The Art Institute of Chicago

Designing for Democracy: Modernism and Its Utopias Author(s): Judith A. Barter Source: Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies, Vol. 27, No. 2, Shaping the Modern: American Decorative Arts at The Art Institute of Chicago, 1917-65 (2001), pp. 6-17+105 Published by: The Art Institute of Chicago Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4102827 . Accessed: 15/08/2011 20:58
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and Modernism ItsUtopias for Designing Democracy:

Judith Barter A.
Field-McCormickofAmerican Curator Arts

Let therefore a new create of without us guild craftsmen that the class-distinctions raiseanarrogant barrier Let between craftsmen artists! usdesire, and conceive, and create new the building thefuture of It together.will ina single combine and architecture, sculpture, painting and one toward heavens the the from form, will dayrise hands a million of thecrystalline workers as of symbol a new coming and faith. Walter 1919 Gropius, Business assuming roleof patron bythe is the held inpast and church aristocracy ages.
Frank 1943 Caspers,

reformendedup, by midsocialist,democratic century, as the visual language of American consumercapitalism.Our story here is a tale of how a European-inflected style established and transformed itself on Americansoil-and on a local levelin Chicago'smuseums,department stores, and expositions--sharing space with historicist designs, experimentingwith American forms, and working its way into a centralposition in both the Americanmarketplaceandthe nationalimagination.

Historicalhindsightallows us to describe modernism as an extended revolution that To construct a utopia always actofnegation is an toward emphasized new technologies, new styles,new anexisting a desire transform to it. of socialrelations, a new challenge and reality, patterns Leszek to traditional forms of aesthetic thought. 19681 Kolakowski, Modernismwas far from uniform, however; is no betterway to introducereaders to as the social historian Raymond Williams There Instituteof The Art colChicago's growing famouslyexplained,it was often more recoglection of twentieth-century decorative arts nizable by what it was breaking away from than to offer a brief sense of both the ambithanwhat it was movingtoward.2 is perhaps It tion and complexity of the modernist movemore useful to think about modernism as a which dominatedthe culturallife of the collection of related styles, dating from the ment, last century, whose practitioners and 189os to the 195os,and including the Wiener soughtto do no lessthaneliminate traditional distinctions Werkstitte, Deutscher Werkbund, De Stijl, betweenfine artandcraft.As the abovequotaGermanBauhaus,FrenchArt Moderne,Scantions suggest, moreover,they did so in a way dinavian organicist, and American streamthat investedthe objectsthey designedwith a lining schools. Such modernist approaches and indeed utopian, social imporwere characterized richvariations arose that powerful, by tance. In reconsidering history and diverthe from differingnationaldesign traditions,and and sity of modernistdesigns,it quickly becomes preferencesfor diversematerials methods of manufacture. that not all versionsof modernism-apparent While eighteenth-and nineteenth-century or modernist visionsof utopia-were the same, valuedart objectsfor theirintrinandthatan aesthetic beganaroundthe turn that antiquarians sic worth and historicalassociations(such as of the twentieth century with an eye toward
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1 Figure Frank Lloyd Wright (American; 1867-1959). Rendering of the living room of the Avery Coonley House, Riverside,Ill. (1908). Ausgefiihrte Bauten und Entwiirfe von Frank Lloyd Wright
(Berlin, 1922), pl.

57.

their relationshipto classicalsources), modernist designersin generaleschewed historicism and decoration,and aimedto achievein their work a complete integrationof art, sciFor ence,andtechnology. themthe object,like the human being, ideally representeda balance of the emotionaland the intellectual, the of artandlife, andthe acknowledgintegration in mentof humanneedandpotential allthings.3 influentialwas the notion of GesamtHighly kunstwerk,or the "totalwork of art,"which blurs the lines between furniture,glass, pictures, sculpture, and their settings. Indeed, many leadingmodernistswere at once archiand and tects,artists, graphic industrial designerswho crossedtraditional bounprofessional dariesin orderto create completeenvironments for living. While modernism issued a clear call to reject history and celebrate the new, it did not, like Venus,rise full-grown from the sea. If it formed a clearbreakwith the past, modernismdrew from it as well-especially from the utopianvision of its immediateprecursor,
8

