Lessons to Learn?
Past Design Experiences and
Contemporary Design Practices
Proceedings of the ICDHS 12th International Conference
on Design History and Design Studies
Edited by: Fedja Vukić, Iva Kostešić
Zagreb 2020
Lessons to Learn?
Past Design Experiences and
Contemporary Design Practices
Proceedings of the ICDHS 12th International Conference
on Design History and Design Studies
Edited by: Fedja Vukić, Iva Kostešić
Zagreb 2020
Lessons to Learn? Past Design Experiences and Contemporary Design Practices
Proceedings of the ICDHS 12th International Conference on Design History
and Design Studies
ORGANIZED BY
Institute for the Research of the Avant-Garde Zagreb
Table of Contents
UNDER THE AUSPICES OF
Ministry of Science and Education of the Republic of Croatia
THE BOOK PUBLISHED BY
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EDITED BY
Fedja Vukić
Iva Kostešić
REVIEWS
Helena Barbosa
Jonathan Woodham
Priscila Lena Farias
PROOFREADING
Chelsea Alethea Sanders
GRAPHIC DESIGN AND LAYOUT
2D, Otto Kušec, Miran Bašić
ISBN
978-953-7703-67-7
Zagreb, October 2020
Introduction:
A Note From the Editor
11
Future Learning on Design, Within and With Design
Fedja Vukić
1 Challenging Orthodoxies
in Design History
and Design Studies I
17
History and Design History: Myths, Memories and Reality
Jonathan Woodham
29
Exhibition Design and the Relationship With the Spectator:
Historical Notes with El Lissitzky and Hebert Bayer
Renata Perim Lopes
39
Investigating Migrating Print Cultures:
Graphic Memory Research Methods Applied to a Study on Typographia Hennies Irmãos
Jade Samara Piaia and Priscila Lena Farias
51
Conjecturing Futures for Brazilian Design Law
Cassia M. De La Houssaye and Patricia Peralta
61
Appropriation, Adaptation, Redesign, Copy, Cut and Paste:
The Covers of Translated Books Published by José Olympio in the 1940s and 1950s
Carla Fernanda Fontana
75
Publishing on the Periphery:
Trade Design Magazines in Late 20th Century Greece
Niki Sioki
85
How Socialist Self-Management Contributed
to the Understanding of Participation in Design
Barbara Predan
97
Sadun Ersin:
An Influential Figure in the Development of Modern Design in Turkey
Deniz Hasirci, Zeynep Tuna Ultav and Melis Örnekoğlu Selçuk
111
Herbert Simon in the Design Field
Felipe Kaizer and Lucas Do M. N. Cunha
2 The Social Impact
of Design
3 Cultural Roles
of Design Practice
123
Roam Home to a Dome? The House that Bucky Barely Lived In
Hsiao-Yun Chu
317
Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil:
A Quest for the Theoretical Basis of the Concept
Ana Sofía López Guerrero and Marcos da Costa Braga
137
Harmful or Useless? Victor Papanek and the Student Rebellion
at Danish Design Schools 1967 – 1976
Anders V. Munch, Vibeke Riisberg and Lene Kiærbye Pedersen
327
Repairing Domestic Objects as an Act of Sustainable Design
Pedro Álvarez Caselli and Antonio Batlle Lathrop
Branding Japanese Olympics:
The Evolution of Design Between Local Tradition and Global Trends
Claudia Tranti
149
339
161
A Case Study Among Colombia’s Post-Conflict ‘Memory Machines’:
Reframing Memory Through Models of Social Design and Doris Salcedo’s Anti-Monument
Diana Duque
The Bedroom of Mademoiselle De Roo:
Private Inputs on an Official Culture of Taste in Domestic Interiors
Carlos Bártolo
351
171
Design for Inclusion: From Ethical Through Aesthetic Thinking
Aura Cruz and Erika Cortés
The Performance of Design in the First Neoliberal Wave in Argentina
Veronica Devalle
361
183
Co-Creating Bauhaus Typography in Denmark:
The Avant-Gardist Vilhelm Bjerke Petersen and Printer C. Volmer Nordlunde
Trond Klevgaard
Echoes of Tomas Maldonado’s Bond with Uruguay:
The Contact Zone Between Design, Art and Architecture
Laura Cesio, Monica Farkas and Magdalena Sprechmann
371
193
Mariska Undi and Anna Lesznai:
A Comparative Study of Two Early Twentieth-Century Hungarian Modernist Designers
Rebecca Houze
Learning From Past Design Experiences in an Educational Context: A Self-Reflective Account
Miray Hamarat and Koray Gelmez
389
Exhibitions as Political ‘Demonstrations’?
