Zittel’s Bedroom in Joshua Tree

Source - http://zittel.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/img_3906.jpg

Zittel's Uniforms

Source - http://summerpierre.files.wordpress.com/2010/04/andrea-zittel-uniforms.jpg

Cardboard Boxes Converted into Shelving in Her Home

Source - http://zittel.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/img_0859.jpg

PBS Biography

Andrea Zittel was born in Escondido, California, in 1965. She received a BFA in painting and sculpture in 1988 from San Diego State University, and an MFA in sculpture in 1990 from the Rhode Island School of Design. Zittel’s sculptures and installations transform everything necessary for life—such as eating, sleeping, bathing, and socializing—into artful experiments in living. Blurring the lines between life and art, Zittel’s projects extend to her own home and wardrobe. Wearing a single outfit every day for an entire season, and constantly remodeling her home to suit changing demands and interests, Zittel continually reinvents her relationship to her domestic and social environment. Influenced by modernist design and architecture from the early part of the twentieth century, the artist’s one-woman mock organization, “A–Z Administrative Services,” develops furniture, homes, and vehicles for contemporary consumers with a similar simplicity and attention to order. Seeking to attain a sense of freedom through structure, Zittel is more interested in revealing the human need for order than in prescribing a single unifying design principle or style. “People say my work is all about control, but it’s not really,” she remarks. “I am always looking for the gray area between freedom—which can sometimes feel too open-ended and vast—and security—which may easily turn into confinement.” Her “A-Z Pocket Property,” a 44-ton floating fantasy island off the coast of Denmark commissioned by the Danish government, contrasts the extremes of a creative escape with the isolation that occurs when a person is removed from society. Altering and examining aspects of life that are for the most part taken for granted, Zittel’s hand-crafted solutions respond to the day-to-day rhythms of the body and the creative need of people to match their surroundings to the changing appearance of life. Zittel lives in California and New York.

Source - http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/andrea-zittel

A-Z Six Month Seasonal Uniforms

Zittel’s longest-running continuous artwork, the “Uniform Project” began in 1991 while the artist was working in a gallery in New York City. As she was working at an office job , Zittel was expected to wear “something respectable”to work. As a young artist, Zittel had very little money to spend on a wardrobe and decided that wearing one fabulous outfit, day after day, was the solution to her problem. While there is often a social stigma attached to wearing the same clothes two days in a row, Zittel’s response to the immediate situation was as pragmatic as it was provocative. Confronting the values placed on fashion and hygiene, Zittel’s fantasy creations are a daily experiment in living. Each handmade creation responds to a particular moment in the artist’s life – her most current interests, tastes, and thoughts. When Zittel began to run out of ideas for new outfits, she developed a set of formal parameters to work within. Interested in the geometric clothing made by Russian Constructivists at the turn of the century, Zittel determined that every article of clothing would be modeled after a rectangle – the original shape of the fabric. Reveling in the absurdity of her task, Zittel’s whimsical creations push an interaction between the human body and rectangles to the limit. Growing tired of the rectangle after a while, but wanting to continue to make clothes where a material is used in its rawest form, Zittel began making dresses from a single strand. Turning to crochet and like the rectangular Personal Panels, Zittel’s latest dresses grow out of a absurd but poetic logic.

Source - http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/andrea-zittel

Zittel’s Place of Birth: Escondido, California

The Escondido Story

By Margie L. Whetstone

January 1963— As Escondido will celebrate the 75th anniversary of its incorporation as a city on October 8 of this year, a brief account of its colorful history since that autumn day in 1888 appears to be in order.

The Indians were the first folk who found the Escondido Valley a good place in which to live, and they built their tiny villages here more than four thousand years ago, according to the late Malcolm Rogers, the well known archeologist.

These early people and their descendants left many legends and artifacts which add color to Escondido’s history. Mrs. Elizabeth Judson Roberts has preserved many myths in her book Indian Stories of the Southwest, which is long out of print and a booklover’s prize. Felicita Park, according to another source, was the judgment Grove where Indians accused of various crimes were punished by imprisoning them on the trees. It was in this grove, too, that the Felicita Pageant which, was written and directed by Dr. Benjamin Sherman, was performed annually from 1927 to 1932. It is the romance of an Indian girl who cared for an American soldier who was wounded in the Battle of San Pasqual on December 6, 1846. Dr. Sherman drew his material from Mrs. Robert’s book.

Scouting parties from the San Diego Mission found the Indians living here and pressed them into service as shepherds and caretakers of the Mission flocks. When the Act of Secularization was passed in 1832, it broke up the large holdings of the Missions. The Indians who had lived at the Missions were given small parcels of land, but they had not learned the significance of ownership or property, and were soon cheated out of their holdings.

Men in political favor then found it easy to acquire large parcels of this land. Thirty ranchos, as they were called, were distributed in San Diego County. One of these was Rincon del Diablo; it was granted in 1843 to Juan Bautista Alvarado, who had beenregidor of the tiny Los Angeles pueblo and of San Diego. This grant, consisting of 12,633 acres, now Escondido Valley, was called Rincon del Diablo, meaning “Corner of the Devil”. The origin of the name is not definitely known. A suggested explanation is that during the Mission period, this section was not under the jurisdiction of either San Luis Rey or San Diego Missions. Anything not held by the church belonged to the devil, so this Spanish grant became Rincon del Diablo.

Senor Alvarado built a rather pretentious six-room adobe on a little knoll in Dead Horse Canyon, about a half mile south of “the Tepee” as a home for his wife, himself and their six children. Alvarado died on the ranch after only three years’ residence, and some time in the 1850 the heirs sold it to judge Oliver S. Witherby of San Diego, who also was a member of the Boundary Commission, and San Diego’s first representative to the state legislature. It is reported that he was a jolly bachelor, who loved good food and dancing. Friends from San Diego would ride out on horseback to the Rancho, dance all night, and return to the city the next day.

Judge Witherby sold the property in 1868 to the Wolfskill brothers, John, Josiah and Matthew, of Los Angeles, for $8,000, and the Valley was known as Wolfskill Plains for a while.

The land boom of the 1880s penetrated to Rincon del Diablo, and the first settlement was made near the present site of Jesmond Dene on the McDougall ranch, where a postoffice called Apex was opened with Mr. McDougall as postmaster. He was succeeded by Thomas W. Adams on June 28, 1883, and the name was changed to Escondido in April 24, 1884.

According to a deed dated October 1883, a group of investors from Los Angeles and San Diego bought the grant from the Wolfskills for $128,000, but a year later sold it to a so-called Escondido Company. This is the first time the name Escondido appears on a document. The Spanish name Escondido means “hidden” and was probably chosen because the valley is surrounded by foothills. On March 1, 1886, the Escondido Company deeded the grant to the newly formed Escondido Land & Town Company, which proceeded to subdivide the valley into small farms and lay out the town site. The Company even built a few houses in town, so that prospective residents would have places to move into while they were looking for property to buy. The need for water was urgent, so the first city wells and Pipe systems were started.