the Arts and Crafts movement. Founded in the mid-nineteenth century by William Morris,JohnRuskin,and otherEnglishintellectuals and socialists, the Arts and Crafts movement was itself decidedly antimodern, decrying the evils of industrialization, the loss of individualcraftsmanship dignity, and and the shoddy products of machine manufacture.Turningnostalgicallyto a preindustrial model of life and labor, its proponents glorifiedthe handworkof folk traditionsand medieval guilds. They espoused the simple, "honest" of crafting objectsthatweredevoidof decorationwhich might obscurethe simany and plicity of theirmaterials construction.' Influential the architecture design on and of earlymodernists suchasFrankLloydWright in America(seefig. i), the Arts andCraftsphilosophy inspiredEuropeanfollowers such as CharlesRennie Mackintoshin Glasgow and the WienerWerkstditte Vienna (see fig. 2), in and remainedpopular well into the twentieth century;indeed, two of the earliestArts and Craftssocieties in the United Stateswere

and for Modernism ItsUtopias Designing Democracy:

founded in Boston and Chicago in I897.' on But the movement's emphasis handlabor-and on quality materials that might bring particularpleasureto in products that werecraftspeople--resulted simply too expensive for their intended audiences to afford, and undercutthe socialistideasof theoristssuchas Morris, who dreamed of satisfied, skilled workersproducingfine, beautifullydesigned objects for every home. Summing up this dilemma,Morrishimself complained:"I have got to understandthoroughly the mannerof work underwhich the Art of the MiddleAges was done, andthatis the only mannerof work which can turn out popular art, only to discoverthatit is impossibleto work in thatmannerin the profit-grinding society.. . ."6In practice, Morris's populist dream collided with the realityof capitalism. While Arts and Crafts practitioners regarded the machine as the enemy, it was not long before a younger set of modernist designers began to find the look, materials, and use of the machinepractical, alluring,and and startedto imaginethe social inspirational, decorativeartsin potentialof mass-produced differentway.In the wake of a fundamentally World War I, which introduced tempered glass, tubular metals, and processed wood earlymodernist productsinto the marketplace, Le such as MarcelBreuer, Corbusier, designers Walter Gropius, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, among others, incorporated these industrialmaterialsinto their work. During the mid-i92os, for example, at the Bauhaus art school in Dessau, Germany,Breuer and with Gropiuscreatedspareinteriorsdecorated of furniture austere,durable, lightweightmetal a standardized design (see fig. 3)-not unlike newly availableappliances such as vacuum cleaners refrigerators-and and promotedtheir creationsas affordable, hygienic,and resilient home furnishings. alternatives traditional to

While the forms of these designswere in part dictated by the materialsof which they the were made,many designersalso preferred look machine-inspired becausethey believedit and allowedthem to fashiona newer,simpler, more affordable environment for the postWorld WarI world. Moderniststook up the Arts and Crafts reformist program of producing holistically conceived, well-designed objects for everyday use, and embracedthe philosophythat good designmight,by bringing unity to the arts,operateas a tool for social howUnlikeArtsandCrafts adherents, change. that modernists ever, imagined theymightreach consumersmore effectivelyby working with cheaplymanuindustryto createstandardized, The machine, factured they thought, products. couldhelpdemocratize design,andbringabout not a utopiacharacterized by revivingthe past, but by achievingtechnologicaladvancesthat of wouldresultin a higherstandard livingforall. and Arts and Craftsantiquarianism modernist futurismmight at first seem to haveexistedin but oppositionto one another, theywerein fact

2 Figure Josef Hoffmann (Austrian; 1870-1956). Dining room for the Palais Stoclet, Brussels
(1905-II). Photo:

BildarchivPhoto Marburg.

Modernism ItsUtopias and for Designing Democracy:

were particularly its proponents,for example, inspiredby late-eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century French neoclassicalfurnishings.8Like other modernisms,Art Deco was informed by what came before it, and nineteenth-century French decorative arts were shaped by an exaltationof the ancienrdgime, of "those traditions, all French, of grace, refinement, of elegance, and, to be sure, of
luxury."9 Unlike other European modernists,

whose social idealism lead them to unite in Bauhaus, groupssuchastheWiener Werkstlitte, and De Stijl,to design,produce, and distribute modernobjects,many Frenchpractitioners still relied on a design concept based on the aristocratic and craft traditions of the Perhaps more imporeighteenth century.1" dectantly,the Frenchcontinuedto approach while by the 1920os orationas a separate issue, otherdevoteesof modernismin Austria,Germany,andHollandhad come to treatit as part of an uncluttered,totally designed architecturalenvironment."
3 Figure Walter Gropius (American, born Germany; 1883-I969). Dining room in one of the "Master's Houses,"Bauhaus, Dessau, Germany
(1925). Marcel Breuer

