“I have set thee at the world’s center, that thou mayest from thence more easily observe whatever is in the world. I have made thee neither of heaven nor of earth, neither mortal nor immortal, so that thou mayest with greater freedom of choice and with more honor, as though the maker and molder of thyself, fashion thyself in whatever shape thou shalt prefer.”
— Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, God to Adam from Oration on the Dignity of Man, 1486 (via visualamor)
(via fuckyeahrenaissanceart)
“Good design means as little design as possible. Not for reasons of economy or convenience. Arriving at a really convincing, harmonious form by employing simple means is surely a difficult task. The other way is easier and, as paradoxical as it may seem, often cheaper, but also more thoughtless with respect to production. Complicated, unnecessary forms are nothing more than designers’ escapades that function as self-expression instead of expressing the product’s functions. The reason is often that design is used to gain a superficial redundance [sic].
[…] Much design today is modish sensation and the rapid change of fashion outdates products quickly. The choices are [clear]: disciplined simplicity or forced, oppressive, stupefying expression. For me there is only one way: discipline.”
[…] Much design today is modish sensation and the rapid change of fashion outdates products quickly. The choices are [clear]: disciplined simplicity or forced, oppressive, stupefying expression. For me there is only one way: discipline.”
— Dieter Rams, Omit the Unimportant, 1984
“My love,
Like an apostle in the time long past,
I’ll carry down a thousand thousands roads.
In the ages, a crown for you is cast
And in that crown,
In the rainbow of shudders, shine my words.
As elephants, with hundredweight games, assiduous,
Completed the victory of Pyrrhus,
I packed your brain with the tread of a genius
All in vain.
Nothing could bind us.”
Like an apostle in the time long past,
I’ll carry down a thousand thousands roads.
In the ages, a crown for you is cast
And in that crown,
In the rainbow of shudders, shine my words.
As elephants, with hundredweight games, assiduous,
Completed the victory of Pyrrhus,
I packed your brain with the tread of a genius
All in vain.
Nothing could bind us.”
— Vladimir Mayakovsky, The Backbone Flute, 1916
“Advertising has remained as the publicist of the place that could be, that sphere outside labor. I mean that since the expiration of actually existing socialism, it’s only or mainly in advertising that the idea of this “good place” is still preserved—so that Utopia remains as a vital part of our imaginations, constantly invading our everyday lives, urging us to violate the demands of increased productivity and to interrupt reality with minor misdemeanors or great refusals, whatever removes us from the realm of necessity and projects us into a world of leisure, indolence, receptivity, and consumption.
Look anywhere, in any mass-market magazine, at any TV show, at any ad, and what do you see? There’s no necessary labor on view unless the spot is aimed at potential buyers of pickup trucks, manly men wearing jeans who presumably work with their hands. But even here, in this minor sales province, the men watch as the truck takes a terrific beating, or they drive the thing with enthusiasm: whether watching or driving, they’re not working. Nobody’s seen working in advertisements because the point is to “sell happiness,” as Don Draper puts it, and that, as always, means freedom from compulsion, freedom from necessity, “freedom from fear” (here he’s quoting FDR). The product is certainly in sight, but it’s the idea of release—not abstention—from these scary and yet tiresome realities (compulsion, necessity, fear) that counts.”
Look anywhere, in any mass-market magazine, at any TV show, at any ad, and what do you see? There’s no necessary labor on view unless the spot is aimed at potential buyers of pickup trucks, manly men wearing jeans who presumably work with their hands. But even here, in this minor sales province, the men watch as the truck takes a terrific beating, or they drive the thing with enthusiasm: whether watching or driving, they’re not working. Nobody’s seen working in advertisements because the point is to “sell happiness,” as Don Draper puts it, and that, as always, means freedom from compulsion, freedom from necessity, “freedom from fear” (here he’s quoting FDR). The product is certainly in sight, but it’s the idea of release—not abstention—from these scary and yet tiresome realities (compulsion, necessity, fear) that counts.”
— James Livingston, Why Consumer Culture is Good for the Economy, the Environment, and Your Soul, 2011
“On you,
steeped in love
who watered
the centuries with tears,
I’ll turn my back, fixing
the sun like a monocle
into my gaping eye.
Donning fantastic finery,
I’ll strut the earth
to please and scorch the public;
And in front of me,
On a metal leash,
Napoleon will run like a little puppy.”
steeped in love
who watered
the centuries with tears,
I’ll turn my back, fixing
the sun like a monocle
into my gaping eye.
Donning fantastic finery,
I’ll strut the earth
to please and scorch the public;
And in front of me,
On a metal leash,
Napoleon will run like a little puppy.”