In 1887, a 100-room hotel was built at the eastern end of Grand Avenue, on the present site of Palomar Hospital. A real estate brochure dated that year describes the hotel as one of the finest and best equipped in Southern California. For many years it served as the social center of the community, and many well-known people were entertained there as guests.

A branch line of the Santa Fe railway was extended to Escondido in 1887, and was a great boon to the community in the transportation of passengers and freight. As an inducement to the railroad company to build the line, the Land and Town Company offered a $50,000 bonus, which the railroad collected by laying the rails across the creek bed where the bridge was not completed. As the Land & Town Company had just erected a two-story building and opened a bank, they did not have the capital to proceed as planned. The company advertised for a buyer and A. W. Wohlford, who was living in the midwest, read the advertisement and was interested. He later came to Escondido, bought the building and bank, and was prominent for many years in the financial development of the city.

A trolley line from the depot up Grand Avenue to the Escondido Hotel was constructed, but it is questionable whether it was ever used except by railroad handcar crews. A horse-drawn bus from the Hotel did, however, meet the train each evening for years, and a reporter from the local paper was always on hand to greet people.

The Escondido Land & Town Company donated alternate blocks on Grand Avenue to the University of Southern California as an endowment for a seminary, which was to be operated as a feeder for students to the University. The brick for the seminary, which was built on a sightly knoll overlooking the city, was made in Escondido. The college functioned only a few years, and in 1894 a High School district was formed and the building was acquired from the University of Southern California. The Land & Town Company also gave lots to any religious group which wished to build a church.

The now famous Wyatt Earp, then a tavern owner in San Diego, was one of the judges of the horse races at a County Fair held in Escondido in 1889, on the Fair Grounds north of town. Sam Brannan, who is reputed to have been California’s first millionaire, spent his last years in Escondido. He planted a fig orchard here and hoped to make a fortune on it, but died penniless.

The people who settled in Escondido in the early nineties were well educated and in comfortable financial circumstances; they built many beautiful homes, some of which are still standing.

On October 8, 1888, Escondido was incorporated as a city with a simple form of government consisting of five trustees elected by the people. These trustees in turn elected one of the five to be president or mayor; A. K. Crovath was the first president. The voters also elected the city clerk, city treasurer and marshal.

About 1891, the Escondido Irrigation District was organized and bonds in the amount of $350,000 were issued; they were sold to Henry W. Putnam of San Diego, for the construction of the Escondido Reservoir, lated named Lake Wohlford. A period of depression followed, and many people were not able to pay their irrigation taxes; finally, a compromise was worked out, whereby the land would be released from the bonded indebtedness upon payment of 43% of the amount due. The burning of the bonds was the occasion for a joyful celebration on Admission Day, September 9, 1905, and a crowd of three thousand people gathered at the Lime Street school grounds in what is now Grape Day Park. When the papers went up in flames, men tossed their hats into the air and women waved their handkerchiefs; judge J. N. Turrentine gave the speech of the day, which was loudly applauded.

On September 9, 1908, the people of Escondido started holding an annual celebration in remembrance of the burning of the bonds. It was called “Grape Day” because grapes were then one of the most important agricultural products of the valley, and each yearly celebration, tons of free grapes were distributed to the crowds. W. L. Ramey of the Escondido Lumber Hay and Grain Company, and Sig Steiner, early store owner and civic leader, were the originators of Grape Day, the community’s largest event for many years.

The education of its children has always been foremost in the minds of the Escondido residents. The first school was built near the Rock Springs Road in 1880 and Elizabeth Judson Roberts, who has ben mentioned before, was the first teacher. This school was soon outgrown and a two-story, brick building was erected on the present site of Grape Day Park; it was named the Lime Street School. At the present time in the city there are two high schools, two junior high schools, six elementary schools and several parochial schools.

With a population af about 1,200 in 1900, Escondido began its slow but steady climb to prosperity and a population of more than 24,000. Factors which have contributed to its growth have been the citrus and grape industries, and hay and grain farming. Lemon production was at its prime for two decades, starting from the late twenties; Escondido once boasted the largest lemon packing house in the world. Avocados were first planted here in the twenties and are still a big business. A large packing plant is maintained for the handling of the fruit.

The acquisition of water from the Colorado River aqueduct made farming more diversified. Now the orchards are being removed to make way for homes and subdivisions, and the Chamber of Commerce has been successful in attracting light industry to the valley as a means of broadening the tax base.

The next seventy-five years will no doubt see more drastic changes in Escondido than those of the years just narrated. May they bring prosperity, happiness and peace to the no longer “Hidden Valley!”

---

Source: San Diego Historical Society Quarterly
January 1963, Volume 9, Number 1

Source - http://www.escondido.com/history/

Andrea Zittel Biography

Critical Space is the first comprehensive survey of Andrea Zittel’s work to take place in the United States. Over the last fifteen years Zittel has used her own day-to-day living - her needs and fantasies relating to food, furniture, clothing, and shelter - as the impetus for her artwork. From designing clothing to be worn every day for six months, to devising diets based on dehydrated food, to producing furniture that changes one’s sense of hierarchies and space, there is no area of daily living, no matter how basic, that she has not been willing to examine.

Born in 1965 in Southern California, Zittel moved to New York City around 1990. The contrast between the cleanliness of suburban California modernity and New York’s gritty urbanism provided fodder for early works such as Repair Work(1991), a presentation of badly damaged objects that she collected off the street and on which she performed extremely rudimentary repairs.

In 1991, Zittel established A-Z Administrative Services. Zittel used this company name - derived from her initials - as a corporate banner under which she produced and marketed her work. The name not only suggested her interest in questioning how individuals function in a society dominated by branding and corporate identities, but also hinted at her ambition for encyclopedic competency. While it later functioned as a naming device or brand identifier for all her works,A-Z Administrative Services initially allowed her to negotiate fluidly with animal breeding companies that would not have been as responsive or immediately trusting had she presented herself as an artist. At that time, contact with these companies was important to her exploration of breeding and husbandry as analogous to ideas of selection and judgment both in the art world and in society at large. However, these interests would quickly shift from animals to humans. Even as she began to gain attention for works such as the A-Z Breeding Unit for Averaging Eight Breeds (1993) that was presented in the 1993 Venice Biennale, her interest in human behavior was evident in sculptural models such as the Family Tree Apartment Complex (1991) and drawings such as Clone Series (1992). In fact, Zittel almost immediately began to see herself as the subject of her investigation and her lifestyle as a source of creative potential.