(American, born Hungary; 1902-1981) designedthe tubularsteel table and chairs, and Laszl6 MoholyNagy (American, born Hungary; 1895-1946) conceived the wall and ceiling painting. Courtesy of the Berlin. Bauhaus-Archiv,

handlabor, Whileone glorified equally utopian. and and silvertankards, the bejeweledcoffers, otherpromisedthe efficiencyof manufactured chromeand glass,both believedin something thanthepresent.7 morecompelling Not all moderniststyles, however,were socialconfueledby a drivetowardimproving ditions and making good design universally accessible.Indeed,FrenchArt Moderne,one in statements the emergof the most influential ing conversationabout the shape of contemporarylife and design,was devotedneitherto nor rejecting stylisticprecedents to embracing for the masses. Popularized at affordability the 1925 "Exposition internationaledes arts ddcoratifset industriels modernes" in Paris (see pp. 19-20), "ArtDeco," as this style came to be called,was characterized its designby ers' and consumers' persistent appetite for luxurious materialsand historicalreferences;

In America,however,the history,stakes, and social uses of modern design were subfromanextended different. Emerging stantially moment during which, as Herbert Hoover the admittedself-consciously, nation'sdesigners "hadalmostnothingto exhibitin the modern spirit,"Americans were presented with of the challenge forginga modernstyle of their and bothinnovation imitation own through (see pp. 19-21).12 One directionof reactionis suggested by the designs of the Austrian immigrantPaul T. Frankl,who embracedthe skyscraperas the signalmotif in his own attempt to create a distinctively American brand of modernism (see cat. no. 5). To arrive at his Franklrejected vision of unadorned verticality, historicalmodels and fine materials-instead, he promoted the skyscraperas a compelling symbol of a modern American culture that

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was drivenandshapedby theforcesof industry. The skyscraper a represented similaroptimism in the work of contemporaryartists such as GeorgiaO'Keeffe(see fig. 4) andJohnBradley Storrs,whose gleamingfigure Ceres (fig. 5), commissioned for the top of the Chicago Boardof TradeBuilding(1927-30o), epitomizes the connectionbetweensleek moderndesign, progress,and the power of businessthatfascinatedthe American publicfor yearsto come. Of the moderniststyles, both European and homegrown, circulating in the United States during the 910osand 1920s, Frankl's antihistorical model was by no means the most influential. Americans living in major urbancenterswould haveencountereda variin ety of modernfurnishings museums, department stores,andworld'sfairs.In Chicago,for example,the Art Instituteplayedan important role in promoting modernism as politically The progressiveand economicallyaffordable. museumhosted the traveling exhibition"German Applied Arts" (1912-13), which featured the productsof the DeutscherWerkbund, an of designers,manufacturers, and organization museumsthat promotednew Germandesign. This pioneeringexhibition(see fig. 6) demonstratedthe diverserangeof modernistexpressions, and showed that artists and architects could work with merchants industrialists and to produce affordableobjects that improved public taste. All the pieces in the show were for sale, and while the Art Institute did not acquire any, Chicago collectors purchased one hundred and five objects. WilliamM. R. directorat the time, French,the Art Institute's remarked that "in Germanythereseemsto be no distinctionbetweenartistandcraftsman... and that intelligentand sympatheticcooperation between artists and manufacturershas Despite the proved a conspicuous success."13 popularityof this displayin the citieswhere it was shown,WorldWarI dampenedAmerican

4 Figure Georgia O'Keeffe (American; 1887-1986). The Shelton with Sunspots,1926. Oil on canvas; 123.2 x 76.8 cm (48Y2 x 30o 4 in.). The Art Institute of Chicago,gift of LeighB. Block, 1985.206.

5 Figure John Bradley Storrs (American; 1885-1956). Ceres, 1928.Copper alloy plated with nickel, then chrome;67.3 cm high on 12.7 x 15.2 cm base (26 /2 in. high on 5 x 6 base). The Art Institute of Chicago, gift of John N. Stern,
1981.538.

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in present-day ideaswho feel thatin our times theremustbe progress perpetual and changein decorativearts even as there arein all the arts
and sciences. "14

Above: 6 Figure "GermanApplied Arts" at the National Arts Club, New York, 1913. Shown at The Art Institute of Chicago, Feb. 27-Mar. 16, 1913.

enthusiasm for things German, and further Werkbund exhibitions did not materialize. By however, objects from Joseph Urban's of New-York based Wiener Werkstditte Amer1922,

ica, Incorporated, prompted positive press when exhibited at the Art Institute (see fig. 7). One Chicago reviewer, for example, proclaimed that the new life and vitality he perceived in the show reflected an international movement that rejected conservatism and emerged from the work of "progressiveleaders