— Vladimir Mayakovsky, A Cloud in Trousers, 1915
“…as revolution sweeps through a modern metropolis… we will sing of the midnight fervour of arsenals and shipyards blazing with electric moons; insatiable stations swallowing the smoking serpents of their trains; factories hung from the clouds by the twisted threads of their smoke; bridges flashing like knives in the sun, giant gymnasts that leap over rivers; adventurous steamers that scent the horizon, deep chested locomotives that paw the ground with their wheels, like stallions harnessed with steel tubing…”
— Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, ‘Le Futurisme’, Le Figaro, Paris, 20 February, 1909 (via jetportal)
“And you were so realistic
Preferring the Soviet Bookstore
To my literary dreams.
“You don’t like war,” you said
After reading a poem
In which I’d simply said I hated war
In a whole list of things. To you
It seemed a position, to me
It was all a flux, especially then.
I was in an
Unexpected situation.
Let’s take a walk
I wrote. And I love you as a sheriff
Searches for a walnut. And And so unless
I’m going to see your face
Bien soon, and you said
You must take me away, and
Oh Kenneth
You like everything
To be pleasant. I was burning
Like an arch
Made out of trees.”
Preferring the Soviet Bookstore
To my literary dreams.
“You don’t like war,” you said
After reading a poem
In which I’d simply said I hated war
In a whole list of things. To you
It seemed a position, to me
It was all a flux, especially then.
I was in an
Unexpected situation.
Let’s take a walk
I wrote. And I love you as a sheriff
Searches for a walnut. And And so unless
I’m going to see your face
Bien soon, and you said
You must take me away, and
Oh Kenneth
You like everything
To be pleasant. I was burning
Like an arch
Made out of trees.”
— Kenneth Koch, To Marina (via spacebaw-archive)
“Glorify me!
For me the great are no match.
Upon every achievement
I stamp “nihil”.”
For me the great are no match.
Upon every achievement
I stamp “nihil”.”
— Vladimir Mayakovsky, A Cloud in Trousers, 1915
“Where men’s Eyes stop short,
there, at the head of hungry hordes,
the year 1916 cometh
in the thorny crown of revolutions.
In your midst, his precursor,
I am where pain is everywhere;
on each drop of the tear-flow
I have nailed myself on the cross.
Nothing is left to forgive.
I’ve cauterized the souls where tenderness was bred.
It was harder than taking
A thousand thousand Bastilles!
And when,
the rebellion
his advent accounting,
you step to meet the savior
then I
shall root up my soul;
I’ll trample it hard
till it spreads
in blood; and I offer you this as a banner.”
there, at the head of hungry hordes,
the year 1916 cometh
in the thorny crown of revolutions.
In your midst, his precursor,
I am where pain is everywhere;
on each drop of the tear-flow
I have nailed myself on the cross.
Nothing is left to forgive.
I’ve cauterized the souls where tenderness was bred.
It was harder than taking
A thousand thousand Bastilles!
And when,
the rebellion
his advent accounting,
you step to meet the savior
then I
shall root up my soul;
I’ll trample it hard
till it spreads
in blood; and I offer you this as a banner.”
— Vladimir Mayakovsky, A Cloud in Trousers, 1915
“in using our genius to exalt the products and companies of our time, i.e. the prime factors in our life, we are making the purest, truest, and most modern art
advertising art offers an artistic field and themes which are utterly new
advertising art is unavoidably necessary
art unavoidably modern
art unavoidably bold
art unavoidably paid for
art unavoidably experienced”
advertising art offers an artistic field and themes which are utterly new
advertising art is unavoidably necessary
art unavoidably modern
art unavoidably bold
art unavoidably paid for
art unavoidably experienced”
— Fortunato Depero, Futurism and Advertising Art, 1931
“Listen carefully, for example, to the “elevated” discussions organized on the occasion of the centenary celebrations for Goethe at Frankfurt by the International Institute of Intellectual Cooperation, an agency of The League of Nations: the Englishman proclaims the name of Shakespeare; the Frenchman that of Rabelais or Balzac; the Italian replies with Dante and Michelangelo, the Spaniard with Cervantes. Though each one points to his own flag, in passing Goethe receives a considerable share of compliments (and sometimes these dithyrambs have a comic sound, the speaker making it clear that he understands everything about the greatness of Goethe and that he has something of it himself).
They are busy with bickerings and squabbles. But agreement exists about Muhammad, for he is of a country which does not yet have a delegation at this court of high culture; he does not belong to one of the nations “involved,” he is outside of the “I’s” and the “me’s” which appear at every turn in the discussion.
When the cathedrals were white, above nationalities concerned with themselves, there was a common idea: Christendom was above everything else. Already, before constructing everywhere the naves of the new civilization, a common enthusiasm of spirit had brought together the peoples of modern times and had led them, through strange avatars; toward Jerusalem, where there was the seat of a universal thought: love.
So I should wish to be nothing more than one of those who seek to discern the “constructive” paths, to prepare “tomorrow”; who observe good with sympathy, evil coolly, and who, above all, allow themselves to be led toward something useful.”