A-Z Administrative Services was established in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, in the first of a series of live/work spaces that was critical to the evolution of her work. A 200 square-foot storefront space had to contain all Zittel’s living and working needs: 100 square-feet in front as a public work space and the back left for private needs. This constrained environment motivated the first experimental structures that she designed to facilitate all her eating, cleaning, socializing, and storage needs in no more than 60 square-feet. The Management and Maintenance Unit 003 (1992), is the earliest extant work of this type and the precursor to the A-Z Living Unit (1993). A portable version of the same idea, the A-Z Living Unit could fold down to the size of a steamer trunk and be reassembled wherever necessary. In 1994, Zittel expanded on this idea by collaborating with her clients: she would provide the basic structure and work with her clients to customize the details according to their needs and desires. Her next series, A-Z Escape Vehicle (1996), took this process of collaboration from the realm of utility to the realization of her clients’ escapist fantasies. Adorning a small portable pod with anonymous metal siding, Zittel created an interior environment that, like the -, could be customized according to personal preference. Instead of specifying surface details or choosing objects, clients imagined their own detailed and intimate environments such as a flotation tank, a cave-like grotto, and a lounge based on customized panel vans popular in the 1970s. The A-Z Escape Vehicles touched upon ways that people often attempt to escape a large and increasingly uncontrollable world by creating personal limitations for themselves.

In 1995, Zittel purchased a small three-story building in Williamsburg that was christened The A-Z. In this environment, she produced furniture prototypes and held social events for people in the community. By turning her home into a showroom and testing ground for her work, Zittel began an investigation into the socially constructed divisions that we make between private and public life in contemporary society. After the establishment of A-Z West in Joshua Tree, California in 2000, the Williamsburg space became known as A-Z East. While the work Zittel produced in New York often explored ways in which urban constraints could be addressed creatively, works produced at A-Z West, such as the A-Z Cellular Compartment Units (2001) and A-Z Homestead Units (2001-05), carried her living experiments into the ex-urban and frontier environments of Southern California.
One of the highlights of the exhibition is a representative selection of Zittel’s A-Z Uniforms (1991-2005). Like A-Z Administrative Services, the A-Z Uniforms were a solution to maximize Zittel’s extremely limited resources. These works began as an attempt to produce clothing that she could wear for all work and social engagements over a six-month period, allowing her to look stylish but avoid the expense of seasonal fashion changes. In the uniforms one can see both an expression of personal fantasy - unusual combinations of color and material - and a clear evolution of material choices. This begins with multi-functional black-and-white garments, followed by simple rectangles of woven cloth inspired by the Russian Constructivists. Zittel then reduced the rectangular ‘panel’ of fabric to the strand - which was successively knitted, crocheted, and finally hand knotted. Most recently, in the A-Z Raugh Uniforms, she works with the purest medium of raw wool. This process led her to realize that it is easier to be creative when the parameters are narrowed than when all options are possible. Zittel coined the term Raugh (pronounced “raw”) in relation to her use of simple materials and elemental design strategies to make objects that will look better as they become naturally worn or undone as a result of lived experience.

Zittel’s drive for direct control and immediacy often parodies the methods of industrial
production and corporate branding while exploring the ironic way that so-called progressive designs often refer to supposedly pure or primitive models. She uses A-Z in all her titles, as one would a logo or brand. The production of the early uniforms on a regimented season-by-season basis plays off the rhythms of the fashion industry, while the annual variations of the A-Z Living Units, A-Z Comfort Units, and A-Z Escape Vehicles operate much as a suburban home model or car brand gets modified and modernized each year. Ultimately, Zittel uses her own lifestyle as a vehicle for experimentation to raise questions about responsibility and emancipation in a consumer culture in which promises of leisure-time freedom have worn thin.

-Trevor Smith, Curator, New Museum of Contemporary Art.

Source - http://www.newmuseum.org/exhibitions/397

"I still struggle with the challenge that it presented in my work - and with the question of what exactly it is that makes something “art.” Is art about having a “real” experience and learning from it - or does art emerge in the act of packaging and communicating that experience?"

-Andrea Zittel

Source - http://zittel.artservr.com/texts/13.pdf

MoMA Biography of Zittel

SOURCE: OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

American sculptor and installation artist. She studied painting and sculpture at San Diego State University in San Diego, CA, graduating in 1988. She then went on to study for her MFA in sculpture at the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, graduating in 1990. In 1992 she set up A–Z Administrative Services, a company which aimed to streamline domestic objects and rituals. For Prototypes for Container, Cover, Support (1993; see 1993 exh. cat., pp. 29–30), Zittel made the objects itemized in the title and gave them to a group of volunteers who then recorded their experiences of using them. Each object was designed to be as multi-functional as possible: the container, for example, could be used as a bowl, a holder and a vase. Zittel expanded on these ideas of functional living by making self-contained units for dining, study and recreation. In 1993 she began to customize the units according to the client for whom they were designed, such as the A–Z Comfort Units Customised for the Cincinnati Art Museum (1994; Cincinnati, OH, A. Mus.), in which each unit housed items from the museum’s collections. In the mid-1990s she made a series of customized trailers as complete living environments that attempted to create a completely functional, yet individualized domestic space: see, for example, Travel Trailer Unit (1995; San Francisco, CA, MOMA). Zittel’s work draws on Modernist concepts of design and architecture reminiscent of those promoted by the Bauhaus School of Design. Her use of a commercial style in the promotional literature for her ‘products’, and of A–Z Administrative Services as the front for her practice, situates her art within the convenience culture of American society.

Catherine M. Grant
From Grove Art Online

© 2009 Oxford University Press

Source - http://www.moma.org/collection/artist.php?artist_id=7525

Brooklyn DIY: Trailer

Source - http://vimeo.com/3230069

Williamsburg Brooklyn Artists Changing Spaces by Kim Reed (1999)

Source - http://www.archive.org/details/WilliamsburgBrooklynArtistsChangingSpacesByKimReed

Williamsburg, Brooklyn Today

From Starving Artist to “Starving Artist”: DIY Arts in Williamsburg

Feb 25, 2009 by Khristina Narizhnaya
Nowadays bohemians from all over the world flock to Williamsburg hoping to find inspiration, but it takes more than creativity to stay afloat in this hip locale. The neighborhood’s exorbitant rents require these free spirits to have some serious bank before even considering the move.

The situation was not always so. As is the case with many funky New York neighborhoods, Williamsburg was once a crime-ridden slum where the creative underclass found refuge from skyrocketing Manhattan rents, and the lack of exhibition opportunities in Soho and Chelsea. Director Marcin Ramocki’s documentary “Brooklyn DIY,” slated for its world premiere at the Museum of Modern Art on February 25, captures an era when Williamsburg was populated by artists with big ambitions and empty pockets.

“I wanted to preserve the DIY art scene, show it to people,” said Ramocki. “DIY is the art movement of people with no money,” he clarified.

Ramocki has and has been involved in the Williamsburg art scene since the 1990s, as an artist and an exhibiter. In 2007 he realized that the DIY character of the Williamsburg art scene was rapidly changing due to rising rents and gentrification of the neighborhood, so he decided to promptly archive it before it was too late.