The majority of modernist furnishings to available Chicagoansat this moment seem to have been offered for sale at high prices, and in relatively exclusive establishments. Like majorretailersin other Americancities, Chicago's departmentstores showed a great interest in Art Moderne (or Art Deco), and promoted it more aggressively than other moderniststyles.Commercial interestin modern furnishingsseems to have escalatedafter the 1927 "SwedishContemporaryDecorative Arts"exhibitionat the Art Institute(seefig. 8), whose name reflectedits organizers'goal of presentingto viewers the elegancetraditionally associated with handblown glass, fine goods, often weavings,and other handcrafted at less expensivepricesthanFrenchimports.15 on Therewas in factanimplicitassumption the of ChicagoansthatSwedishsociety-and part Scandinavianculture generally-was more democratic thantheFrench, morelikethecommiddleclass.'" fortablelifestyleof the American At around the same time, the exclusive CharlesA. StevensandBrothersstore,located in Chicago's also district, opened Loop business a smallgiftgallery fig.9). At Stevens Broth(see modernfurnishings took on a chic,sophisers, ticated look, much like the store's expensive dresses. Catering to a wealthy clientele, the firm developeda designvision in keepingwith the eleganceand richnessof Frenchmodernism. StevensBrothersbelievedthat modernist furniture should not be mass-produced of new industrial materials, but rather handcraftedof fine fabric,leather,and wood, as a testamentto the discriminating taste of both A designerand patron.17 differentinterpretation of the modernist aesthetic prevailed at another new establishment,Secession, Ltd.,

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opened in 1927by architectsRobert Switzer and Harold Warner(see fig. io). Influenced by their travelsin Austria,France,Germany, and Sweden, Switzer and Warnerdecorated their shop's interior in blacks, whites, and grays, with unbleachedmuslin fabrics, German and Swedish wallpapers,and tall, black of cabinets theirown design,not unlikeFrankl's
"18 "skyscrapers. in The Art Instituteparticipated the commercial of modernist as promotion furnishings well: In 1928 Warner, alongwith the museum's current RobertHarshe,joineda group director, of Chicago businessmen and arts organizations in sponsoring "Exposition Modern the of American Industrial and Decorative Arts," store(see held at MandelBrothersdepartment fig. ii). Although the organizersexhibited a copper coffee tableand mirrorby Frankl,the decorative accessories they displayed were

mainly examples of French Art Deco design.19

the was As at Stevens Brothers, emphasis not on the functionalismor economic restraintoften with German modernist associated furnishings, materials that but insteadon the rare,luxurious the characterized upscaleArt Modernestyle. In the wake of WorldWarI, prosperousChicagoans,traditionallyfrancophilicin the first chic place,regarded expensive, Parisian designs more favorably thanGermanones. Of all the Chicago department stores duringthe 1920s, only sellingfinerfurnishings to Marshall Fieldand Companycatered a wide rangeof tastesand budgets.Makingthe obvious connectionbetweenmodernistdesignand expense, one critic wrote in 1927that Field's displayed its modern interiors in the model rooms of a "cosmopolitan" city apartment, and showed affordable maple reproductions of early-American pieces in its "budget which featuredrooms furnishedfor house," In under $1800oo. these displays,homey,smallhooked rugs,and chintz wallpapers, patterned

and "late-Georgian" draperies complemented Field'sdeparted from furniture.20 "Adam-style" Art Deco influences in furnishprevailing pied-a-terre, presenting the "cosmopolitan" German-modernist inspired objects by ing Peter Behrens and WolfgangHoffmann (see cat. no. 13),and silk doorwayhangingsby the of WienerWerkstditte America.21 Field'suneven mix of colonial and modernist furniture can be seen, in fact, to have resultedfrom-and indeedto havecapitalized on-a largercompetition between historicist and modernist impulses in the 1920os. On a local level,Chicago,as a city with a continual visual history dating to only after the Great Fire of 1871,manifestedits culturalinsecurity through an attractionto the colonial past of the East Coast. This penchantmergedwith a in interest America's widernational eighteenthcenturyculture,which was partlya conservative reaction to increasingimmigration and the perceiveddilutionof the country's AngloSaxonracialstock. It laterconstituteda reassuring, backward-looking response to the hardshipsof the GreatDepression.Nostalgia for what was believedto be America's golden businessmen such as Henry age prompted

Opposite below: page, 7 Figure "Modern Austrian Art, Assembled by Wiener Werkstatteof America," The Art Institute of Chicago, Sept. 19Oct. 22, 1922.

