Vitra Design Museum
The Vitra Design Museum is an interesting place for anyone interested in - well - design. It's not in Zurich, or even Switzerland, but in Germany, just over the border from Basel where it is a big tourist attraction. Both for the contents and activities, and the Frank Gehry architecture (which I personally am getting a bit bored with).
The inception of the Vitra Design Museum dates back to the early 1980s. With the aim of documenting the history of the Vitra company, Vitra CEO Rolf Fehlbaum began collecting the furniture of designers who had influenced the company's development, such as Charles and Ray Eames, George Nelson, Alvar Aalto, and Jean Prouvé. As the collection grew, so did the desire for an architectural venue in which the objects could be displayed."
However in Zurich they do have a shop where you can buy replicas and miniatures of famous interior design classics. The photos here are of the miniature variety in a showcase outside the shop in Pelikanstrasse. These are not cheap, around 200 euros and you can't even sit on them - they are 6cm tall - but they are exceedingly cute.
Click the image for an enlargement
I'm also not an art expert but I sometimes worry about the effect Picasso has had on art by establishing this international superhero persona. Not on art should we say, but on Art with a capital. Not the stuff that gets done, but the stuff that gets written and shouted about to the extent that you might think there was nothing else. That's what I wonder about this sort of architecture, and it isn't just Gehry of course.
The Vitra design classic models? I would buy one if I had 200 euros that didn't have a better destination. I don't think it's just cuteness. I suppose there is a snobbishness in it. You're buying a badge that says you know and feel about contemporary design, (but I'd rather have a real one). I think it's much better 200 euros value than say half a Prada handbag.
It is all about self gratification nowadays and I think everyone is caught up in it (me included). Even art or architecture. It is more about telling the world about your depth than being deep. It is more about portraying an image, than living the image. Why should anyone care I guess. Since this is what makes money and and many of the grand masters died paupers. Imagine anything worse than painting a picture because you were feeling something or interpreting something and then no one buying it. Today you are poor, and that is not acceptable any longer.
Surely you can make a statement "You're buying a badge that says you know and feel about contemporary design" without spending 200 Euros? Hang on a second... why do you want to make a statement anyway????
Please take my post as "tongue in cheek".... Thanks
As for Gehry, my feeling is that at least he tries something different. The Düsseldorf buildings, which we both know, fit well into the surrounding area (I don’t know how it’s inside). If you look on the Bilbao Guggenheim, it’s spectacular and I suppose was meant to be spectacular! The question is in my mind that you must take care of what is around, it must fit in, but if you have a virgin land and shall design a museum, it’s nice to see that’s something more spectacular is tried. I guess we (or rather someone else) have to judge in some 50 or 100 years whether these buildings then still are attractive. At least there is a greater chance for Gehry’s works than for the box–makers of the 60’s or 70’s. ... and at least something has been tried.
Also, I think it's good that some architects can immediately be recognized - they have created a style (Gaudi, Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, Pei, Piano, Aalto, Saarinen, Bofill... and Guimard, Lavirotte, Nouvel... to mention some French ones... and I forget.)
Recently someone spoke to me about the Kunsthaus in Zürich and said it wasn't worth going to because it only had some "second rate Picassos". The idea being that you had to have Picassos, and they had to be "first rate" if you were going to amount to anything. This of course isn't everyone's view thankfully, and maybe it is just a reflection of mass-culture. I'd hate to think that people thought that architecture in Zurich wasn't worth paying attention to because there are no Gehry's or whatever.
Jean Prouvé : c'est ujnn nancéen ! J'ai fait mes études à Nancy; j'ai même trravaillé pour un promoteur dans un immeuble le premier de grande hauteur, le building Joffre, il me semble conçu par un Prouvé : son frère Henri. La dernière fois que nous sommes rentrés des Vosges, nous sommes passés par le centre de Nancy au lieu de la contourner comme d'ordinaire. Nous avons eu un regard à la sortie vers Paris sur la droite pour l'habitat modulaire que Prouvé a bâti à flanc de falaise. Pas en très bon état.
Alvar Altoo... J'ai ramené une table basse en lamellé collé de Finlande, c'est ma fille qui l'a chez elle. Nous avons des vases Altoo, son fameux vase.
Lorsque j'ai commencé à travailler, on ne peut dire que j'étais grassement payée. Un de mes premiers achat a été de m'offrir à crédit un canapé deux places et une chauffeuse Togo de chez Roset ! Cela vaut une fortune maintenat si on veut s'en offrir et ce n'est pas démodé et pourtant actuelelment ils sont de moins bonne qualité. Je peux te dire que de mes fauteuils, je ne suis pas du tout "bored" ! Et ils sont très confortables quoqu'ils soient très encombrants.
La petite amie de l'aîné de mes fils travaillait chez un éditeur qui a publié une série de livres sur le design, les objets mythiques, c'est très intéressant. (Des voitures aussi. Etc...)
Le Vitra Design Museum, c'est comme ces livres, mais en trois dimensions...
:)
It's nice coming here.