The documentary, which, according to Ramocki, is “as DIY as DIY gets,” due to its low budget and small production team, examines the development of the Williamsburg art scene from its conception in mid-1980s, to the “scene” it has become today. In the mid-1980s “pioneers,” such as painter Amy Stillman and hybrid sculptor Ken Butler, moved to Williamsburg for the cheap space. Toward the end of the 1980s, Williamsburg had become an artistic community with “anarchistic creativity” expressed in DIY art galleries, loft parties and warehouse “happenings.” Around the turning of the new millennium, the art scene changed dramatically, with professional and business-oriented art and artistic spaces replacing anything and everything DIY.

“Brooklyn DIY” is showcased as part of the 2009 edition of Documentary Fortnight, MoMA’s annual exhibit of international documentary film and video. Sally Berger, the assistant curator at MoMA’s Department of Film who organized the exhibit, decided to include the documentary in the series because the history of the evolution of Williamsburg as an artists’ community has not yet been told, she said.

“It is a unique chapter of art, life and creativity that began when artists started moving to Williamsburg after the collapse of Soho as an artists’ haven,” Berger said. “The DIY movement was unique, original, and spontaneous and inspired a renaissance of creativity outside the mainstream art world.”

Ramocki said that it is becoming harder and harder to find the DIY art spaces in Williamsburg. In the mid-1980s and 1990s it was possible to rent a space, maneuver and manage an art gallery or a performance space, without having significant capital or cash flow. But the prices have sky-rocketed, space is limited and in high demand and artist-run establishments are facing more and more challenges. For all that, Ramocki is not saying that the art scene in Williamsburg is dead in any way. Now, it’s just different.

“You’re still going to have creative individuals moving to Williamsburg. But now it’s a different group of people, economically speaking,” said Ramocki. “But the spirit is still the same.”

Source - http://www.greenpointnews.com/entertainment/from-starving-artist-to-starving-artist-diy-arts-in-williamsburg

Joshua Tree, CA Art Scene

Art Blooms in the California Desert

Stephanie Diani for The New York Times

"From the Point of View of the Little People," an assemblage by Noah Purifoy, is at the Noah Purifoy Outdoor Desert Art Museum in Joshua Tree, Calif.

By JULIA CHAPLIN

Published: April 21, 2006

A FEW squat concrete buildings and a whole lot of dust. That's what you're likely to notice first while driving through Joshua Tree, at the foothills of the Mojave Desert in Southern California. The scorched land still feels like a rugged frontier with nonstop wind and king-cab pickup trucks hauling rusted washing machines and groceries.

There's nothing remotely charming or quaint about it. But hidden among the cactus, creosote and tract housing is a full-fledged art scene, with striking works by contemporary artists like Andrea Zittel, Jason Rhoades and Jack Pierson. (Mr. Pierson likes to put the old roadside sign letters he collects for his artwork out in the soil behind his house to get that vintage sun-baked, weathered look.)
Set roughly 125 miles east of Los Angeles and 35 northeast of Palm Springs, the high-desert towns off Route 62, including Pioneertown, Twentynine Palms and Wonder Valley as well as Joshua Tree, have long been a haven for rock climbers who pilgrimage for the weirdly shaped boulders at Joshua Tree National Park. But over the last few years established artists, architects and musicians in search of lower mortgage payments and wide open space have been trickling out and setting up studios in old ranch houses, shipping containers and geodesic domes left over from the 1970's.

Now it has become a weekend destination for cultural foragers, whose idea of a fun getaway is exploring outdoor sculpture gardens, artists' studios and experimental architecture — like an igloo made of sandbags.

"Joshua Tree is like the art world's Palm Springs," said Lisa Overduin, the director of Regen Projects, the Los Angeles gallery that represents Ms. Zittel and Mr. Pierson. "It's funny to see collectors in spiked Manolo's teetering around the desert looking for art."

Ms. Zittel's "High Desert Test Sites," an annual art happening (this year on May 6 and 7), is the best opportunity to experience Joshua Tree's contemporary-art scene. Ms. Zittel, the conceptual artist who helped kick-start the Joshua Tree migration when she expanded her studio here from Brooklyn six years ago, invites artists to trek out to the desert and install large-scale site-specific works among the boulders, caves and cactus. (Some of this year's participants include Katie Grinnan, Amy Yao and Ryan McGinley.) Onlookers and revelers are given booklets with maps so they can track the whimsical creations in a sort of zany scavenger hunt that includes extracurricular activities like stopping for hamburgers at local cafes and dancing the electric slide at Pappy & Harriet's, a local honky tonk.

The artist Ed Ruscha, the musicians Eric Burdon and Victoria Williams, the performance artist Ann Magnuson and a cross section of Los Angeles screenwriters and set designers have all bought homes in Joshua Tree in recent years, perhaps drawn by its openness — both in attitude and in space. With its sweeping plateaus, car-chase roads and big wandering skies, it's sort of like that other desert art outpost, Marfa, Tex., where the elemental landscape and slow-motion pace are themselves like a surreal artwork.

"It's like there aren't any rules here, just survival," said Thom Merrick, an artist who moved from New York several years ago because he was feeling "compressed" in the city. "I go hiking every day up on the hill," he said. "And if I need to think I rake rocks."

The towns themselves have an authentic, survivalist quality refreshingly devoid of slick, trendy accouterment. Many of the artists furnish their homes from the dusty thrift shops along the highway. (Oversize kitschy lamps and coyote-howling-in-the-moon paintings are hot items.) In the evening, artists gather at sleepy bars like the Palms, with it's scratched pool tables and country-western jukebox. At the Beatnik Café, local youth with piercings and black-dyed hair mingle under a sci-fi sculpture of an H. R. Geiger-esque deer spirit with tree roots. Banks of computers against the wall have intentionally snarled cords that add to the desert "Blade Runner" effect.

LOCALS like to say that Joshua Tree has always been a haven for "entrepreneurs." The area was originally a stopover for gold prospectors in the 1870's who camped by the Oasis of Mara in Twentynine Palms. In 1938 the government passed the so-called Baby Homestead Act in an attempt to populate the barren federal lands, offering a free five-acre parcel to anyone willing to slap up a small structure. The homesteaders who showed up were a motley cross section of desperadoes willing to start anew in the middle of nowhere, which over the years included a good number of artists, outcasts and U.F.O. enthusiasts.

Many of the original homestead cabins are still standing. Some have been renovated by new owners, like Mr. Pierson and Ms. Zittel, who painted hers a minimalist art-gallery white, furnished it with foam rocks and brought in two shipping containers to create an experimental live-work compound she calls A-Z West. To complete the modern pioneer idea, Ms. Zittel built dozens of "Wagon Stations," small steel capsules inspired by station wagons strewn about the rocky hillside and containing single sleeping mats. She had her artist friends customize them with designs like hot-rod flames. (Several of the wagons are on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art at Altria in New York City until June 18.) Other homesteader cabins lie abandoned and are spooky looking, with their flapping shreds of wallpaper and old bedsprings.

