UVC Art 100 Module 10 Objects (by design)

OBJECTS [BY DESIGN]A

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Module 10

WHY

DO WE N

EED

MATERIA

L CULT

URE?

Jule

s Pro

wn “

Min

d in M

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r” 1

982), p. 1

“ALTHOUGH ART MUSEUMS, historical societies, museums of history and technology, historic houses, open-air museums, and museums of ethnography, science, and even natural history, have long collected, studied, and exhibited the material of what has come to be called material culture, no comprehensive academic philosophy or discipline for the investigation of material culture has as yet been developed.”

Kranner

t Art

Muse

um A

ddition

, Univ

ersi

ty o

f Illi

nois,

Urban

a-Cham

paign, 1

985

THE

GRAND ENTR

ANCE

THE

FIRST

FLOOR

Educa

tion D

irect

or A

nne Sau

tman

lead

ing a

gal

lery

discu

ssio

n

THE

BASEMENT

Louis

Sulli

van, E

leva

tor G

ate

from

The

Chicag

o Sto

ck

Exch

ange

Buildin

g, 1894,

Cast-iro

n with

bro

nze p

latin

g

HOW D

O WE

DEFINE

MATERIA

L CULT

URE?

Jule

s Pro

wn

“Min

d in M

atte

r”

(1982)

p. 1

“Material culture is the study through artifacts of the beliefs —values, ideas, attitudes, and assump- tions—of a particular community or society at a given time. The term material culture is also fre- quently used to refer to artifacts themselves, to the body of material available for such study. I shall restrict the term to mean the study and refer to the evidence simply as material or artifacts.”

WHAT IS AN ARTIFACT?

O R D I N A R Y O L D P E B B L E

P E B B L E T O O L S , O L D U V A I G O R G E , T A N Z A N I A , 1 . 8 M I L L I O N Y E A R S A G O

ARTIFA

CT

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PIECE OF OBSIDIAN (VOLCANIC GLASS)

OBSIDIAN TOOLS

Properties of the material are enhanced by human intervention

ARE THESE NATURALLY-OCCURRING THINGS, OR ARTIFACTS?

WHY

BOTHER W

ITH O

BJECTS

?

WOULD

N’T W

ORDS AND D

EEDS BE

MORE REVEALIN

G OF

CULTURE?

Jule

s Pro

wn

“Min

d in M

atte

r”

(1982)

p. 3

Why should one bother to investigate material objects in the quest for culture, for a society's systems of belief? Surely people in all societies express and have expressed their beliefs more explicitly and openly in their words and deeds than in the things they have made. Are there aspects of mind to be discovered in objects that differ from, complement, supplement, or contradict what can be learned from more traditional literary and behavioral sources?

WHAT COULD BE CULTURALLY REVEALING ABOUT THE STUDY OF OBJECTS?

1. Cultural value can be understood through multiple lenses when dealing with material objects.

Inherent value. Value in original context, at a later point, today. (subject to frequent

change) Use value. Aesthetic, spiritual, relational values.

WHAT COULD BE CULTURALLY REVEALING ABOUT THE STUDY OF OBJECTS?

2. Objects survive and provide direct and tangible evidence of the past. This allows us to “experience” the past through empathetic engagement of our senses.

WHAT

DOORS M

IGHT

THE

STUDY

OF OBJE

CTS O

PEN?

Jule

s Pro

wn

“Min

d in M

atte

r”

(1982)

p. 5

"This affective mode of apprehension through the senses that allows us to put ourselves, figuratively speaking, inside the skins of individuals who commissioned, made, used, or enjoyed these objects, to see with their eyes and touch with their hands, to identify with them empathetically, is clearly a different way of engaging the past than abstractly through the written word. Instead of our minds making intellectual contact with minds of the past, our senses make affective contact with senses of past.”

—Arnold Hauser, Sociology of Art

GROUP QUESTI

ON

What different kinds of value can we isolate and appreciate in this pendant?

WHAT COULD BE CULTURALLY REVEALING ABOUT THE STUDY OF OBJECTS?

3. Objects might be more representative of what people in a society are doing, thinking and feeling than words are.

Jule

s Pro

wn

“Min

d in M

atte

r”

(1982)

p. 3

Henry Glassie has observed that only a small percentage of the world's population is and has been literate, and that the people who write literature or keep diaries are atypical. Objects are used by a much broader cross section of the population and are therefore potentially a more wide-ranging, more representative source of information than words.

WHAT COULD BE CULTURALLY REVEALING ABOUT THE STUDY OF OBJECTS?

3. Objects are physically real, capable of empathetic use.

“The theoretical democratic advantage of artifacts in general, and vernacular material in particular, is partially offset by the skewed nature of what in fact survives from an earlier culture. A primary factor in this is the destructive, or the preservative, effect of particular environments on particular materials. Materials from the deeper recesses of time are often buried, and recovered archaeologically. Of the material heritage of such cultures, glass and ceramics survive in relatively good condition, metal in poor to fair condition, wood in the form of voids (postholes), and clothing not at all (except for metallic threads, buttons, and an odd clasp or hook).”

