Functionalism

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Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the Bachelor of Fine Art in Graphic Design Program at Art Institute of Seattle Summer, 2016

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Scott Mansfield Dave Danioth Doug Heinlein

Special thanks to Lee Strattan for convincing me to study design in Scandinavia, rather than drawing in Florence. If not for her advice, I wouldn’t have discovered such an amazing culture, that seems to have found that harmony between form and function.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract

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Part 1

3

Part 2

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Conclusion

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Bibliography

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ABSTRACT This thesis explores the evolution of functionalism within art history, and how it translates into contemporary design. Of all the artistic movements influencing design, from Impressionism to Postmodernism, functionalism is arguably the most impactful. The concept of form following function is often underestimated, but it is a key component to producing successful design moving forward. Using this “less is more� design philosophy, one should understand how this movement began, and why designers ought to put function first. From there, designers can move into the realm of finding a harmony between form and function.

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W

hat is the nature of a chair? According to Le Corbusier, a Swiss-French architect, “…a chair is in no way a work of art; a chair has no soul; it is a machine for sitting in” (I). The idea that a chair should be treated in this regard is an example of functionalism, a viewpoint that “in spite of having been reviled and rejected throughout the last decades, remains a benchmark against which much design is judged” (I). It is based on the idea that form follows function. Horatio Greenough was the first to consider the interplay of form and function in his criticism of ornamental architecture in 1852 (II). The phrase was later coined by architect Louis Sullivan in 1896. Sullivan wrote, “Life is recognizable in its expression, that form ever follows function. This is the law” (III). Sullivan’s ideas went on to influence a line of thinking within the design community that permeates today: that which does not contribute to a form’s primary function should be omitted (IV). In other words, less is more. Whether the goal is to inform, enlighten, or persuade, a designer must strive for function before considering form. It is only then that the designer might find harmony between the two. This paper looks at Functionalism from a historical lens, and examines its relevance within lean UX and the golden ratio.

Louis Sullivan, architect

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PART ONE As a practice, functionalism breaks everything down into its component parts and omits the unnecessary. It is cross-disciplinary by nature and can be seen within architecture, interior design, industrial design, and digital design. It is often synonymous with problem-solving. Functionalism manifested in the late nineteenth century not just as a clean and rational design style but also a set of principles. Functionalists believed that design should be “simple, honest and direct; well adapted to [its] purpose; bare of ornament; standardized, machine-made, reasonably priced; and expressive of [its] structure and materials” (I). While it is difficult to ascertain the birthplace of a new way of thinking, Scandinavia is a good place to start.

Rodovre Town Hall, Arne Jacobsen

Scandinavian architecture of the early twentieth century is considered by many to be the archetype from which functionalism stems. Due to the peninsula’s geographical isolation from the rest of Europe, design was viewed from a survivalist standpoint. It was minimalistic, affordable, and available to all. This “democratic” approach to design was stripped of ornamentation, using limited available resources.

Interior spaces were designed to be light and open, helping to create a comfortable atmosphere during the long winters. It was less important for something to be beautiful or decorative and more important for it to work (V). The use of design for survival dates back to antiquity. Primitive man rarely designed solely for visual pleasure (VI). Prehistoric forms often were created for ritual purposes, such as to ensure a successful hunt, a prosperous harvest, or to promote fertility. While technology and the Industrial Revolution have allowed humans to design without concern for survival, the relationship between form and function is still important to consider.

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Elasticity, Umberto Boccioni

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The onset of functionalism coincided with the Modernist movement in the early twentieth century. European society began questioning the role of the artist during the Industrial Revolution. Machines had replaced craftsmen in a majority of production methods. Who needs a handmade, intricately carved chair when you can buy a machine-made chair for half the price? Modernism encouraged artists to re-examine their existence and evaluate progress within society. Artists and designers reacted to this changing infrastructure by abstracting and experimenting, in an effort to preserve individual expression and keep the role of the artist sacred. English writer and art critic, John Ruskin, was a notable advocate for the craftsman, stressing the “individual value of every soul� (I). He wanted people to respect the intrinsic quality of the material, and condemned the precision of the machine.