"The great thing about the desert is we can all project our fantasies on it," Ms. Zittel said. "I came here looking for a part of myself, a connection to who I would have been if I hadn't been an artist."
The earth artists from the 60's and 70's like Michael Heizer and James Turrell also headed to the desert, but to remote parts in Nevada and Arizona. Their projects, like Mr. Turrell's "Roden Crater," required big budgets and grand-scale land manipulation. The artists and architects who are colonizing Joshua Tree seem more interested in creating do-it-yourself mini-utopias. That's very much part of the pervasive Wild West spirit here that lets neighbors, rugged enough to settle in the desert and brave the elements, do as they please. This is also a town where military personnel (the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center is nearby), Roswell-minded conspiracy theorists, hippies and bikers all seem to coexist.

"Joshua Tree is the perfect place to be visionary and experimental," said Linda Taalman of Taalman Koch, a Los Angeles architecture firm. "There's a sense of remoteness and anything goes."
The apocalyptic sculpture garden of one prominent artist, Noah Purifoy, suggests just that. Mr. Purifoy, an installation artist and co-founder of the Watts Towers Art Center in the 1960's, moved to the desert in 1989 and spent the last 15 years of his life blanketing the two-and-a-half-acre tract of parched land with sculptures made from recycled junk like pastel plastic lunch trays, outdated computers, toilets and — my favorite — a train track with trains made of old bicycle wheels, VCR's and beer kegs.

Progressive architects, who like to play with utopic philosophy, have also set their sights on Joshua Tree as a promised land where aesthetic building regulations are few and neighbors don't complain. This fall visitors will be able to visit the iT House, a prefabricated aluminum and glass structure being built by Taalman Koch Architecture. The firm is collaborating with artists like Sarah Morris and Liam Gillick to create graphic strips of wallpaperlike vinyl that will surround the house for changing views and filtering sun.

Another firm, Ecoshack, operates a design lab near Joshua Tree where environment-minded guests can test experimental temporary dwellings like thermal-wing tents and cocoon sleeping capsules.
George Van Tassel, a self-proclaimed U.F.O. abductee, built a dome in the 1950's that he named the Integratron. It was bought by Nancy and Joanne Karl, two sisters from New York, a few years ago, and now it's open to the public.

If you time it right, you can attend a U.F.O. convention and concerts featuring local bands like Concrete Blond and Bauhaus (for some reason there's a large concentration of 1980's Los Angeles bands living out in Joshua Tree). It's also a sort of shrine for everyone from didgeridoo players to the singer Robert Plant to a professor who, according to Joanne Karl, showed up with a herd of sheep and goats.

Consider spending $10 on a "sound bath." You go upstairs in the dome, crash out on a mat, close your eyes and zone out for a half hour while one of the sisters creates a surround sound symphony using several crystal bowls. (It's a bit like a Pink Floyd laser show without the lasers and Pink Floyd.)
Pioneertown, developed as a movie set in 1946 by Roy Rogers and other Hollywood investors, is also in many ways a living art installation. It's where classic Westerns including "The Cisco Kid" and "Annie Oakley" were filmed, but now it's a semifunctioning town that feels more like a David Lynch set. Off the dusty main street with its fake jail and general store are a functioning bowling alley, houses to rent and most important, Pappy & Harriet's, an Old West-style saloon with antlers and pool tables that is the hub, along with the Palms in Wonder Valley, of the local music scene.

Run by the ex-New Yorkers Linda Krantz and Robyn Celia, Pappy & Harriet's is a must stop for musicians like Lucinda Williams, PJ Harvey and Leon Russell. Sunday afternoons are when the local desert rock bands come out, among them Gram Rabbit, Angel Thrift and Queens of the Stone Age. On a recent Thursday afternoon, Jessica Von Rabbit, the lead singer of Gram Rabbit, was drinking a mug of beer at the end of a long wooden bar, outfitted in a fur-lined coat and big red sunglasses.
In any other small desert town her midday vampy-rock star appearance might have caused hostile stares. But in Joshua Tree, she was just another local.

Source - http://travel.nytimes.com/2006/04/21/travel/escapes/21joshua.html?pagewanted=all

The Non-Manhattan Project

Andrea Zittel bolted New York for the California scrub—and now the art world comes to her desert home.

By Karen Rosenberg
Published Jan 14, 2006

(Photo: Susanna Howe)

My boyfriend and i have a secret house in L.A.,” says Andrea Zittel, conspiratorially. “He complains that in the desert it’s all me, it’s not us. So I’m trying to make a place that’s not my testing ground.” Zittel’s desert house, in Joshua Tree, is known as A-Z West, and it’s all about her in the way that Turkey Hill is all about Martha: It’s a homesteader’s cabin turned into a studio and lab for the playful, thoughtful, radical art-and-life experiments for which she’s becoming widely known. At A-Z West (there’s a defunct Brooklyn branch, A-Z East), she wears the same self-designed uniform for months. She recycles junk mail into a grayish pulp. Her mission statement says, “Home furniture, clothing, food all become the sites of investigation . . . to better understand human nature and the social construction of needs.” It’s not hard to understand how these things can strain a relationship.

Her relationship with the art world, meanwhile, is thriving. With a traveling survey about to open at the New Museum and the Whitney, the 40-year-old joins those artists who escaped to the margins—Donald Judd, Michael Heizer—only to find themselves at the center. In Zittel’s universe, it’s okay to show at the cutting-edge Andrea Rosen Gallery in Chelsea while incubating radical ideas amid the hippie squats of Joshua Tree. Zittel has become a self-described “tourist attraction,” hosting a parade of art pilgrims—a version of the cocktail parties she held weekly during her time in Williamsburg. She’s definitely out of the way, rationing water when the delivery truck doesn’t show, but she’s not off the grid.

Zittel is, essentially, a one-woman corporation; under the moniker “A-Z Administrative Services,” she acts as industrial designer, copywriter, and tester. Some of her inventions, like the Living Units (trunks that unfold into kitchens, bathrooms, and the like) are meant to make daily routines easy and efficient. Others, such as the podlike Escape Vehicles, appeal to fantasies of isolation and security. As an archivist at Pat Hearn, in the early nineties, she was flummoxed by the fashion codes of the trust-fund set, so she had one black dress made and wore it every day for six months. It’s a classic Zittel strategy, circumventing rules by inventing new ones, and it inspired a series called A-Z Personal Uniforms. Now, she quips, “I can wear a $6,000 dress to an opening, but it’s $6,000 because it’s mine.”

