
horizontal white box,
poised on pillars, set off
against the rural
surroundings, the far
panorama and the sky?’
‘This shows you how the long
window becomes part of the
façade solution.’
‘The moment one steps
inside the villa one finds
a new structural rhythm
taking over.’
Dan Flavin
Untitled (monument for V. Tatlin) 1975
Vladimir Tatlin
Monument to the Third International, Petrograd, 1920
Carl Andre (1935-)
Equivalent VIII, 1966
My arrangements I’ve
found are essentially
the simplest I can
arrive at, given a
material and a place …
Carl Andre
David Mabb
Self Portrait posing as Rodchenko, dressed in a Rodchenko Production Suit made from the ‘Fruit’ William Morris fabric
2002
Alexander Rodchenko 1891-1956
Drum and Bass, 2003
Combat(after Rodchenko), 2003
Mathieu Mercier
Orla Kiely Autumn ‘07
“Bauhaus art and design has been an important influence for many contemporary designers, but for Orla Kiely the geometry and colour of the work has special resonance.”
Tate Modern Shop:Orla Kiely Purse
Jim Lambie
Touch Zobop, 2003Tate Britain, London
Tomma Abts
Winner of Turner Prize 2006
Ert, 2003 Boros Collection, Berlin
Less is More
Mies van der Rohe
Less is a Bore
Robert Venturi
I like elements which are hybrid rather than
‘pure’, compromising rather than ‘clean’,
distorted rather than ‘straightforward’,
ambiguous rather than ‘articulated’, perverse
as well as impersonal, boring as well as
‘interesting’, conventional rather than
‘designed’, accommodating rather than
excluding, vestigial as well as well as
innovating, inconsistent and equivocal rather
than direct and clear.
Robert Venturi 1966 (Architect)
I am for richness of meaning rather than
clarity of meaning; for the implicit function
as well as the explicit function.
Robert Venturi 1966 (Architect)
Alessandro Mendini, Redesign of Modern Movement Chairs - Wassily by Breuer, 1978
Marcel Breuer 1925
We can no longer fulfill our obligations as architects if we carry on as cake decorators. Our role is far greater than that. We, the authors of architecture, have to take on the task of reinvestigating Modernity
Zaha Hadid 1983
Zaha Hadid
Terminus, Strasbourg France, 2001
Andreas Gursky
Shanghai 2000
The Titanic - Photomontage, Stanley Tigerman, 1978, USA
Modernism ran out of steam
over a decade ago. But at its
core was an ethic - the
responsibility that a designer
has to actively contribute to,
indeed enhance, the social,
political, and cultural
framework.
Steven Heller, Émigré 33, 1995
Modernism is the expression by
individual human beings of how they
will live their own present, and
consequently there are a thousand
modernisms for every thousand persons.
Octavio Paz (Nobel Prize reception speech
1990)
Doris Salcedo Tate Modern October 2007
‘Shibboleth’