His views went on to influence William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement. Morris, like Ruskin, sought to elevate the role of the craftsman and separate art from industry (I).

While best known for his illustrative wallpaper design, Morris also created stained glass and furniture (VII). The intricacy of the Arts and Crafts style seems anti-functional due to its level of detail, but proponents of the movement prided themselves on simplicity and restraint in ornamentation while retaining the piece’s decorative and hand-made quality. Despite best efforts, the intensity of labor required to produce this kind of work ended up being unaffordable for the masses. This movement was nonetheless a stepping stone for functionalism, which took prominence in the twentieth century and essentially abandoned ornamentation. Germany is known for its adherence to this new design style. Designers such as Gropius, Breuer, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe led the way (I).

Snakeshead Printed Cotton, William Morris

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Wassily Chair, Marcel Breuer

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The Bauhaus school was founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius, whose aim was to unify art and industry through a universal language.

The school focused on problems relating to form, and explored how geometric principles can be applied to design (VIII). Much like Scandinavian functionalism, the Bauhaus emphasized affordability, availability, and comfort (V). Gropius’s views on form influenced artists such as Kandinsky, Klee, and Itten. Gropius observed “There has arisen a demand for beauty of external form as well as for technical and economic perfection…A thing that is technically excellent in all respects must be impregnated with an intellectual idea – with form – in order to secure preference among the large quantity of products of the same kind” (I). The school was not only distinguished by its rationality and sans serif typefaces, but by its insistence on the collective. The names of artists and designers were not given. The work was intended to reflect the school as a whole. “The basic pedagogical

approach was to eliminate competitive tendencies and to foster individual creative potential and a sense of community and shared purpose” (IX).

The functionalist principles of the Bauhaus manifested in architecture, furniture, and interior design. Furniture became cheap and mass produced, primarily made of wood and metal. Despite the Bauhaus’s emphasis on the collective, one of its teachers, Marcel Breuer, became famous for his reinterpretation of the chair.

His Wassily Chair was considered a “‘yardstick’ of rationality, economy and mass availability” (I). “A chair made of high-grade steel tubing (a highly elastic material) with tightly stretched fabric in the appropriate places, makes a light, completely self-sprung seat which is as comfortable as an upholstered chair, but many times lighter, handier and more hygienic, and therefore many times more practical in use. . .” (X). If a chair is a machine for sitting in, then Breuer designed it to function perfectly.

Berlin architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe used functionalist principles in his housing development known as Die Wohnung (i.e., the dwelling). This masshousing project was created by a German association of artists, manufacturers and designers known as the Deutsche Werbund (German Work Federation). The group sought to promote “only those objects from the realm of applied arts which bear no ornament whatsoever. . .” (I). German design, particularly with regard to furniture, became highly standardized.

Modular furniture grew in popularity due to the efficiency of its production. According to “The Studio” Book of Decorative Art, the success of modular furniture was attributed to its “extensive range of combinations [which] ensures to the complete article an individuality and character of its own, without betraying the use of machinery in its production.”

Modular furniture was a way for people to retain their sense of identity in an industry of mass production.

Die Wohnung unserer Zeit, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

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PART TWO If functionalism began by looking at a chair, then it persists today by looking at a device. From the Industrial Revolution to the Technological Revolution, the method of analyzing form and its role in function is just as important today, if not more so, than it was in the twentieth century. “Today, we interpret Sullivan’s idea as a call to center any design, regardless of its nature–a building, a tool, a software program–on the user” (III). If we simplified the chair by looking at what the sitter needs from it, we are now simplifying user experience (UX) design by examining what the user requires from it. lean UX is a design process that has helped to streamline interface design in a way that is valuable to the user.

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Lean UX focuses on customer validation, with the goal of releasing a minimal viable product rather than a complete design. It is functionalist in that the goal is to eliminate waste from the process. The Internet has changed the way people consume information.

Society is moving more quickly, and designers must work in shorter release cycles to keep their competitive edge. Releasing early and often, gaining market feedback and making changes based on validation or failure, is the new design standard. lean UX is based on three foundations: design thinking, agile development, and build-measure-learn.

