TrustNews Mar 20
Design - an essay
“Ceci n’est pas une definition." This non-visual paraphrase on Rene Magritte's famous painting of a pipe is probably about as close as one can get to a definition of what Design might be. We use and abuse the word Design constantly and further colour and confuse it by pre-empting any meaning it may have to suit visual prejudices, especially by value judgements, i.e. ‘good’ Design, ‘bad‘ Design.
The word Design itself, in our context of a euro-centric culture, originally stems from artists‘ early attempts at formulating precepts that eventually elevated the creative process beyond craftsmen’s workshop practices. During the Early Renaissance, Handbooks and Treatises proliferated as artists desired to have Art put on a parallel with the Liberal Arts that included science and mathematics, so making it an intellectual pursuit as well as a creative one. The words disegno, colorito, compositione and inventione proscribed the principal creative guidelines, and of these disegno was deemed the more important since it revealed the artist’s creativity when Idea and Form would become manifest through drawing. Art was then not so narrowly defined: it was a multidisciplinary activity that included artefacts, building and writing: Leon Battista Alberti (1404-72) is a good example of this new breed of artists; architecture also became known as the ‘mother of all arts’, signifying a body that housed all aspects.
The styles developed from this period persisted into the eighteenth century, remaining mainly in the classical canon bar changes in taste and fashion. The Industrial Revolution, however, became the most effective catalyst for change because of innovations in engineering, social migration and growing commercial wealth. These factors contributed towards our notion of Design as we see it today. Those early beginnings of mass production made possible through mechanization demanded variety and novelty due to growing consumerism and ever-changing popular taste. An earlier euro-centric culture now absorbed new forms, new ideas from very different cultures through increased trade in the colonies and empire giving rise to a form of multi-culturalism expressed in the manufactured arts and demand for these was assured through the publication of illustrated catalogues. But the availability of cheap, decorative objets d'art engendered also imitations that corrupted the artistic integrity of established manufacturers in fabrics, glass, ceramics and metalwork. Competition among manufacturers was great and the apogee of all this would be seen in the Great Exhibition of 1851 which was intermixed with exhibits from all over the world which set the pattern for International Exhibitions thereafter. The extraordinarily innovative Crystal Palace, a vast pre-fabrication of cast iron and glass was itself an architectural landmark, a culmination of engineering ideas that had developed from the later eighteenth century to meet the fast-growing needs of transport, especially those of the new railway system with the building of bridges, stations, tunnels and viaducts.
In the so-called Age of Enlightenment that preceded these results of the industrial Revolution, philosophers and scientists explored ideas to embrace aesthetic, social, economic and moral issues that offered a sense direction and purpose, and these in turn began to re-emerge in a more radical way that sought to reform through education and political theory, John Ruskin and William Morris were the influential creative thinkers of this period and their idealistic notions of beauty and design attempted to combat the excesses of Victorian households stuffed with ill-considered decorative bric-a-brac. Their somewhat doctrinal aesthetics were born of a reaction to the spoils of the new mechanized industrial age and were a return to a dream-world of the Middle Ages which became a point of departure for subsequent ideologies, i.e. a return to Nature inspired the Arts and Crafts Movement and out of which came the international Art Nouveau that discarded old historicist approaches, to adopt instead a self-consciously new style that was to be manifested in many guises across Europe and America. With the turn of the century, Europe found itself in a socio-economic and cultural melting pot. A rapid succession of radical movements, political and artistic, jostled for centre stage; one of the more extreme being the Italian Futurists. Their manifesto glorified new science and technology, advocating the dynamism of modern life with a complete rejection and destruction of past cultural edifices and values, together with all bodies associated with the old order and establishment. The intervention of WWI calmed such youthful endeavours but in Russia spawned a complete revolution which achieved what the Futurists could only dream of. War had accelerated innovation and methods of production that were to be harnessed towards meeting ever-increasing consumerism and its concomitant demand for new ideas and new products. Schools of Art, Architecture and Design that had grown rapidly across Europe and America in the later 19C now benefitted from a new lease of life tempered by radical post-war creative thinking that sought to replace more traditional methods by theory and practice expressive of and fit for a modern society - most notably, the Bauhaus. A less attractive aspect of this can be sensed from the high moral stance imposed that dictated what was significant and appropriate, and dismissive of those who resisted. Paradoxically, it was the rise of totalitarianism in Europe that in turn labelled the moderns as degenerates and so caused the exodus of artists, designers and architects into the free world, remodelled again by WWll, to perpetuate a continuum of styles which has been constantly changing and developing in a global sense that responds to the pace and demands of life today governed by cybernetics.