Artists International Association’s ‘For Liberty’ Exhibition, London 1943
Harriet Atkinson
399
Aestheticising Design: Revisiting the Concept of Commodity Aesthetics
Mads Nygaard Folkmann
4 Politics and Design: Past,
Present, Future
207
Torres Balbás’ Garden Design in the Alhambra
in Relation to His Restoration Theory
Sara Satoh
217
1980’s Brazilian Rock Album Covers: A Visual Analysis
Paulo Eduardo Moretto and Priscila Lena Farias
409
231
Irish Suburban Housing:
Concrete Nationalism and the ‘House of To-Morrow’
Tom Spalding
The Monpe as a Totalitarian Costume:
Japanese Farmer Work Pants as a Wartime Uniform for Women in the Japanese Empire
Rie Mori
419
241
The Armorial Movement:
Cultural Entwinements in the Legacy of Time From a Graphic Design Perspective
Paula Valadares and Helena Barbosa
The Significance of Fiction: The Aesthetic Politics of Speculative Design
Li Zhang
431
255
Cultural Blends:
A Metaphorical Method for Designing Cultural Products With Traditional Cultural Properties
Zhenzhen Qin and Sandy Ng
Lessons Learned About Design Policies Based on Shared Experiences
Between Differentiated Territories: The Transatlantic Case of Chile — Canary Islands
Bernardo Antonio Candela Sanjuán, Katherine Mollenhauer and Alfonso Ruiz Rallo
449
267
Bohemians, Craftsmen and the New Woman
John Henry Martin
Liberation, Nation and Salvation:
South African Political Party Logos of the 2019 General Election
Deirdre Pretorius
463
281
The Coexistence of Preservation and Modernisation Design Strategies for the Textiles
Heritage of Phlow Karen in the Rachaburi Province (Thailand)
Nanthana Boonla-or and Teerapoj Teeropas
Designers as Cultural Intermediaries:
Towards a Framework to Understand Design’s Engagement in Culture Wars
Emrah Ozturan, Gulname Turan and Dogan Gurpinar
475
293
Italian Typographic Heritage:
A Contribution to Its Recognition and Interpretation as Part of Design Heritagev
Emanuela Bonini Lessing, Fiorella Bulegato and Priscila Lena Farias
Benjaminian Taktisch in Contemporary Critical Design
Tau Lenskjold
485
307
Richard Hamilton and the LUX 50th Anniversary Project
Noriko Yoshimura
Portuguese Film Posters at the Dawn of Estado Novo:
Modernism Under Dictatorship
Igor Ramos and Helena Barbosa
499
A Brief History of Ergonomics in the USSR:
Socialist Ergonomics and Its Development at the VNIITE Institute of Industrial Design
Ana Sofía López Guerrero
5 Challenging Orthodoxies
in Design History and
Design Studies II
509
The Eameses and Kenmochi:
Interaction Between the US and Japan’s Industrial Design in the Post-WWII Era
Izumi Kuroishi
521
VNIITE and Lithuania: Industrial Design on the Western Soviet Periphery
Triin Jerlei
535
Objects of Desire:
Consumption and Popular Luxury in Early Modern Southeastern Europe
Artemis Yagou
543
6 Design and Technology
Contradictions in Modern Design Aesthetics in Post-Colonial History
— The Introduction of Television in Taiwan, 1960s to 1990s
Ju-Joan Wong
555
The Master Approving of His Own Work
Žiga Testen
567
An Experience of Synthesis and Freedom:
Space and Design in Post-World War II Portugal
Sandra Antunes and Maria Helena Souto
579
Alexandre Wollner, the Ulm School, and the Newspaper:
The Use of Grids and Its Influence on the Formation of the Graphic Design Field in Brazil
Alice Viggiani
591
‘The School Question’: Race and Colonial Attitudes Towards Craft Education
in British Malaya and the Dutch East Indies, 1900 – 1930s
Mitha Budhyarto and Vikas Kailankaje
601
Women in Italian Graphic Design History:
A Contribution to Rewrite History in a More Inclusive Way
Francesco E. Guida
611
Surface, Deep, Implicit.