Photo: Good Furniture Magazine 19,6 (Dec. 1922), p. 259. Above: 8 Figure "SwedishContemporary Decorative Arts" at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York,Jan. i8-Mar. 20, 1927.Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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utopianism, and corporate image-making occurred at Chicago's "Century of Progress International Exposition" of 1933,which operated to some extent as an urban, modern alternative to establishments such as Colonial Williamsburg and Greenfield Village. Celebrating the ennobling forces of science and industry, the exposition marked the city's growth over one hundred years from a small village to a national center of commerce, culture, and transportation.The futuristic forms of the fair's buildings, interior furnishings, and consumer products embodied the speed of progress
9 Figure The Art ModerneShop in the Charles A. Stevens and Brothers Store, Chicago, Ill. Photo: Good Furniture Magazine 30, 2 (Feb. 1928), p. 72.

Ford andJohnD. Rockefeller, to promotea Jr., romantic view of the national past through in such enterprisesas Colonial Williamsburg in Dearand Greenfield (1926) Village Virginia born,Michigan (1929). Even as affordable imitationsof colonial offeredtheirusers tangible,comfurnishings forting reminders of a simpler past, a new, moduniquelyAmericanstyle of streamlined ernism emerged in the 1930s,luring buyers with imagesof futureprogressandprosperity, modernism's andreactivating utopian,populist in the serviceof Americanindustry. potential Indeed, after the Depression began, many AmericandesignersrejectedArt Deco's opulence but retained its sleek curvilinearity.23 Streamlining proved the ultimate marketing tool for a stagnant economy: industry redesignedproducts of all kinds in order to stimulate consumption and restore public faithin corporate Americaas the primesource of national progress. By aligning itself with machineefficiency,aerodynamicdesign, and scientific innovation, industry worked to remakeits image,castingitself as an economic savior capable of defeating the worst economic disasterin Americanhistory. An early,spectacular exampleof the connection between streamlining,technological

itself. During the exposition, for instance, corporate sponsors furnished model houses of various styles with tubular-metal furniture (see p. 48, fig. i, and cat. no. 13);the Chrysler Corporation introduced its aerodynamic Airflow auto design; and the Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railroad unveiled the Burlington Zephyr engine, which astonished crowds with its gleaming, stainless-steel casing and sleek The Depression assured simplicity (see fig. 12).23 the transfer of artistic patronage from wealthy individuals to corporate sponsors, and at the "Century of Progress" exhibition large corporations displayed their (and implicitly America's) technological prowess through brightly colored, vertically massed buildings and pavilions (see fig. 13).The fair cemented the association of modernism with a new, fast-paced lifestyle, emphasizing streamlined living, timesaving technologies, and a vision of an American culture in which the machine enabled a future of limitless progress and prosperity. During the 193os, America's premier cultural institutions continued to join with business in promoting modernism and defining its shape: in New York, for example, the Museum of Modern Art organized a series of enormously popular exhibitions that began in i93i with "The International Style: Architecture since 1922." In 2934director Alfred H. Barr,Jr.,

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and architect/curator PhilipJohnsoncollaboratedon "TheMachine Age,"whichshowcased more thanfour hundredobjectsrangingfrom industrialproducts to home furnishingsand minimala appliances. Privileging functionalist, ist aestheticover FrenchArt Deco, the show solidified the museum'slongstandingalliance with the Bauhaus International and styles. This link between the United Statesand the InternationalStyle was furtherstrengthened by the largenumberof foreigndesigners fleeing Europe in advanceof World WarII. Breuer,Gropius, Mies, and Laiszl6MoholyNagy all immigrated to the United States, the lattertwo resumingtheir careersin Chicago-Mies at the Armour Institute(eventually renamedthe Illinois Instituteof Technology), and Moholy at the New Bauhaus(later known as the Institute of Design). Graphic and industrialartistslike Herbert Bayerand EgbertJacobsenfound work at Chicagocompanies such as the ContainerCorporationof America,where they used modernisttypography and designs to signal a new corporate "look."24 DuringWorldWarII, the company's chairman,WalterPaepcke, discoveredmodernism's power to promote products and, more importantly, to construct the public image of the corporationitself; many others followed his lead, aligning their corporate identitieswith the defenseof democraticcreativity, culture, and individual freedom and initiative.In the postwar years, at headquarters from Chicago to New Yorkand beyond, sleek chrome and glass International Style furnishingsjoined modernist graphicdesign and abstractart as the aesthetic language of corporateinfluence(see fig. 14).25 If modernismemerged as an expression of Americandemocracyin the boardroom,it in took on similarimportance the livingroom. While corporations preferred expensivemodas ernistfurnishings symbolsof theiraffluence

Above: 10 Figure Secession, Ltd., Chicago, Ill. Photo: Good Furniture Magazine
30,

Below: 11 Figure A "Living Room Fireplace Group" from the "Exposition of Modern American Industrialand Decorative Arts," Mandel Brothers department store, Chicago, Ill., Oct. 1928. Photo: Good Furniture Magazine 31, 6 (Dec. 1928), p. 315. 15

2 (Feb.