One can sense from this all too brief historical vignette that to define Design further would have to take into account innumerable and diverse factors that condition this illusive word, and that a strict definition would be unrealistic and probably misleading. To overcome this dilemma might it be simpler to suggest that we try to understand Design as sensation, not a finite state, something alluded to. This means that Design cannot really be taught as the variables involved are too subtle, like quicksilver, in that they cannot be grasped in didactic terms but only perceived visually, sensationally. Schools of Art, Architecture and Design today certainly are places for learning essential techniques and creative processes but, more importantly, they offer a place for immersion and exposure to collect a wealth of visual experience that forms a personal state of understanding for Art, whatever its outcome. These collective sensibilities combine to form a personal core that directs an elected creative process towards a visual manifestation in Art, Architecture and Design.
To take an example from any one of these areas is inevitably to present a prejudicial value judgement. Our human condition, however, cannot avoid this since it is not in our nature to be super-impartial; we do need to be able to exercise our critical faculties towards an appreciation and understanding of aspects of Design and how these might determine our response to either a building or a planning issue that may arise.
Last year, at the Royal Academy, l saw an extraordinary retrospective exhibition of the work of the architect Renzo Piano. All the galleries were replete with drawings, photographs, videos, engineering models and architectural scale models - breathtaking by their sheer creative brilliance and scope. What most impressed, however, was a darkened centre room that displayed The Renzo Piano lsland – it took a little while to take this surprise in – a marvellous conceit of all his projects on an imagined island!
In his architecture there is no one identifiable style; every project is expressed differently, being pertinent to the purpose and function of the building and its spatial context. One can, nevertheless, identify a certain process of conceptualization that cohesively underpins Piano's creative personality; a lightness of touch that still gives sureness to elegant form and detail with surface materiality employing conscientious ecological technology to determine construction. Since the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, completed in 1977, that established his reputation, Piano has been moved to create a bottega, a workshop that encourages a collaborative approach to problem-solving. This is called the Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW) and within this one can sense there being a constant exploration of creative ideas architectural that relentlessly test all configurations and issues that keep their projects alive, to relate vitally to context and place, recreating and to arrive at a unique sense of place - of truly civic buildings.
What makes this Island so relevant in a Design context is that, unlike previous ‘ideal cities’ proposed by architects (pace) there is no suggestion of imposition to dictate the nature or character of the place, for example, Pienza, a delightful mini city built for Pius ll by a pupil of Alberti, Bernardo Rossellino, in 1459-62 that adhered to a new renaissance of architecture. Cities usually emerge organically overtime, adopting changes that add character and uniqueness, something we can enjoy it its urban nature has been sympathetically considered to meet civic human needs.
The Island is not a city, as such - though it could be, as it shows such possibilities that are too often lacking in an ad hoc urban framework. All the buildings were created for specific sites in different countries, societies and environments, some densely urban, some open natural surroundings. Piano has modelled this island plane in relief to be a varied landscape and urban cityscape, that embrace his tremendous range of building types from airports, museums, galleries, cultural centres, medical centres and work and residential areas. These potentially disparate edifices nonetheless share relationships of shape, form, light, shade, texture and spaces that are compatible with each other despite the fact they were conceived years apart and uniquely. This complex configuration presents an aesthetic and spatial dialogue that harmonizes and humanizes these elements of disegno in the prospects provided within the panorama of the urban lslandscape.
To end this essay, I cannot resist paraphrasing once more, and this time from E.H. Gombrich's ‘Story of Art’ and his two opening sentences: “There is really no such thing as Design. There are only designers."
To understand better Piano's ideas, sources and working methods, and the importance he gives disegno, I recommend watching a 45 minute interview he gave, entitled ‘On the Shoulder of Giants’, which can be seen on YouTube. A definitive book written about Renzo Piano is ‘The Art of Making Buildings’, published by the Royal Academy to coincide with his exhibition.
Arthur Morgan