Basic Design as a Signature Pedagogy in Design Education
Giulia Ciliberto
623
An Analysis of the Visual Identification of Early São Paulo City Letterpress Printing Shops:
Contributions for Brazilian Design History
Fabio Mariano Cruz Pereira and Priscila Lena Farias
633
Discourses on Design History Methods:
The Case of ‘Cooperativa Árvore’ Posters
Mariana Almeida and Helena Barbosa
647
Theory vs/♥ Practice in the Design Education Curriculum:
The Case of the Portuguese History of Design
Helena Barbosa
661
Lost in Translation?
Representing the Concept of Artificial Intelligence to the General Public
Tingyi S. Lin and Jou-Yin Sun
673
The History of Parametric Design and Its Applications in Footwear Design
Marilena Christodoulou
7 Epilogue: A More Adjusted
Design for the Future?
Conference Panels
683
Human Senses and the Enjoyment of Objects
Silvia Puig Pages
695
Using AI to Classify Instagram’s Dissident Images
Didiana Prata, Fabio Cozman and Gustavo Polleti
709
Decentring Design Thinking for Development Engineering
Yunus Doğan Telliel and Robert Krueger
721
Digital Communication and Global Visual Image Standards of Emojis as a Challenge
for an Intercultural Comparison between Japan and Germany
Christof Breidenich, Keisuke Takayasu and Nicole Christ
737
Can a Nation Survive through Craft?
The Colonial Past, Current Subjectivities and Sustainable Futures
Yuko Kikuchi
773
The Development of Creative Industries in Russia Between 1990 – 2020
Olga Druzhinina
787
Utopia or Belief ?
Matko Meštrović
807
PANEL 1
Publishing Design Research
in Academic Journals
809
PANEL 2
Designing Archives and Collections
The ICDHS 12th Conference was organised by the Institute for the Research of the Avant-Garde
(Zagreb) and supervised by the ICDHS Board as a four-day online event from October 16 – 19, 2020.
ICDHS (International Committee for Design History
and Design Studies) BOARD MEMBERS
Paul Atkinson, Tevfik Balcıoglu, Helena Barbosa, Priscila Farias, Lucila Fernández Uriarte,
Fredie Floré, Héctor Flores Magón Y Jiménez, Haruhiko Fujita, Javier Gimeno Martínez, Yuko
Kikuchi, Pekka Korvenmaa, Tingyi S. Lin, Victor Margolin (†), Oriol Moret, Viviana Narotzky,
Oscar Salinas Flores, Fedja Vukic, Wendy Wong, Jonathan M. Woodham
Track Chairs
1.
Politics and Design: Past, Present, Future
Co-chairs: Barbara Predan and Tevfik Balcıoğlu
2. The Social Impact of Design
Co-chairs: Fredie Floré and Daniel Huppatz
3.
Technology-Focused Design
Co-chairs: Paul Atkinson and Tingyi S. Lin
4. Cultural Roles of Design Practice
Co-chairs: Javier Gimeno Martinez and Priscila Lena Farias
5. Challenging Orthodoxies: Design History and Design Studies
Co-chairs: Jonathan Woodham and Helena Barbosa
6. Open strand
Co-chairs: Katharina Pfuetzner and Karolina Jakaite
Programme Committee
Paul Atkinson, Tevfik Balcıoglu, Helena Barbosa, Adelia Borges, Petra Černe Oven, Mauro
Claro, Erika Marlene Cortes, Aura Cruz, João de Souza Leite, Özlem Er, R. Hakan Ertep, Kjetil
Fallan, Priscila Lena Farias, Monica Farkas, Marinella Ferrara, Fredie Floré, Davide Fornari,
Monica Gaspar, Javier Gimeno Martinez, Erick Iroel Heredia Carrillo, Daniel Huppatz,
Karolina Jakaite, Triin Jerlei, Guy Julier, Tomoko Kakuyama, Mariko Kaname, Krista Kodres,
Andres Kurg, Grace Lees-Maffei, Tingyi S. Lin, Clice Mazzilli, Enya Moore, Oriol Moret, Anders
V. Munch, Sinan Niyazioglu, Shinsuke Omoya, Jesse O'Neill, A. Can Ozcan, Marina Parente,
Raquel Pelta, Tina Pezdirc Nograšek, Katharina Pfuetzner, Fátima Pombo, Barbara Predan,
Helena Rugai Bastos, Niki Sioki, Pau Sola-Morales, Maria Helena Souto, Keisuke Takayasu,
Sarah Teasley, Saurabh Tewari, Jilly Traganou, Zeynep Tuna Ultav, Mario Uribe, Ju-Joan Wong,
Jonathan Woodham, Artemis Yagou.