Shelter magazines have a tendency to confuse Zittel’s work with architecture and industrial design—careers she rejected. “As a designer, you have such an obligation to people. As an artist, you have a lot more freedom,” she says. When an innovation proves less than useful (say, the A-Z Chamber Pot), Zittel simply moves on. Critics don’t quite know how to categorize her; some call her a Conceptualist, others an object-maker. A few of Zittel’s collectors actually live with her creations, but most show and store them like sculpture.

She wants to make A-Z West a place where she and other artists can escape the pressures of the Art Basel herd. “I wanted to show that there could be a viable arts community outside a cultural capital like New York or Los Angeles, somewhere more affordable,” she says. As it happens, the housing market in the Coachella Valley has exploded, and an artist can no longer snap up a piece of land for $20,000. But life at A-Z was never purely Utopian. “I think there’s a dark side to everything good—for instance, the minute you have a prefab house with alternative energy sources, people are going to build everywhere.” If all goes well, A-Z West will one day become a foundation, with Zittel, her boyfriend, and their 17-month-old son settled in their L.A. abode, where “we just bought a sofa,” she says. “It took us a year to find one I liked.”

Source - http://nymag.com/nymetro/arts/art/15536/

A-Z West

 

Source - http://arttattler.com/Images/NorthAmerica/Illinois/Chicago/Museum%20of%20Contemporary%20Art/Production%20Site/05.jpg

A-Z Six-Month Seasonal Uniforms

 

Source -http://www.pbs.org/art21/images/andrea-zittel/various-a-z-six-month-seasonal-uniforms-1992-1995?slideshow=1

Andrea Zittel,“Pattern of Habit,” installation view, Sprüth Magers Berlin, 2011.

 

Source - http://blog.art21.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/zittel2.jpg

About Berlin Exhibit

SMOCKSHOP BERLIN   

SPRÜTH MAGERS BERLIN —- FEBRUARY 18 - APRIL 18 2009

 Sprüth Magers Berlin is delighted to host Andrea Zittel’s artistic enterprise, ‘Smockshop’, in their gallery space in Berlin this spring. This is the first time the Smockshop (www.smockshop.org) has set up its stall outside North America, and it is also scheduled to be the last time it opens for business at all, making this a unique opportunity to experience Zittel’s artistic and economic experiment. Two artisans will work in the gallery for the first four days of the exhibition making the smocks that are available for purchase right after their production. The works will be then on view in the gallery throughout the whole exhibition period. The double wrap-around garments designed by Zittel collectively represent an aesthetically diverse yet functionally uniform body of work. Extending Zittel’s longstanding interest in the form and function of everyday life, the smocks develop a modernist tradition of clothing design and manufacture, extending back to the Russian avant-garde, which emphasises utility and economy, and inclines towards an alternative experience of clothing to the prevailing discourse of fashion.

Each smock conforms to the same basic shape and form, but there is nonetheless an infinite array of colour, texture and pattern possibilities, as their method of manufacture derives from Zittel’s principle that ‘rules make us more creative’. Since it was founded in 2007, almost 300 smocks have been made by the collective. The process of making is collaborative, as each smocker is given license to interpret and rework Zittel’s designs according to their own interests and skills. The clothes range from monochrome simplicity to lurid dazzle, and from formal elegance to sculptural inventiveness. Yet though each smock is completely unique, they have all been designed and made with a sense of universal functionality in mind; suiting most body sizes or shapes, and offering socially appropriate attire in both casual and formal settings, the smock is conceived as a garment for everywoman (and maybe everyman) at any time.

The Smockshop is part of Andrea Zittel’s ongoing artistic project, to make work which is rooted in daily routine, and the functional experience of everyday living. Food, furniture, shelter and clothing have all at times been sites of investigation of how modern life is lived, and how we construct, define and distinguish between our wants and needs. From 1994, for six years, ‘A-Z East’, a small three storey storefront building in Brooklyn, New York, became the testing ground and showcase for her experimental inquiries into why people eat, sleep, wear, wash and generally live in the ways that they do. In 1999, she relocated her enterprise to ‘A-Z West’, a 25 acre site in the californian desert, where Zittel’s home, studio, and ‘experiments in living’ research and development facility continue to be based.

Andrea Zittel trained at San Diego State University and Rhode Island School of Design. Recent solo exhibitions include IKON Gallery, Birmingham (2001), Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2005), and the Whitney Museum of American Art at Altria, New York (2006). The Smockshop has traveled throughout the USA, and is making its European debut at Sprüth Magers Berlin.

Sprüth Magers Berlin will also be concurrently hosting new works by Cindy Sherman and presenting Gerda Scheepers’ ‘Taras Bookies 2007/2009’ at Schellmann Sprüth Magers. 

Source - http://spruethmagers.net/exhibitions/226@@press_en

"How writers, artists, and other interesting people organize their days."

Source-http://dailyroutines.typepad.com

9 Must-Include Items In A Healthy Daily Routine

By Deepak Dixit

‘Had a great day?’

How many times have you thought or said this to you or someone else? A day becomes great by great moments of experience. Experience will depend on the circumstances and your actions. We have limited control over our circumstances but can have full control over actions. I wish to suggest some action-items for a healthy life.

Why daily? You may be receiving your paycheck weekly/monthly or yearly, but the unit of action is ‘day’. Day is a logical unit of work. After each day’s work we go to sleep/rest and next day starts afresh. A ‘day’ to ‘life’ is like a ‘chapter’ to ‘book’. Any item added to a day’s routine produces tremendous results in long run due to cumulative effect.

Just focus- You need not to be perfect or champion for the items suggested here in your daily routine.

Nor does the time spent on the activity or the technique used matters. What matters is your satisfaction which is an individual decision. All you have to do is just focus on the activity sincerely and honestly. In long run, by repetitive use, you will gain expertise. You will yourself find the best suited technique and asses the suitable level of performance.

The suggested items are-

1. EXERCISE Appropriate physical exercise according to your diet, work and environment is an essential part of healthy routine. The advancements in technology have made our lifestyle very comfortable as far as physical activity is concerned. Sparing few minutes from your schedule (preferably early morning or evening time & empty stomach) should not be very difficult even if your schedule is very tight. It’s just a matter of outlook and habit. You need not to necessarily join a zim or fitness program, though beneficial if you can afford. Simple activities like brisk walking, swimming, jogging, jumping or climbing are great exercises. Just find out your natural rhythm, power and stamina and select an activity to increase it regularly.

2. MEDITATION Most of the time we are in action- performing something or other. Each piece of action is a small transaction of larger program /consideration / compulsion. The transactions are so fast that generally we are not able to analyze or optimize our actions. When we sleep (the state of minimum activity), we are not aware ourselves. While in meditation we are in a state of minimum action yet aware. This gives two fold benefits. Firstly your system is at rest and thus heals / maintained automatically by just being in no load/off line environment. Secondly when mind is not attached to worldly demands you are able to detach yourself from your created personality and able to realize what is the absolute reality rather than perceived image of reality which is projected by the mind. You may pick up a meditation technique based on your religious beliefs or adopt something universal as yoga or reiki. You can design your own technique to give rest to mind & body and rejuvenate.