ARTIFA

CTS…

R E V E A L H U G E A M O U N T S O F I N F O R M A T I O N A B O U T T H E P E O P L E ( A N D T H E C U LT U R E S ) T H A T M A D E T H E M .

W E C A N “ R E A D ” T H E S E I M A G E S T O L E A R N A B O U T O T H E R S O C I E T I E S , A N D A B O U T O U R S E L V E S .

In the West (for example, Europe and the USA), this kind of artifact has been “put on pedestal” as the most exalted kind of artifact.

Here we tend to privilege art above other kinds of artifacts.

(E.g., Krannert vs. Spurlock Museum)

Augustus St.-Gaudens, Diana,1892-4, in Philadelphia Museum of Art

ONE CATEGORY OF ARTIFACTS IS ART.

HOW ARE OBJECTS PRESENTED IN THESE TWODIFFERENT VENUES?

WHAT DOES THE METHOD OF DISPLAY CONVEY ABOUT THE VALUE/SIGNIFICANCE OF THE OBJECTS DISPLAYED?

ANOTHER CATEGORY OF THINGS IS “VERNACULAR” OBJECTS.

Shaker side chair, maple with rush seating, c. 1880

THESE ARE ORDINARY OBJECTS WHICH HAVE WIDE POPULARITY AND WHOSE SPECIFIC ORIGINS ARE OBSCURE.

Shaker side chair, maple with cane seating, c. 1880Plastic outdoor chair, c. present

Bryan Ropar with a small sample of his plastic chair collection

Maarten Baas, in collaborationwith Contrasts Gallery, ShanghaiPlastic Chair in Wood, 2008elm wood

Sam Durant, Porcelain Chairs, 2006

Jules Prown

“…works of art constitute a large and special category within artifacts because their inevitable aesthetic and occasional ethical or spiritual (iconic) dimensions make them direct and often overt or intentional expressions of cultural belief. The self-consciously expressive character of this material, however, raises problems as well as opportunities; in some ways artifacts that express culture unconsciously are more useful as objective cultural indexes.”

(Prown, “Mind in Matter,” p.2)

Siegfried Giedion

“We shall deal here with humble things, things not usually granted earnest consideration, or at least not valued for their historical import. But no more in history than in painting is it the impressiveness of the subject that matters. The sun is mirrored even in a coffee spoon.”

(Giedion, “Anonymous History,” p. 294)

THE VALUE OF “ANONYMOUS HISTORY”

NOW W

E’RE G

OING T

O

LOOK A

T A T

HIRD

CATEGORY

OF

ARTIFA

CTS…

DE

SI G

N O

BJ E

CT

S.

WHAT

IS D

ESIGN?

W E U S E T H I S W O R D O F T E N , F O R E X A M P L E :

Fashion designInterior designProduct designPackaging designGraphic designAutomotive designWeb designUser interface design

PACKAGING DESIGN: COMPARE/CONTRAST

1. What stylistic choices are made in these package designs? Let’s list as many as we can.2. What meanings do we attribute to those stylistic differences?

WE N

EED A

DIS

TINCTI

ON

BETWEEN: Something made through a

process of careful consideration, often but not always credited to a specific maker.

Something made with both function and aesthetic appeal in mind.

AND

relatively minor changes in the appearance of a product

desig

n vs.

sty

ling

FASHION DESIGN, OR PRODUCT STYLING?

DESIGN IS

:

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AN

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—H

ES

KE

T T,

P . 6

DESIGN D

EFINED

“ V E R Y F E W A S P E C T S O F T H E M A T E R I A L E N V I R O N M E N T A R E I N C A P A B L E O F I M P R O V E M E N T I N S O M E S I G N I F I C A N T W A Y B Y G R E A T E R A T T E N T I O N B E I N G P A I D T O T H E I R D E S I G N . I N A D E Q U A T E L I G H T I N G , M A C H I N E S T H A T A R E N O T U S E R - F R I E N D LY , B A D LY -F O R M A T T E D I N F O R M A T I O N , A R E J U S T A F E W E X A M P L E S O F B A D D E S I G N T H A T C R E A T E C U M U L A T I V E P R O B L E M S A N D T E N S I O N S . ”

— H E S K E T T , P . 2

THERE’S

A

RELATI

ONSHIP…

B E T W E E N U S , A S P E O P L E , A N D T H E O B J E C T S T H A T S U R R O U N D U S .

G O O D D E S I G N E R S T R Y T O M A K E T H I S R E L A T I O N S H I P A H A P P Y O N E .

Name three visual/functional elements of the chair.

SIDE CHAIR, CIRCA 1880, MAPLE, CANE SEATLEBANON, MASSACHUSETTS

COMPARE/CONTRAST: FORM

Side chair, gilt and Beauvais tapestry, c. 1780

COMPARE/CONTRAST: MEANINGS

Whistler, Arrangement in Gray and Black #1, 1871

Ingres, Princesse de Broglie, 1853

Briefly describe the visual form of the seating pictured in this photograph. Then speculate: what set of functions are implied in this design? What meanings can we infer about the people likely to be seated in each chair?