1928), p. 74.

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Above: 12 Figure The Burlington Zephyr of the Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railroad, shown with a streamlined Olson Rug Company truck, 1935. Hedrich-Blessing Archive, the Chicago Historical Society.

Below: 13 Figure Edward H. Bennett (American, born England; i874-i954); John Augur Holabird (American; 1886-1945); and Hubert Burnham (American; 1882-1968). Traveland Transport Building, "A Century of ProgressInternational Exposition," Chicago, Ill., i933.

andpower,Americanconsumerswere offered alternatives use at home.For examfor cheaper Russel Wright(see cat. no. 16), a leading ple, proponent of organic modernism, declared the movementtoward mass-produced,inexpensive, and informal design to be "a truer expression of our Democratic ideals" than custom-made,historicalfurniture,and imaginedthatthroughit Americans might"develop a more honest way of living."26Indeed, after World WarII, designers and manufacturers used materials technologiesdevelopedor and honed during wartime-molded fiberglass and plywood, synthetic glues, and plasticsthat to createstylishfurnishings were accessible and affordablein a way that most earlier modernistdesignshad neverbeen. The work of George Nelson (see cat. no. 28), Charles andRayEames(seecat.no. 22), Paul McCobb, and other designersfit the lifestylesof young married couples who were busy educating themselves on the G.I. Bill and raisingfamilies in what would constitute the greatest population surgein Americanhistory.Affluence had returned:most Americans,in fact, defined themselvesas "middleclass"regardless of their income level, and with that identity came a heighteneddesirefor domesticity and affluence,intensifiedin part by the inseThe curities and hardshipof the war.27 mass out of cities and into new, suburmigration ban, single-familytracthousing emphasized the need for new environments,new possessions, and a new start. In the post-World WarII period, then, modernist design-which emerged early in the centuryfrom an urgeto remakethe world by providing good design to the massesbecame the languageof Americancorporate power and a symbol of populist prosperity. Harnessedfirmly to the Americandreamsof and home ownership,consumerism, democratic freedom, modernism's utopian promise

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came closest to being realizednot in Europe but in the United States; not at the hands of Gropius's million socialist workers, but and throughthe workingsof the marketplace the hopes and desiresof countlessconsumers. it Ironically, perhaps, was only a modern,consumersociety,aidedby technological advances and machine manufacture,that could make William Morris's nostalgic dream of good designin everyhome evenbeginto come true. Today, it is tempting to look back at the modernist movement-itself no longer but "modern," a closed historicalepisode-as a failed experiment,and to criticizeits architectureand designas standardized mechand anized, impersonaland inhuman.We would do well to remember,however, that Morris and his Arts and Craftscolleaguesleveledjust

such criticisms at the Victorian styles they railed and reacted against. As we have seen, modernism's beginningswere not impersonal at all, but sprangfrom a deeplyhumanistgoal of integrating and artfully,andmakingthe life pleasuresof livingwith beautifulobjectsavailable to each and all, every day.To understand the importanceof such hopes is to graspthe moral and aesthetic attractionof modernist designs to their originalusers, and restoreto those designs some of the human meaning that time and circumstances havetaken away. After all, as Morrishimself said near the end of his life, worryingthat his idealisticscheme had borne no fruit, "If others can see it as I have seen it, then it may be called a vision ratherthan a dream."28

14 Figure Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.The Inland Steel Building, Chicago, Ill., 1958.View of interior corner office. Hedrich-Blessing Archive, the Chicago Historical Society.