3. THINKING Most of us think that thinking is not an activity by itself. It’s an ongoing process in our minds which is a natural phenomenon. The question is, ‘can we use this process to our advantage?’ As we do regular exercise with our body, a conscious exercise of the mind is also recommended. For few minutes daily, we can set aside all other activities, sit or lie down and just focus on thinking only. The agenda will be decided by you as you are the sole participant. Some suggestions are, ‘your aim(s), problems, relationships, finances, aspirations, lifestyle etc.

4.GAME All the work and no play makes James a dull boy,so he should play also. Most of our work is formal in nature, be it professional or social. There is very little scope for playfulness. Therefore, it is better to keep aside some time for a playful activity daily. Best is to be with children during this time. Children are always in the state of playing. We can enjoy and learn playing in their company. Otherwise find some of your ‘own type’ and do play a game preferably involving some physical activity.

5. RECEIVE /READ We absorb the details around us by our senses of seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling and touching. Since you are reading this article, I can assume that you can read. Therefore I suggest that reading of few pages on the topic of your interest should be a part of your daily routine. Those of us who are either unable to read or not satisfied with mere reading and want a better multimedia experience should actively devote some time to just focus on receiving details from the environment. The environment can be a closed screen of a movie hall/ computer or an open platform of your life.

6.EXPRESS /WRITE In our formal and social communication we are not able to express ourselves freely. We need some time in a day to express freely what we feel and think. Writing is a good way of expressing, so try writing a dairy, blog or book. In case you are not very comfortable with writing, find a person, place or platform where you feel free. If you can’t find any of these, find some lonely place and express to yourself whatever you feel like -sing song/crack a joke /cry /laugh /…. The idea is to release and charge up.

7. GRATITUDE Those who believe in God, should find sometime daily to feel thankful to God for whatever they have got (Best is to remain always in the state of thankfulness). Even if you do not believe in God, say ‘THANKS’ to anything you value/yourself. It is a magic word and if you just say and feel it honestly, your life will begin to transform.

8. PARTY After a days work, you deserve a party. I am not suggesting a formal party with heavy expenditure. Partying means spending sometime with your near & dear in the state of enjoyment. Use music of your choice as it has got the tremendous healing power.

9. WINDUP At the end of the day of activities, it is worthwhile to spend sometime on analyzing and winding up the main actions taken and planning for the nest day.

Source - http://ezinearticles.com/?9-Must-Include-Items-In-A-Healthy-Daily-Routine&id=3719668

The Uniform Project Site

http://www.theuniformproject.com/

Fashionable Nursing Uniforms? Pratt Fashion Design Students Took On the Challenge

 By CHERYL WISCHHOVER Sunday, Nov 6, 2011 / 7:51 PM


Hannah’s winning is design in the middle, w/2 runners-up

The splashy designs we see on the runway and in editorials often take a lot of the spotlight in the fashion world, but there’s also a whole world of functional clothing that exists to allow people to do their jobs better or to portray a certain image to clients or customers. Nurses are a perfect example. Their jobs are often messy (both literally and emotionally), but the clothes they wear to do their jobs make them invisible. And as much as popular culture loves the “naughty nurse” image, fishnets and thigh high boots don’t work in real life. I know this from first-hand experience, because I used to be a nurse.

Scrubs are functional, comfortable, and completely hideous on almost every body type. Bedside hospital nurses I worked with used to wear distinctive jewelry, nail polish, decorated clogs (that’s how bad it is)…ANYTHING to add an individual touch to a very pragmatic uniform. So when I heard about a design competition in which Pratt fashion design students were designing uniforms for nurses in a hospice unit, I had to learn more about it.

The Visiting Nurse Service of New York (VNSNY)’s Haven Hospice Specialty Care Unit, located at Bellevue Hospital, has interior designer touches and amenities that very few hospitals have, like a hot tub. The nurses there are dealing with death, dying, and grieving on a daily basis. Pratt hosted a design competition in which students had to design functional yet attractive uniforms for the nurses who work in this special unit. “There is nothing more important than for Pratt students to go out into the world and engage in the broader community and beyond their immediate community and the trends that exist on 7th Avenue,” said Jennifer Minniti, Chair of Pratt’s Department of Fashion Design in a release.

Twenty-two junior fashion design students took part, and Hannah Ross was deemed the winner–she won a $2,500 scholarship from VNSNY and her design is going to be produced and worn by the nurses. I spoke to Hannah to see what it was like designing for a bunch of nurses, who–I can also confirm from experience–can be an, um, opinionated group.

Hannah told me that the VNS realized they didn’t have uniforms that fit the beautiful space; they were wearing things like Spongebob printed scrubs. When asked about the most difficult part of the challenge, she said, “I usually use a lot of color and I like to design costumes and crazy avant garde pieces. For this I really toned myself down.”

The nurses directed the design, and told the students that they actually like their scrubs because they were “easy, flattering and loose-fitting and they work on any body type.” Hannah’s response was, “I was thinking in my head, ‘No, this is horrible! We need to totally change this,’ but we had to keep in mind that they like the comfort and the simplicity. They didn’t want to feel overwhelmed putting on a lot of pieces and they didn’t want them to be tight-fitting.”

The result was a jacket, pants and top, all knit rather than woven (scrubs are woven and stiff) to give them a little shape and stretchiness. And tons of storage options, like pockets and a tab for hanging a stethoscope. The hardest part for Hannah? “Taking a step back and realizing that this wasn’t an art project and I didn’t really need to show creativity as much as I needed to show functionality and make it aesthetically pleasing,” she told me.

So while nurses can’t don five inch heels and skinny pants to do their jobs, they deserve an outfit that’s going to make them feel confident and attractive, because don’t you just feel better about the world when you’re wearing a good outfit? Kudos to Pratt for this project. Now if only someone could tackle the epidemic of Crocs and clogs in hospitals.

Source - http://fashionista.com/2011/11/fashionable-nursing-uniforms-pratt-fashion-design-students-took-on-the-challenge/

Sheena Matheiken of the Uniform Project

Source - http://www.splurgerina.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/The_Uniform_Project.jpg

The Paris Uniform

by eighty jane

A few days back from my trip to the fashion capital of the world, I’ve had a bit of time to reflect a bit on my experience. I was surprised (and maybe a little disappointed) to find that Parisian fashion didn’t seem to stand apart from the global crowd. It might be a result of the nature of fashion these days: We all read the same magazines (the same publisher, at least) and, perhaps more importantly, we read many of the same blogs.

My trip consisted of days in New York City, Paris, and Amsterdam – and each seemed to be a mosh of the same H&M-informed style palettes. To be fair, each of these cities has more than their share of tourists, and each is a “Western” city. Perhaps if my international jaunt had included Merida or Calabar or Jakarta I might have gotten a bit more variety.