The first foundation of lean UX is design thinking, which was best summarized by Tim Brown, CEO and president of the design firm, IDEO: “It’s a discipline that uses the designer’s sensibility and methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and market opportunity” (XI). Designers are encouraged to empathize with users and the problems that they face in order to create a design solution that is valuable and effective.

If success is measured by the number of users an application attracts, then identifying the user’s needs first is a functionalist approach.

Tim Brown, CEO and President of IDEO

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Agile software development is all about collaboration. In order to produce working software sooner, designers must build a shared understanding with customers and team members throughout the entire design process. “Lean UX is deeply collaborative and cross-functional, because we no longer have the luxury of working in isolation from the rest of the product team” (XI). Keeping the lines of communications open reduces the need for time-consuming proposals and documentation and creates an environment in which participation and debate are welcome.

This concept of cross-disciplinary design collaboration is almost indistinguishable from the Bauhaus collective. It is based on the belief that anonymity fosters an emphasis on the design rather than the designer. Designing without an ego puts focus back on to the user and the problem at hand.

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The build-measure-learn foundation is all about user testing. Releasing a minimally viable product early and often helps designers avoid incorrect market assumptions as early as possible. This process of continuous discovery and learning helps to ensure that an idea is right before dedicating time and money to developing it. Experimentation also breeds creativity.

Lean UX design focuses on problem-solving rather than feature implementation. A chair that has an expensive fabric isn’t as valuable as one that has a generic fabric if it falls apart under the weight of the person sitting in it. Similarly, implementing a high-tech feature on a mobile application is worthless if the user isn’t able to understand it. In UX design, ensuring user comprehension that holds users’ attention is often more important than the depth of the app’s capabilities.

Lean UX sees functionality as usability. The golden ratio, on the other hand, is a means to achieve functionality. Using hierarchy, prominence and symmetry, the golden ratio can be applied to direct the user’s eye to certain elements of a design.

The golden ratio, unlike lean UX, is a functionalist principle that dates back to antiquity. In fact, it is a mathematical formula that occurs in nature. Similar to the Fibonacci sequence, it describes a perfect balance between two proportions. It is approximately equal to a 1:1.61 ratio (XII). The golden ratio has been used for at least four thousand years in art and design, from ancient Greek architecture such as the Parthenon, to Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa (XIII). When a composition adheres to the golden ratio, it is inherently more pleasing to the eye.

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The effect of the golden ratio on the human brain was tested by researcher Giacomo Rizzolatti, a neuroscientist at the University of Parma. He presented to an audience (with no background in art history) three images of the statue of Doryphoros, a statue by Polykleitos. Two of the images were distorted, and the original adhered to the golden ratio. “The original activated certain sets of brain cells more than the distorted versions, suggesting the brain judges beauty by at least partly hard-wired standards” (XIII).

The insula—the part of the brain that moderates emotions—was more active when the volunteers were shown the original, as well as the amygdala, which moderates memory. It is suggested that this inherent preference towards mathematical balance is evolutionary (XIII).

Today, the golden ratio (also known as the divine ratio) is used in print and digital design to create dynamic layouts that feel balanced and are thus pleasing to the eye. The ratio can similarly be used in web and mobile design to organize content on a page. It creates interest, and gives prominence to certain content (XII). It also directs a user’s eye through a page, creating a desired narrative. Giving content visual hierarchy makes it more digestible to the viewer, which should be a designer’s primary goal.

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Images of the statue of Doryphoros by Polykleitos used in the study by Giacomo Rizzolatti

While the golden ratio is an overarching principle that designers can employ to adhere to functionalism, some methods are more specific to one discipline. Within the field of information design, professor Edward Tufte, a theoretician in visualization, uses the data-ink ratio, which measures efficiency as the amount of ink used to represent data in a chart. “The other items, those that amount to decoration, can be eliminated because they are either redundant or they distract the reader from what really matters” (III). This less-is-more approach to data visualization makes the assumption that excess elements interfere with comprehension.

Charles Joseph Minard’s infographic showing the fate of Napoleon’s Moscow campaign of 1812 (Fig. 1) is considered by Tufte to be an excellent example of the data-ink ratio (XIV).

