EXHIBITIONS: Suddenly, this summer: Pop Art in Denver

The Denver Art Museum will host a two-month exhibition of paintings by Pop Art pioneer Tom Wesselmann this summer. His abstract collages and iconic color-saturated still lifes are celebrated as the foundation of Pop Art in America. The exhibition of 100 pieces of artwork -- including drawings, maquettes and photographs  --  runs July 13 - September 14.

The Huffington Post notes that the show is “One of 15 international 2014 summer art exhibitions you should definitely see.” 

See more info here.

Wesselmann Still Life No. 35, 1963

 Wesselman Still Life No. 60, 1973

                        Wesselmann Still Life #30, 1963

                                                         Wesselman Great American Nude #1, 1961

PRIZE WINNERS: 2014 UK Design Awards announced

Heydar Aliyev Centre in Baku, Azerbaijan

On June 30, the London Design Museum announced its 2014 awards for top achievements in architecture, digital media, fashion furniture, graphics and transport. Iranian architect Zaha Hadid won first prize in architecture for her luminous and elaborately curvaceous Heydar Aliyev Centre in Baku, Azerbaijan (pictured above). It's a thriving conference venue, museum and gallery. 

The fashion category was won by Prada. The judges said: "Prada's S/S14 collection loudly declares the joy of being a modern woman. It mixes colours, textures, and paintings to leapfrog over the world of tasteful bland fashion. This is serious clothing that doesn't take itself seriously."

Prada's S/S14 collection, as shown at Milan Fashion Week

Pro Chair Family line by Konstantin Grcic

Konstantin Grcic won the furniture category for his Pro Chair Family line. The designer's goal was to "absolutely shake up the educational sector, and give students a truly happier experience in the classroom." Grcic's chairs, according to the judges, are "seriously comfortable and joyous without risk of becoming a cartoon."

Volkswagen won the transport award for its XL1, a highly efficient liquid-fuelled production car. The judges noted: "Here is a car that seems like it’s come out of a dream of the future. It’s refined... and it looks beautiful -- dangerous almost -- in its dramatic shapes and lines."

UFO-like Volkswagen XL1

For more information, link here to the London Design Museum's website

EXHIBITIONS: Designing Women in NYC

Designing Modern Women 1890-1990 

at Museum of Modern Art, New York

Through Oct. 1, 2014

Gesso by Margaret MacDonald Mackintosh,

more than a muse 

Presenting design objects by more than 60 women, this show highlights the work of Marianne Brandt, Eileen Gray, Lilly Reich, Eva Zeisel, Ray Eames, textile artist Anni Albers, ceramicist Lucy Rie, 1960s graphic designer Bonnie Maclean and other luminaries. Some of the artists are well known to design aficionados; many, though, might be unfamiliar to a general audience.The exhibition explores the connections between modern design, female emancipation, class stratification, and health reform, paying particular attention to everyday spaces and objects, such as kitchens and labor-saving appliances.

The first object on display might be a bit perplexing; it's a tall wooden side chair by famed designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh, crafted in 1897. Why begin with a man’s work? Label-reading viewers will learn that from early in his career, Mackintosh collaborated with his wife, Margaret MacDonald, an acclaimed artist during her own lifetime. Mackintosh readily acknowledged Margaret as more than a muse, declaring: "I have talent; she has genius."

               Marianne Brandt teapot

Eileen Gray's elegant and utilitarian "1027 table"

                                                                                                                        Annie Albers textile design    

EXHIBITION: Jewish midcentury modern designers in San Francisco

Many creators of iconic midcentury Modernist designs were Jewish -- 

why, I couldn't tell you! San Francisco's Contemporary Jewish Museum 

is currently honoring this phenomenon with a special exhibition that's on until October 6.

"Designing Home: Jews and Midcentury Modernism examines the contribution of Jewish designers, architects, patrons, and merchants in the creation of 

a distinctly modern American domestic landscape."

Link here for more info.

Henry Dreyfuss' Princess phone -- every 1950s teenage girl's dream.

(I begged my parents for one, and eventually got it. Yep, pink.)

       Above: George Nelson/Irving Harper Marshmallow sofa

Below: Alex Steinweiss, creator of the modern album cover, in his studio

See my "book note" posting of 12/15/13, for more about this giant of 20th C. graphic design

Ernest Sohn, "Esquire" coffee service

Exhibition poster

OBJECTS OF DESIRE: Yale Art Gallery's splendid collection

A weekend visit to the Yale Art Gallery -- originally to see a special exhibition of JFK photos -- revealed that their collection of 20th century decorative arts is quite stunning. Many of my favorite designers (Eva Zeisel, Henry Dreyfuss, Norman Bel Geddes, Ettore Sottsass) are represented here, and the imaginative influence of urban skylines and 1930s ocean liners is present throughout. The size of the exhibit is just right; there's plenty to see, but not so much that museum-i-tis sets in. Admission is free.

    Items for the perfect art deco/modern kitchen:

    From left: Corning glass "Top-of- Stoveware"

    Magnalite tea kettle, Dreyfuss herb chopper

    White pitcher by Eva Zeisel

    Limoges "Jiffy Ware" orange and white pitcher

Cityscape vases, glassware and 

Norman Bel Geddes' "Manhattan" cocktail ensemble 

Black vitrolite clock by Gilbert Rohde (1933) 

Blue earthenware chocolate pot by Ilonka  Karasz (1934)

                               

          All photos by Michael Schonbach

OBJECTS OF DESIRE: Space Age style for today

Biff's Coffee Shop in Oakland, CA 1963

LAX Theme Building 1961

http://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/21228978/list/Out-of-This-World-Decorating--Space-Age-Style-for-Today

BOOK NOTE: "The Gee Whiz invention of the 1940's" ...

Who doesn't love the Polaroid camera?

Instant: The Story of Polaroid 

Princeton Architectural Press, hard cover, 192 pages, 100 color illustrations, $24.95

Merging user-friendly technology with pop culture, the Polaroid camera was a phenomenon of its time that retains iconic status today, sixty years after its debut in the marketplace. Christopher Bonanos’ bright and breezy book Instant chronicles the story of Edwin Land, a passionate and resolute visionary who created the first camera capable of producing prints in a minute, while delighted photographers and onlookers could watch images magically appear “out of a green-gray mist”. Land started Polaroid in a garage, in 1937; it eventually became a billion-dollar enterprise. Sound familiar? (In fact, Land was one of Apple founder Steve Jobs' first business and design heroes.) With its appeal to fine artists such as Ansel Adams and Andy Warhol, technology enthusiasts and doting parents, the “gee whiz invention of the 1940s” – despite now being supplanted by the digital camera – “still exerts a weird and bewitching pull.”