Week 3: Beauty+Utility

Beauty+Utility [the politics of design]

The True Principles of Pointed Architecture, A.W.N. Pugin, 1841

Industrialization

Honoré Daumier, “Third-class Carriage,” 1860s

Today half of the world’s population lives in cities: 3 billion, compared to 1.5 billion 30 years ago.

Industrialisation in Nineteenth-century Britain

It is not, truly speaking, the labor that is divided but the men –divided into mere segments of men – broken into mere segments of men –broken into small fragments and crumbs of life; so that all the

little pieces of intelligence that is left in a man is not enough to make a pin, or a nail, but exhausts itself in making the point of a pin, or the head of a nail.

John Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, 1853

The purpose of applying art to articles of utility is two-fold; first, to add beauty to the results of the work of man, which would otherwise be ugly; and secondly, to add pleasure to the work itself, which would otherwise be painful and disgusting.

William Morris, The Arts and Crafts of Today, 1889

Nineteenth-century Design Reform:

looking back, looking ahead

The unity imposed on all of the arts might also serve as a metaphor for an ideal world in which all individuals are unified by a single faith and live in harmony with society.

-Margaret Belcher

The True Principles of Pointed Architecture, A.W.N. Pugin, 1841

Nineteenth-century Design Reform: looking back, looking ahead

A.W.N. Pugin Scarisbrick Hall, 1836

False Principles: imitation of architecture, ornament constructed

Putty pressing, plaster and iron casting for ornaments . . . are not to be rejected because such methods were unknown to our ancestors, but on account of their being opposed in their very nature to the true principles of art and design -- by substituting monotonous repetitions for beautiful

variety, flatness of execution for bold relief, encouraging cheap and false magnificence, and reducing the varied principles of ornamental design.

A. W. N. Pugin, An Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in England, 1843

Octagonal oak table from the Prince’s chamber, Palace of Westminster, by A.W.N. Pugin, c.1830s

Typical Victorian plate c.1850s

Bread plate A.W.N. Pugin for Minton, 1849

Henry Cole and Design Education

Sir Henry Cole and Richard Redgrave; photograph attributed to Charles T. Thompson

Henry Cole and Design Education

True Principles:

nature as model for ornament appropriate ornament for object (and use) abstraction in representation

Richard Redgrave, “Well-spring� vase 1857

Henry Cole and Design Education

False principles: imitation of nature inappropriate decoration for function ornament constructed

This was exhibited as demonstrating 'False Principles of Decoration’ Amongst the errors of this design were the 'falsifying the perspective' by repetition of the architectural view.

http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/prints_books/features/Wallpaper/Design_Re form/index.html

True principles

False principles

Owen Jones and 'The Grammar of Ornament' (1856)

Wallpaper with formalised floral motif, by Owen Jones (1809-74), England, Mid-19th century Colour print from woodblocks

Flowers or other natural objects should not be used as ornaments, but conventional representations founded upon them sufficiently suggestive to convey the intended image to the mind, without destroying the unity of the object they are employed to decorate.�

Owen Jones, The Grammar of Ornament, 1856

Owen Jones, The Grammar of Ornament, 1856

William Morris, Acanthus, Wallpaper, Color Print from Woodblock, c. 1870s

The Great Exhibition of 1851 [The Crystal Palace]

The Great Exhibition of 1851 [The Crystal Palace]

The Great Exhibition seemed to promise the fulfillment of universal progress, ingenuity, prosperity, and peace.

--David Raizman

Pugin’s Gothic Court at the Great Exhibition, London, 1851

Design reform: didactic aspirations or good design?

contemporary design reform: sustainable design [?]

Urban Orchard Project, London, 2010

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