Conference Partners
Publishers
Layout and Design
Acknowledgements
References
The author wishes to thank LUXMAN executives and others - Teruyoshi Kawakami,
Kazuyuki Doi, Motohide Nakago, Yasushi Kojima, Takeyuki Koyanagi, and Eri
Yonezu — for offering a lot of information and support for the writing of this paper.
Foster, H. (2014). The first pop age: Painting and subjectivity in the art of Hamilton, Lichtenstein, Warhol,
Richter, and Ruscha. Princeton University Press.
Godfrey, M., Schimmel, P. & Todoli, V. (Eds). (2014). Richard Hamilton [Catalogue of an exhibition held at the Tate Modern, London, 13 February – 26 May 2014]. London: Tate Publishing.
Hamilton, R. (1982). Collected Words 1953 – 1982. London: Thames & Hudson.
Hamilton, R. (1989). ‘concept | technology > artwork,’ Richard Hamilton.
Stockholm: Moderna Museet.
Hamilton, R. (2010). ‘concept | technology > artwork,’ Richard Hamilton.
(Foster, Hal et al. eds. October Files, Book 10). The MIT Press.
Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship
in Northeast Brazil: A Quest for the
Theoretical Basis of the Concept
LÓpez Guerrero, Ana Sofía; Master | Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism,
University of São Paulo, México
Braga, Marcos da Costa; PhD | Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism,
University of São Paulo, Brazil
Lina Bo Bardi, pre-artisanship, conceptual references, Antonio Gramsci, Giuseppe Pagano, Gio Ponti
Harada, I. (Ed). (1975). Lux. Hi-Fi components series, Vol.1. Tokyo: The Stereo Sound.
The purpose of this work is to understand some of the references that Lina Bo Bardi employed to build the
concept of pre-artisanship, a concept she developed to study certain material productions that she found in the
Northeast of Brazil, and which, according to her, constitute the basis of Brazilian culture. This text analyses the
influence of three Italian thinkers on Bo Bardi's thoughts: Antonio Gramsci, Giuseppe Pagano, and Gio Ponti,
and explores the convergences between each one of them and her trajectory, by comparing different documents
written by and about Bo Bardi with others related to the thought and work of the three authors.
Maharaj, S. (text). (1993). Richard Hamilton [exh.cat. XLV Biennale Di Venezia British Pavilion,
13 June – 10 October 1993]. The British Council.
Spectre, P. (2019). Richard Hamilton: Introspective. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd.
Twemlow. A. (2011). Remembering Richard Hamilton as design critic. Design observer, 19 Sep.
2011, https://designobserver.com/article.php?id=30208.
Noriko Yoshimura is a Professor at Miyagigakuin Women's University, Japan, and
specialises in British Art and Design History. Her recent publication William De Morgan and
Victorian Art was awarded by The Japan Society of Design in 2019. She is currently researching Richard Hamilton, aiming to publish his monograph, which includes figures related to
him, such as John Voelcker, John McHale, and Marcel Duchamp, among others.
<yoshimura@mgu.ac.jp>
316 | Richard Hamilton and The LUX 50th Anniversary Project | 3 cultural roles and design practice
Background
B
orn in 1914 in Italy and naturalised as Brazilian in 1951, Lina Bo
Bardi arrived in Brazil in 1946. Her work, which reveals a critical
posture towards the social problems in an unequal country,
would go on to cover diverse fields such as architecture, design, theatre, museography, curatorship, and teaching. The importance of studying and explaining Bo Bardi's concepts and ideas regarding Brazilian
material culture and the concept of pre-artisanship is multifold; on
the one hand, it has contributed to the rescue, valorisation and documentation of popular Brazilian productions; and on the other hand,
Bo Bardi intended to create an industrial design school that would
have Brazilian artisanship culture as a reference point.
Bo Bardi's insights about the aforementioned productions are the
result of her training as an architect at the Faculty of Architecture in
Rome; her permanence in Milan; her work with Carlo Pagani; her contact with people like Gio Ponti and Bruno Zevi; her work as a reporter
alongside the photographer Federico Patellani (with whom she documented post-war Italy); and her participation in the foundation of the
magazine A. All of that experience outside Brazil contributed to define
her vision about popular culture, which would take on a specific and
new meaning in the reality of north-eastern Brazil.
