Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Winner- Political ergonomics
This reading was a very good extension of the lecture about the political acrhitecture of Deli. It went more into depth and on a much more world oriented scale then what had been disscussed in the lecture. it again brough to light aspects of design that i had never concidered. after reading this i then relised that this also helped to clarify an earlier reading in my mind. that of Cold war Hot house. i found that these to papers tied intogether very well. Cold war Hot house gave a perfect example of design following and influencing politics. The was that Russia and USA victories where determine whos citizens had the better life style and this was determined by the appilences and objects they owned.
Lecture on the design and acrhitecture of Deli
This was a most interesting lecture as it brought to my attension a totally different side of design and architectecture that i had never concidered. The way that design and acrhitecture had been used to influence the people of India in a political sense was very intreging. After sitting through this lecture i have found myself looking at the way design has been used to influence politics and vice verser. It can be used to dominated the citizens or give them a sence of cultural pride, settle unrest or in fact cause it. this lecture then followed on into the reading we did.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Draft essay
Bauhaus. The Beginning of Industrial design
The Benefit of Hindsight allows us to explore the way that Bauhaus students and masters used the new technology and processes available to them to develop a new kind of design. The type of design we now refer to these days as industrial design. Including how the theory’s and designs produced during the time of the schools existence have had a lasting effect on designs being produce by present day by industrial designers. My initial conclusions are that it was the combining of the arts and new technology which has lead to the mass production of commodities that we now see today. I feel that the designs that were produced are products of the era in the sense that they were very minimalist instead of the extravagant designs that were the norm before the opening of the school. This can be put down to the fact that it was post war and in the middle of the great depression and so money and resources would have been scarce. This could have been why the minimal no frills designs would have found popularity. This minimalist approach would have been the foundations of the Design era Known as Modernism. By tracing the history of the Famous school we can see the lasting influences that it has had on modern day design and the roll it has had in shaping modern day industrial design education style.
The Bauhaus (House of Building) School of design Began in 1919. And was initially located in the German town of Weimer by an accomplished architect of the times, Walter Gropius. Despite the fact that the school was foundered by an architect it did not run an architecture program till several years after its opening. Walter Gropius wanted to develop new education methods in the area of design. He was sure that the best way to achieve this was through Handicraft. He saw it necessary that the school become a workshop and that the students would be taught by artists and craftsmen. The intention of this being to remove the division between that of Fine arts and that of applied arts. However the schools purpose was redirected in 1923. It became apparent to Gropius that for the school to survive in a Technical civilization its programs had to change. The Bauhaus would now produce prototypes for mass production. The aspects of Function and aesthetic were to be applied to the new prototypes being produced. This could be viewed as the first step into the world of industrial design. It was becoming evermore difficult to amass allowances for this new type of education and so in 1925 when the Thueringer government stopped supporting the school economically the school found a new home in Dessau. Later in 1926 the Masters where promoted to professors. Despite the success of the school Gropius Left the school in 1928. His successor was A Swiss architect Hannes Meyer. He pushed the scientific development in design training. He was dismissed due to his inability to lead in 1930. German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe then became head of the school and turned the Bauhaus in to more of a vocational university before it was closed in 1933 under the Nazi regime.
During the time of the Bauhaus’s existence there was an economic depression. This depression was worst felt in Germany. The depression was due to the fact that post World War 1 Germany had very large Debts to Pay and also heavy restrictions placed on their industries because the allied countries feared Germany becoming to powerfully once more and restarting the war. To pay and service the large debts the German government owed. The German reserve bank began printing money to the point where money became worthless. This plunged the county into a massive depression, the one we now refer to as the Great Depression. Money and resources were short in the community and so people no longer could afford the extravagant items which were main stream before the Great War. Wants became needs and so design followed suit. Designs were stripped back to the basics, Framing became exposed, Function, aesthetic and form became very important. A good example of this type of design is: Marcel Breuer’s Wassily chair. The framing is exposed and made of round tubing bend to create the form of the chair. The chair is simple, aesthetically pleasing and uses minimal materials. With the scarcity of wealth and resources it is easy to see how this type of design found popularity. The type of design is also well suited to the mass production methods that had been developed during the times. Mass productions of objects meant that large numbers of objects could be produced quickly and cheaply.