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We’ve seen functionalism as cross disciplinary in that it can be applied to lean UX design, layout design using the golden ratio, as well as information design using the data-ink ratio. Due to the fact that functionalism is cross-disciplinary, there is no rule set in stone for a designer to follow. The fulfillment of function is often subjective. All the designer can do is take an active role in understanding and solving the problem. According to Bowers, “In determining whether a design is good, we might better employ our experience, learning, and research to ask whether or not the design works in the context of the situation” (VI). Even if a design informs, enlightens, and persuades, what persuades one person might dissuade another.

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Functionalism has been, and will continue to be, a blurry line. What is necessary to the success of a design often depends on how one defines function. Is the function to entice the viewer? Maybe ornamentation is needed to appeal to the user. Many people claim that the monotony of functionalism is what caused the Postmodernist movement.

According to Kay Fisker in the Magazine of Art, “Functionalism was a cleansing agent which swept over the nation by storm, liberating and stimulating. It was necessary, but it destroyed too much. Architecture became skeletal, sterile and antiseptic.

At times the whole movement seemed inhuman” (I). Perhaps this is because society was too strict in its definition of function.

While Le Corbusier claimed that a house is “a machine for living in” (I), he forgot that it also has to sell. It is important to recognize that while function should always take precedence over form, losing sight of form altogether eliminates delight as a possible function. According to Donald A. Norman in his book, Emotional Design, “Beautiful things are more functional, and beauty is as much in the eye of the designer as it is in the eye of the beholder” (III). Perhaps designers should first strive for function, then consider harmony with form. A chair is first and foremost a machine for sitting in, but one that looks great–well that’s just good form.

CONCLUSION

The principles of functionalism span human history and various disciplines. Form began as a means to an end, and it still should be treated as such. While designing from a survivalist standpoint is no longer necessary, the principles of functionalism still apply. Designers have more tools to manipulate form than ever before, and globalization has given them a larger platform to work from. In a society that is rapidly evolving, the idea that form follows function continues to be the foundation from which successful design is judged.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY I) Marcus, George H. Functionalist Design: An Ongoing History. Munich: Prestel, 1995. Print.

II) ”Horatio Greenough." Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 06 Sept. 2016.

III) Cairo, Alberto. The Functional Art: An Introduction to Information Graphics and Visualization. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.

IV) “Functionalism.” encyclopedia.com. International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences.

2008. Web. 2 Aug. 2016.

V) Eyþórsdóttir, Katrín. “The Story of Scandinavian Design: Combining Function and Aesthetics –Smashing Magazine.” Smashing Magazine. Vitaly Friedman and Sven Lennartz, 12 June 2011. Web. 2 Aug. 2016.

VI) Bowers, John. Introduction to Two-dimensional Design: Understanding Form and Function.

New York: Wiley, 1999. Print.

VII) Henderson, Philip Prichard. "William Morris." Encyclopedia Britannica Online.

Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 06 Sept. 2016.

VIII) "Bauhaus." Sis. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 Aug. 2016.

IX) "Bauhaus Movement, Artists and Major Works." The Art Story. The Art Story Foundation, n.d. Web. 2 Aug. 2016.

X) Hasebrink, Burkhard. Innenräume in Der Literatur Des Deutschen Mittelalters: XIX. Anglo German Colloquium, Oxford, 2005. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 2008. Print.

XI) Gothelf, Jeff, and Josh Seiden. Lean UX: Applying Lean Principles to Improve User Experience. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.

XII) Friedman, Vitaly. “Applying Divine Proportion to Your Web Designs – Smashing Magazine.” Smashing Magazine. Vitaly Friedman and Sven Lennartz, 29 May 2008. Web. 2 Aug. 2016.

XIII) Choi, Charles. "Sense of Beauty Partly Innate, Study Suggests." LiveScience. TechMedia Network, 21 Nov. 2007. Web. 30 Aug. 2016.

XIV) Smith, Michael E. "Edward Tufte and Graphics." Publishing Archaeology:. N.p., 19 Sept.

2016. Web. 3 Aug. 2016.

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