They are busy with bickerings and squabbles. But agreement exists about Muhammad, for he is of a country which does not yet have a delegation at this court of high culture; he does not belong to one of the nations “involved,” he is outside of the “I’s” and the “me’s” which appear at every turn in the discussion.
When the cathedrals were white, above nationalities concerned with themselves, there was a common idea: Christendom was above everything else. Already, before constructing everywhere the naves of the new civilization, a common enthusiasm of spirit had brought together the peoples of modern times and had led them, through strange avatars; toward Jerusalem, where there was the seat of a universal thought: love.
So I should wish to be nothing more than one of those who seek to discern the “constructive” paths, to prepare “tomorrow”; who observe good with sympathy, evil coolly, and who, above all, allow themselves to be led toward something useful.”
— Le Corbusier, When the Cathedrals Were White, 1947
“When once a standard is established, competition comes at once and violently into play. It is a fight; in order to win you must do better than your rival in every minute point, in the run of the whole thing and in all the details. Thus we get the study of minute points pushed to its limits. Progress. A standard is necessary for order in human effort.”
— Le Corbusier, Toward an Architecture, 1923
“Changes in decoration account for the quick devaluation of the product of labour. The worker’s time and the material used are capital items that are being wasted. I have coined an aphorism: The form of an object should last (i.e., should be bearable) as long as the object lasts physically. […] A ball gown for a lady, only meant for one night, will change its form more speedily than a desk. But woe to the desk that has to be changed as quickly as a ball gown because its shape has become unbearable, for than the money spent on the desk will have been wasted.
This is well-known to the ornamentalists, and Austrian ornamentalists try to make the most of it. They say: ‘A consumer who has his furniture for ten years and then can’t stand it any more and has to re-furnish from scratch every ten years, is more popular with us than someone who only buys an item when the old one is worn out. Industry thrives on this. Millions are employed due to rapid changes.’ This seems to be the secret of the Austrian national economy; how often when a fire breaks out one hears the words: ‘Thank God, now there will be something for people to do again.’ I know a good remedy: burn down a town, burn down the country and everything will be swimming in wealth and well-being. Make furniture that you can use as firewood after three years and metal fittings that must be melted down after four years because even in the auction room you can’t realize a tenth of the outlay in work and materials, and we shall become richer and richer.”
This is well-known to the ornamentalists, and Austrian ornamentalists try to make the most of it. They say: ‘A consumer who has his furniture for ten years and then can’t stand it any more and has to re-furnish from scratch every ten years, is more popular with us than someone who only buys an item when the old one is worn out. Industry thrives on this. Millions are employed due to rapid changes.’ This seems to be the secret of the Austrian national economy; how often when a fire breaks out one hears the words: ‘Thank God, now there will be something for people to do again.’ I know a good remedy: burn down a town, burn down the country and everything will be swimming in wealth and well-being. Make furniture that you can use as firewood after three years and metal fittings that must be melted down after four years because even in the auction room you can’t realize a tenth of the outlay in work and materials, and we shall become richer and richer.”
— Adolf Loos, Ornament and Crime, 1908
“Chandra Mukerji argues that Europe was already a ‘hedonistic culture of mass consumption’ in the early modern period. According to her, this contradicts the prevailing view, elaborated by the sociologist Max Weber and popularized in Britain by R.H. Tawney, that the ‘Protestant Ethic’ which fueled capitalist expansion was one of ‘ascetic rationality’, that the early capitalists were thrifty, ‘anal’ character types who saved rather than spent, and that only with the arrival of industrial capitalism, and especially in our own period, did modern consumerism begin. Even the English Puritans, she suggests wore costly and elaborate clothes — and in any case, their clothes were influenced as much by the sober but fashionable wear of the Dutch as by religious considerations.”
— Elizabeth Wilson, Adorned in Dreams: Fashion and Modernity, 1985
“Mass-production is based on analysis and experiment.
Industry on the grand scale must occupy itself with building and establish the elements of the house on a mass-production basis.
We must create the mass-production spirit.
The spirit of constructing mass-production houses.
The spirit of living in mass-production houses.
If we eliminate from our hearts and minds all dead concepts in regard to the house, and look at the question from a critical and objective point of view, we shall arrive at the “House-Machine,” the mass-production house, healthy (and morally so too) and beautiful in the same way that the working tools and instruments which accompany our existence are beautiful.”
Industry on the grand scale must occupy itself with building and establish the elements of the house on a mass-production basis.
We must create the mass-production spirit.
The spirit of constructing mass-production houses.
The spirit of living in mass-production houses.
If we eliminate from our hearts and minds all dead concepts in regard to the house, and look at the question from a critical and objective point of view, we shall arrive at the “House-Machine,” the mass-production house, healthy (and morally so too) and beautiful in the same way that the working tools and instruments which accompany our existence are beautiful.”
— Le Corbusier, Toward an Architecture, 1923