Despite the Fact that the Bauhaus was closed in 1933 by the Nazi’s it was re-opened in Chicago in 1937. The early Bauhaus design styles had a large impact in America. The Successor to the Bauhaus dubbed The New Bauhaus” adopted the curriculum of the original Bauhaus that had been developed by Walter Gropius in Weimer and Dessau. The New school in Chicago was founded by previous master Laszlo Moholy-Nagy of the German school. The teaching methods and curriculum developed in the early stages of the school under Walter Gropius were use as a starting point for the school in Chicago and then went on to be further developed. Some of the developments to the curriculum included a more important role in the study of natural and human sciences, Photography was more widely used and prominent within the school in Chicago and the training which students received in the area of mechanical technique became much more sophisticated than that which was taught in the school in Germany. However the way the school was run was tweaked to meet the requirements of American society. Moholy-Nagy was succeeded By Serge Chermayeff. But the teaching style and aim remained very similar to that of the original Bauhaus. Later in the 1950s The New Bauhaus integrated with the Illinois Institute of Technology. It is still to this day part of the Illinois Institute of Technology and is regarded and respected as a professionally oriented school of design. This continuation of the school and its unique teaching styles to the present day has allowed it to shape the way industrial design is approached and the designs which have been produced. Even in our own school of design (Victoria) we approach design in a very hands on and technical way. An influence you may say has its origins right back in the 1920s.
The Masters and students of the early Bauhaus moved away from the traditional materials and were instead were fanatical about metal. This is very evident in a lot of the furniture designs. With the use of these new materials designers could exploit the properties of metal to produce new simple elegant designs. Tube steel was lighter, easily worked, cheap. Steel has flex and is easily bent to exact measurements. For the Bauhaus designers it was pure, Clean and hygienic. The perfect material to make a beautiful home. It was the exploration and exploitation of new materials which allowed the designers to mass produce objects more easily and produce very modernist style objects. The techniques used and developed at the Bauhaus are still used in modern day designs and is easily seen in a lot of modern day furniture design.
It is easy to see when we trace the history of Bauhaus design from its founding in 1919 to the modern day how it has played a major roll in the way we now approach industrial design. The learning techniques that were first developed in the early days has turned us from artists or Craftsmen to a combination of both. Industrial design would be almost impossible without this hands on approach. The introduction of new materials and techniques of working these materials allowed the creation of very modern designs and has change the way we view beauty. Also the orientation of prototype production has laid the foreground for modern day mass production. As now when we design something in industrial design we don’t just design the object but the process in which it is made.
The Benefit of Hindsight allows us to explore the way that Bauhaus students and masters used the new technology and processes available to them to develop a new kind of design. The type of design we now refer to these days as industrial design. Including how the theory’s and designs produced during the time of the schools existence have had a lasting effect on designs being produce by present day by industrial designers. My initial conclusions are that it was the combining of the arts and new technology which has lead to the mass production of commodities that we now see today. I feel that the designs that were produced are products of the era in the sense that they were very minimalist instead of the extravagant designs that were the norm before the opening of the school. This can be put down to the fact that it was post war and in the middle of the great depression and so money and resources would have been scarce. This could have been why the minimal no frills designs would have found popularity. This minimalist approach would have been the foundations of the Design era Known as Modernism. By tracing the history of the Famous school we can see the lasting influences that it has had on modern day design and the roll it has had in shaping modern day industrial design education style.
The Bauhaus (House of Building) School of design Began in 1919. And was initially located in the German town of Weimer by an accomplished architect of the times, Walter Gropius. Despite the fact that the school was foundered by an architect it did not run an architecture program till several years after its opening. Walter Gropius wanted to develop new education methods in the area of design. He was sure that the best way to achieve this was through Handicraft. He saw it necessary that the school become a workshop and that the students would be taught by artists and craftsmen. The intention of this being to remove the division between that of Fine arts and that of applied arts. However the schools purpose was redirected in 1923. It became apparent to Gropius that for the school to survive in a Technical civilization its programs had to change. The Bauhaus would now produce prototypes for mass production. The aspects of Function and aesthetic were to be applied to the new prototypes being produced. This could be viewed as the first step into the world of industrial design. It was becoming evermore difficult to amass allowances for this new type of education and so in 1925 when the Thueringer government stopped supporting the school economically the school found a new home in Dessau. Later in 1926 the Masters where promoted to professors. Despite the success of the school Gropius Left the school in 1928. His successor was A Swiss architect Hannes Meyer. He pushed the scientific development in design training. He was dismissed due to his inability to lead in 1930. German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe then became head of the school and turned the Bauhaus in to more of a vocational university before it was closed in 1933 under the Nazi regime.