Above, see a Polyvore representation of the most common look I saw on the streets of Paris. I wish I could say that the striped shirt was characteristic of the classic Paris style we all think of, but I think it’s just a reflection of a global trend toward horizontal stripes. The look lost it’s jazz after seeing it for the 88th time, but it’s made up of good foundation-like pieces, so I’m not mad at it. Click here to shop the look.

Source-http://www.thefashioncult.com/2011/06/the-paris-uniform/

The Bauhaus, 1919–1933

The Bauhaus was founded in 1919 in the city of Weimar by German architect Walter Gropius (1883–1969). Its core objective was a radical concept: to reimagine the material world to reflect the unity of all the arts. Gropius explained this vision for a union of art and design in the Proclamation of the Bauhaus (1919), which described a utopian craft guild combining architecture, sculpture, and painting into a single creative expression. Gropius developed a craft-based curriculum that would turn out artisans and designers capable of creating useful and beautiful objects appropriate to this new system of living.

The Bauhaus combined elements of both fine arts and design education. The curriculum commenced with a preliminary course that immersed the students, who came from a diverse range of social and educational backgrounds, in the study of materials, color theory, and formal relationships in preparation for more specialized studies. This preliminary course was often taught by visual artists, including Paul Klee (1987.455.16), Vasily Kandinsky (1866–1944), and Josef Albers (59.160), among others.

Following their immersion in Bauhaus theory, students entered specialized workshops, which included metalworking, cabinetmaking, weaving, pottery, typography, and wall painting. Although Gropius' initial aim was a unification of the arts through craft, aspects of this approach proved financially impractical. While maintaining the emphasis on craft, he repositioned the goals of the Bauhaus in 1923, stressing the importance of designing for mass production. It was at this time that the school adopted the slogan "Art into Industry."

In 1925, the Bauhaus moved from Weimar to Dessau, where Gropius designed a new building to house the school. This building contained many features that later became hallmarks of modernist architecture, including steel-frame construction, a glass curtain wall, and an asymmetrical, pinwheel plan, throughout which Gropius distributed studio, classroom, and administrative space for maximum efficiency and spatial logic.

The cabinetmaking workshop was one of the most popular at the Bauhaus. Under the direction of Marcel Breuer (1983.366) from 1924 to 1928, this studio reconceived the very essence of furniture, often seeking to dematerialize conventional forms such as chairs to their minimal existence. Breuer theorized that eventually chairs would become obsolete, replaced by supportive columns or air. Inspired by the extruded steel tubes of his bicycle, he experimented with metal furniture, ultimately creating lightweight, mass-producible metal chairs. Some of these chairs were deployed in the theater of the Dessau building.

The textile workshop, especially under the direction of designer and weaver Gunta Stölzl (1897–1983), created abstract textiles suitable for use in Bauhaus environments. Students studied color theory and design as well as the technical aspects of weaving. Stölzl encouraged experimentation with unorthodox materials, including cellophane, fiberglass, and metal. Fabrics from the weaving workshop were commercially successful, providing vital and much needed funds to the Bauhaus. The studio's textiles, along with architectural wall painting, adorned the interiors of Bauhaus buildings, providing polychromatic yet abstract visual interest to these somewhat severe spaces. While the weaving studio was primarily comprised of women, this was in part due to the fact that they were discouraged from participating in other areas. The workshop trained a number of prominent textile artists, including Anni Albers (1899–1994), who continued to create and write about modernist textiles throughout her life.

Metalworking was another popular workshop at the Bauhaus and, along with the cabinetmaking studio, was the most successful in developing design prototypes for mass production. In this studio, designers such as Marianne Brandt (2000.63a-c), Wilhelm Wagenfeld (1986.412.1-16), and Christian Dell (1893–1974) created beautiful, modern items such as lighting fixtures and tableware. Occasionally, these objects were used in the Bauhaus campus itself; light fixtures designed in the metalwork shop illuminated the Bauhaus building and some faculty housing. Brandt was the first woman to attend the metalworking studio, and replaced László Moholy-Nagy (1987.1100.158) as studio director in 1928. Many of her designs became iconic expressions of the Bauhaus aesthetic. Her sculptural and geometric silver and ebony teapot (2000.63a-c), while never mass-produced, reflects both the influence of her mentor, Moholy-Nagy, and the Bauhaus emphasis on industrial forms. It was designed with careful attention to functionality and ease of use, from the nondrip spout to the heat-resistant ebony handle.

The typography workshop, while not initially a priority of the Bauhaus, became increasingly important under figures like Moholy-Nagy and the graphic designer Herbert Bayer (2001.392). At the Bauhaus, typography was conceived as both an empirical means of communication and an artistic expression, with visual clarity stressed above all. Concurrently, typography became increasingly connected to corporate identity and advertising. The promotional materials prepared for the Bauhaus at the workshop, with their use of sans serif typefaces and the incorporation of photography as a key graphic element, served as visual symbols of the avant-garde institution.

Gropius stepped down as director of the Bauhaus in 1928, succeeded by the architect Hannes Meyer (1889–1954). Meyer maintained the emphasis on mass-producible design and eliminated parts of the curriculum he felt were overly formalist in nature. Additionally, he stressed the social function of architecture and design, favoring concern for the public good rather than private luxury. Advertising and photography continued to gain prominence under his leadership.

Under pressure from an increasingly right-wing municipal government, Meyer resigned as director of the Bauhaus in 1930. He was replaced by architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1980.351). Mies once again reconfigured the curriculum, with an increased emphasis on architecture. Lily Reich (1885–1947), who collaborated with Mies on a number of his private commissions, assumed control of the new interior design department. Other departments included weaving, photography, the fine arts, and building. The increasingly unstable political situation in Germany, combined with the perilous financial condition of the Bauhaus, caused Mies to relocate the school to Berlin in 1930, where it operated on a reduced scale. He ultimately shuttered the Bauhaus in 1933.

During the turbulent and often dangerous years of World War II, many of the key figures of the Bauhaus emigrated to the United States, where their work and their teaching philosophies influenced generations of young architects and designers. Marcel Breuer and Joseph Albers taught at Yale, Walter Gropius went to Harvard, and Moholy-Nagy established the New Bauhaus in Chicago in 1937.
Alexandra Griffith Winton
Independent Scholar

Source - http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/bauh/hd_bauh.htm

Bauhaus Typography

 

Source - http://www.toffsworld.com/images/stories/art/bahaus_font.jpg

Marianne Brandt

Source - http://lindandjames.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/marianne-brandt.jpg

Simple Sustainable Furniture Site

http://www.livingsimplistically.com/index.html

The Dessau Bauhaus

Source - http://dropbearsexist.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/dscn1533.jpg

Space of Habit

 

Source - http://purple.fr/diary/entry/andrea-zittel-s-latest-solo-show-at-spruth-magers-berlin