Book Description

This stunning publication showcases the Art Institute's important and growing collection of twentieth-century American ceramics, furniture, glass, and metalwork. Colorful, engaging essays explore approximately forty of the museum's most fascinating decorative objects, introducing readers to major design trends such as Art Moderne, streamlining, and organicism. They also illuminate the creations, philosophies, and personalities of important twentieth-century designers such as Charles and Ray Eames, Paul T. Frankl, and Eva Zeisel. Never before published as a collection, the Art Institute's works also reveal modernism's impact on the collectors, designers, and retailers of decorative art in Chicago. An introduction by Judith A. Barter, Field-McCormick Curator of American Arts, focuses on the history and philosophy of modernist design, and in particular on the shifting nature of modernism's democratic and utopian impulses. Situating the Art Institute's holdings within the context of American modernism, author Jennifer M. Downs explores how twentieth-century interiors and furnishings were influenced by contemporary movements in architecture and the fine arts, and by major events such as the 1925 Paris "Exposition internationale des arts decoratifs et industriels modernes," the Great Depression, Chicago's 1933 "Century of Progress International Exposition," and World War II. A striking, definitive guide to an increasingly important collection, Shaping the Modern will appeal to modern-design collectors and enthusiasts alike.