During the time of the Bauhaus’s existence there was an economic depression. This depression was worst felt in Germany. The depression was due to the fact that post World War 1 Germany had very large Debts to Pay and also heavy restrictions placed on their industries because the allied countries feared Germany becoming to powerfully once more and restarting the war. To pay and service the large debts the German government owed. The German reserve bank began printing money to the point where money became worthless. This plunged the county into a massive depression, the one we now refer to as the Great Depression. Money and resources were short in the community and so people no longer could afford the extravagant items which were main stream before the Great War. Wants became needs and so design followed suit. Designs were stripped back to the basics, Framing became exposed, Function, aesthetic and form became very important. A good example of this type of design is: Marcel Breuer’s Wassily chair. The framing is exposed and made of round tubing bend to create the form of the chair. The chair is simple, aesthetically pleasing and uses minimal materials. With the scarcity of wealth and resources it is easy to see how this type of design found popularity. The type of design is also well suited to the mass production methods that had been developed during the times. Mass productions of objects meant that large numbers of objects could be produced quickly and cheaply.
Despite the Fact that the Bauhaus was closed in 1933 by the Nazi’s it was re-opened in Chicago in 1937. The early Bauhaus design styles had a large impact in America. The Successor to the Bauhaus dubbed The New Bauhaus” adopted the curriculum of the original Bauhaus that had been developed by Walter Gropius in Weimer and Dessau. The New school in Chicago was founded by previous master Laszlo Moholy-Nagy of the German school. The teaching methods and curriculum developed in the early stages of the school under Walter Gropius were use as a starting point for the school in Chicago and then went on to be further developed. Some of the developments to the curriculum included a more important role in the study of natural and human sciences, Photography was more widely used and prominent within the school in Chicago and the training which students received in the area of mechanical technique became much more sophisticated than that which was taught in the school in Germany. However the way the school was run was tweaked to meet the requirements of American society. Moholy-Nagy was succeeded By Serge Chermayeff. But the teaching style and aim remained very similar to that of the original Bauhaus. Later in the 1950s The New Bauhaus integrated with the Illinois Institute of Technology. It is still to this day part of the Illinois Institute of Technology and is regarded and respected as a professionally oriented school of design. This continuation of the school and its unique teaching styles to the present day has allowed it to shape the way industrial design is approached and the designs which have been produced. Even in our own school of design (Victoria) we approach design in a very hands on and technical way. An influence you may say has its origins right back in the 1920s.
The Masters and students of the early Bauhaus moved away from the traditional materials and were instead were fanatical about metal. This is very evident in a lot of the furniture designs. With the use of these new materials designers could exploit the properties of metal to produce new simple elegant designs. Tube steel was lighter, easily worked, cheap. Steel has flex and is easily bent to exact measurements. For the Bauhaus designers it was pure, Clean and hygienic. The perfect material to make a beautiful home. It was the exploration and exploitation of new materials which allowed the designers to mass produce objects more easily and produce very modernist style objects. The techniques used and developed at the Bauhaus are still used in modern day designs and is easily seen in a lot of modern day furniture design.
It is easy to see when we trace the history of Bauhaus design from its founding in 1919 to the modern day how it has played a major roll in the way we now approach industrial design. The learning techniques that were first developed in the early days has turned us from artists or Craftsmen to a combination of both. Industrial design would be almost impossible without this hands on approach. The introduction of new materials and techniques of working these materials allowed the creation of very modern designs and has change the way we view beauty. Also the orientation of prototype production has laid the foreground for modern day mass production. As now when we design something in industrial design we don’t just design the object but the process in which it is made.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)