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Notes
note: Editor's For the specific dates of Art Institute exhibitions, please consult the List "Selected of DecorativeArts Exhibitionsheld at The Art Instituteof Chicago, 1917-65," on p. 104of this publication. Recommended Reading The following publications offer a further introduction to twentieth-century arts.For ease of reference, Americandecorative they receiveshort citationswithin the notes. Cheney and CandlerCheney 1936.SheldonCheney and MarthaCandlerCheney, America Art and the Machine:An Accountof IndustrialDesign in 2o0th-Century (New York/London, 1936). Clark 1983.RobertJudsonClarket al., Design in America: The CranbrookVision, 1925-1950, exh.cat.(New York/Detroit,1983). SharonDarling,ChicagoFurniture, 1833-1983: Art, Craft& Industry, Darling1984. (Chicago/New York,1984). ModernDecorativeArts, 1925 Davies 1983.KarenDavies,At Home in Manhattan: exh. cat. (New Haven,1983). to the Depression, Landmarks B. and and 1993. Kathryn Hiesinger GeorgeH. Marcus, Hiesinger Marcus An Handbook(New York,1993). Design: Illustrated of Twentieth-Century Hine 1986.ThomasHine, Populuxe.(New York,1986). Johnson,AmericanModern,1925-1945:Designfor a New Johnson2000.J. Stewart Age, exh.cat.(New York,2000). Kardon1995. ed., JanetKardon, Craftin the Machine Age: TheHistoryof TwentiethAmericanCraft,1920-1945,exh.cat.(New York,1995). Century Kirkham2000. Pat Kirkham, Women ed., Designersin the USA, I900-2000:Diversityand Difference,exh. cat. (New York,2000). Museum Art (New Miller199o.R. CraigMiller, Modern of Designin theMetropolitan York,1990). Neuhartet al. 1989. JohnNeuhart,MarilynNeuhart,andRayEames,EamesDesign: The Work the Officeof Charlesand Ray Eames(New York,1989). of ArthurPulos, TheAmerican Pulos 1988. DesignAdventure: 1940-1975 (Cambridge, Mass.,1988). Wilson 1986. RichardGuy Wilson et al., The MachineAge in America,1918-1941, exh. cat (New York,1986). for Modernism ItsUtopias:' 6-17 and BARTER, pp. "Designing Democracy: in I. WalterGropius, "Programof the StaatlicheBauhausin Weimar," Hans M. Dessau,Berlin,Chicago(Cambridge, Mass., 1969), Wingler,The Bauhaus:Weimar, "Patrons a Profit--Business at Discovers as a SellingForce," Art p. 31.FrankCaspers, Art Digest 17,15 (May 1, 1943),p. 5. Leszek Kolakowskiquoted in Hilton Kramer, "Abstraction Utopia, II: FromTheosophyto Utopia,"New Criterion16, I (Sept. & 1997), 12. p. 2. RaymondWilliams,The Politicsof Modernism: Against the New Conformists (New York,1989), 43. p. 3. See Membersof the Instituteof Design/ IllinoisInstituteof Technology,"Maniin festo, 1955," Wingler(note I), p. 214. 4. For a socialhistory of the Arts and Craftsmovementand its impactin America, see T.J.JacksonLears, Placeof Grace: No Antimodernism the Transformation and of AmericanCulture, 188o-i920 (New York,1981). 5. The Art Institute sponsored Arts and Crafts exhibitions beginning after the RobertAshbee'stripto Chicagoin 1898.Ashbee'sGuildof EnglishdesignerCharles Handicraft,a communalassociationof craftspersonsbased on medievalmodels, inspiredClaraBarkeWellsto form the Kalo silversmith's communityin suburban ParkRidge,Illinois.For more on the Boston Societyof Arts and Crafts,see Wendy Art et 1875Kaplan al., "The Thatis Life":TheArts& CraftsMovementin America, 1920,exh. cat.(Boston,1987), 299-300. pp. 6. William Morris Himself-Designs Morris,quotedin GillianNaylor,ed., William by and Writings (London,1988),p. 212. For more on this theme, see HowardMansfield,Restorationand Renewal in a 7. N. Throwaway (Hanover, H., 2001). Age 8. SeeJohnson2000, pp. 14-16. Revue 9. GabrielMourey,"L'Artnouveaude M. Bing al'Expositionuniverselle," 20 desArtsDecoratifs (1900), p. 280. See also DeboraSilverman, Nouveau in FinArt and de-Sicle France: Politics, 1989). Psychology, Style(Berkeley, Art Artsin France: Nouveauto Le and io. NancyJ. Troy,Modernism theDecorative Corbusier (New Haven,1991), 5o. p. a who embraced II. At the 1925 Parisexposition,modernistssuch as Le Corbusier, new technolreformistphilosophyand designedversatile incorporating furnishings was for Frenchdesigners, whom decoration ogy, competeduneasilywith traditional See or architectural designelements. ibid.,pp. 16o-69. distinctfrom integrated 12. Herbert Hoover,then U.S. Secretaryof Commerce,quoted in International Art, Paris,Reportof Commission Expositionof ModernDecorativeand Industrial for The M. Shifman, "Design Industry: 'German 13. William R. French, quotedin Barry Arts in The Arts'Exhibition theUnitedStates, 1912-13," Decorative Society Applied 185o American wasorganized John tour to thePresent 22 (1998), p. 25.Theexhibition's vol. by of CottonDana,Librarian theNewarkFreePublicLibrary, Newark,N.J.,in collaboraMuseum Kunstin Handelund Werkbund theDeutsches and fiir tionwiththeDeutscher in fromAug. Io-Sept. 1912. 