A piece of home
August 25, 2015
The length of time one piece tooks to create is a measure of its value.The origins of design can be traced back to the Industrial Revolution and the birth of mechanized production.
The idea of accessible, mass-produced design that is affordable to anyone was not only applied to the industrial mechanics, but also to the aesthetics of architecture and furniture. This modern and contemporary philosophy of practicality came to be called Functionalism.
Functionalist designers would consider the interaction of the design with user and how any of the its features would conform to the human posture.
Western design generally, whether architectural or design of furniture, had for millennia sought to convey an idea of lineage, a connection with the tradition and the history.
Functionalism rejected the imitation of stylistic and historical forms, and sought an establishment of functionality in a piece.
However, the modern movement sought newness, originality, technical innovation, and ultimately the message that it conveyed spoke of the present and the future, rather than of what had gone before it.
Modernist design seems to have evolved out of a combination of influences: technically innovative materials and new manufacturing methods. New philosophies and artists emerged from the De Stijl of Netherlands, the Deutscher Werkbund and the Bauhaus school, both located in Germany.
Notable schools
De Stijl was founded in 1917 by Theo Van Doesburg in Amsterdam. The movement was based on the principles of promoting abstraction and universality by reducing excessive elements down to the essentials of form and color.
Characteristics of furniture from this movement include: simplified geometry of vertical and horizontal compositions and pure primary colors and black and white.
Dutch design generally has shown the preference for simple materials and construction.
Influential artists from this movement include the well-known Gerrit Rietveld, Piet Mondrian, and Mies van der Rohe, who continued to evolve the ideas of modernist design.
The Dutch De Stijl Movement was the rejection of the decorative excesses from Art Nouveau and other past movements, and promoted logicality through construction, function and usability.