16, Gewerbe, appeared Chicago Hagen.The exhibition to 14. WilliamLaurelHarris,"Backto DuncanPhyfe-or Forward Art Nouveau?," GoodFurniture Magazine19,6 (Dec. 1922), p. 259. The Metropolitan Museumof Art, New York,alsohostedthis exhibitionin 1927. 15. 16. Miller199o, p. 18. 17. "ModernDecorative Art in Chicago,"Good FurnitureMagazine 30, 2 (Feb. 1928), pp. 72-73. 18. Darling1984, 273-74.Seealso GoodFurniture Magazine(note i7), pp. 72-74. pp. and 19. The Associationof Arts and Industries the Art Director'sClub of Chicago both helped organizethis exhibition,which featuredfurniturecraftedfrom exotic accessories Reni Lalique.The exhibiand woods, Rodierupholstery, decorative by tion opened in October 1928. See "ModernRooms in New York and Chicago," 6 (Dec. 1928), pp. 315-16. GoodFurniture Magazine31, and 20. "On Exhibition ChicagoStores," in GoodFurniture Decoration33, 5(Nov. 1929), pp. 269-74. GoodFurniture 21. AthenaRobbins, "Distinctive Roomsat Marshall Field's," Magazine 32, 6 (June1929), p. 325. 22. Miller(note 16),p. 27. at Fair:Chicago 1933/34-New Hauss-Fitton,"Streamlining the World's 23. Barbara A York1939/40," in ClaudeLichtenstein FranzEngler, Streamlined: Metaphor and eds., The 1995) 68-75. pp. Drag,exh.cat.(Baden, of for Progress: Esthetics Minimized business durmail-order and the 24. Chicago, heartof the nation's advertising printing was designto flourish. ing the 1920S and 1930s, a logicalplacefor modernistgraphic was firm OwingsandMerrill, instruPaepcke, alongwith the architectural of Skidmore, in mentalin bringing modernists MoholyandMies)to the New Bauhaus (specifically of of The hostedanexhibition the Container Corporation AmerChicago. ArtInstitute For "Modern BecomesAdvertising." more entitled Art ica'sinnovative graphic designs, and on Paepcke, JamesSloanAllen,TheRomance Commerce Culture: see of Capitalism, and Crusade Cultural 1983). Reform for (Chicago, Modernism, the Chicago-Aspen and DeBeers,Life andFortunemagazines, Pan American 25. Abbott Laboratories, in their advertisingefforts. For more on Airlines all employed modernistdesigns "TheNew Medici:Corporate modernismand the corporation, JudithA. Barter, see Art"(Ph.D.diss.,Universityof Massachusetts CollectingandUses of Contemporary at Amherst,I991). Interiors104,5 (Dec. 26. Wright,quoted in "Snapshots: Russeland MaryWright," 1944), p. 86. Departing from the streamlinedaesthetic,organic modernistdesign such as curvilinear traditional materials reliedon smoother, forms,andincorporated ceramics, fabrics,andwood. see middleclassin the 1950s, LorenBaritz,TheGood 27. For moreon the American Life: The Meaning of Success the AmericanMiddle Class, (New York, 1990), for pp. 182-201. 28. WilliamMorris,quotedin Naylor (note 6), p. 224. ACatalogue Collection ofthe "The Modern DOWNS, New Feeling": "The Modern Spirit," 19-21 pp. New Dimensions(New York,1928), p. 20. I. PaulT. Frankl, 2. RenaRosenthal,for example,opened a shop in New YorkCity where she sold modernAustrian See for objectsas earlyas 1916. DianeH. Pilgrim, "Design theMachine Age,"in Wilson1986, p. 277. Elsiede Wolfepublished extremely an influential decorating guidethatpro3. In 1913, motedeighteenth-century French- English-style and furnishings. Althoughsheencouraged her readersto buy bona-fideantiques,she also endorsedhistoricallyaccurate Elsie (New York,1913), 261-64. reproductions. deWolfe,TheHousein GoodTaste pp. to 4. Report Commission Appointed theSecretary Commerce Visitand Report by of of the International ModernDecorative Industrial and Artsin Paris, upon Exposition of 1925, quotedin Johnson2000, p. 8.
(Washington, D.C., 1925), p. 16.

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