Thus, in order to recognise how Bo Bardi conceptualised the notion
of pre-artisanship, it is necessary to look through her theoretical and
3 cultural roles and design practice | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 317
1 Bahia no Ibirapuera, Nordeste,
Brennand cerámica, etc.
2 In the Institute Lina Bo and Pietro
Bardi (The Glass House), there
is a copy of Gramsci's book ‘Gli
intellettuali e l'organizzazione
della cultura’ [Intellectuals and
the organisation of culture] with
annotations and highlights possibly
made by Bo Bardi. Also, there are
handwritten notes by Lina Bo on
Gramsci's ideas in relation to the
national-popular and the nationalist.
conceptual references. In order to do so, we start with two assumptions: first, that when analysing her productions, whether as a magazine editor, article producer, author of museographic texts, or exhibition curator, it is possible to trace the gradual development of the idea
of a Brazilian pre-artisanship. Such development can be divided into
three periods: her training as an architect in Rome and her professional work in post-war Italy; her first years in Brazil; and finally, her
experience in the Northeast region. This last period, between 1958
and 1964, is when she began effectuating a series of discussions and
exhibitions¹ to publicly show the objects and practices that composed,
what in the future she would call, pre-artisanship (Bardi, 1967).
made by the inhabitants of Northeastern Brazil, productions that
reflected the lives of the people who created them; anonymous and
popular artefacts that she called pre-artisanship: objects made often
with industrial waste and local materials that were part of people's
daily life, in which, according to the architect, existed at a high level
of creativity linked to a precarious condition. It was a production
that reflected the creative possibilities of the people who coexisted
with the most precarious economic and human conditions. She
considered these creations a precedent of what could be the Brazilian
design, and thus, valued the inventive and creative capacity of ordinary people and the development of local culture.
The second assumption, to which this work will try to contribute, is
the influence on Lina Bo's construction of the concept of pre-artisanship by three Italian characters: Antonio Gramsci, Giuseppe Pagano,
and Gio Ponti. This hypothesis is based both on notes² written by Bo
Bardi and consulted in the Glass House archive, and on other specialists' research on the architect's thoughts and career.
In her writings, Bo Bardi began by defining what would and what
would not be popular (1951); then, she explained the concepts of craftsmanship, artisan and popular art (1958). Later, she introduced the
problems she found in the industrialisation taking place in the country and the idea of the national as different from the nationalist. She
also discussed the notion of folklore as opposed to popular art, and situated the context within the culture, that she considered as authentic
Brazilian culture (Bardi, 1961). The idea of pre-artisanship appeared
later, alongside the statement that in Brazil, a handcraft production
has never existed — at least under Western European terms, — just
sporadic productions that emerged for survival:
It is important to state that, although the objective of this work is to
verify that there are conceptual references taken from these figures in
Bo Bardi's idea of pre-artisanship, we understand that those references will be complemented by a work of interpretation and translation into a specific context: the Northeast of Brazil (Pereira 2007).
In addition, the proposed analysis of these three Italian personages
does not mean that other references to Bo Bardi's thought and career
are discarded. For example, according to Renato Anelli (2010), the
ideas of Celso Furtado, Paulo Freire, and Pietro Maria Bardi, enrich and
discuss the ideas of Lina Bo Bardi. However, we will not examine them
in this work, because the analysis of all of these influences deserves a
much larger space than currently at hand.
Lina Bo Bardi and
the Concept of
Pre-Artisanship
In 1958, Lina Bo Bardi was invited to Bahia, where she performed
several activities: she gave classes and lectures, wrote for the local
newspaper, restored the Solar da Unhão, directed the Museum of
Modern Art of Bahia, organised exhibitions and worked on a series of
ideas and concepts that made her reflect deeply on Brazilian culture,
specifically on popular culture. Through these actions, she questioned the unplanned process of industrialisation that was taking
place in the country, which was distinguished by the importation of
processes and products, and pointed out what this would mean for
Brazilian popular culture: its eventual extinction and mischaracterisation. On the other hand, she tried to preserve material productions
318 | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 3 cultural roles and design practice
‘In the Northeast there is, if we want to continue using the word handicraft, a
pre-artisanship, and northeastern production is extremely rudimentary. The family
structure of some productions, such as, for example, the lace makers of Ceará or the
ceramists of Pernambuco, may have a handmade appearance, however they are isolated, occasional groups, forced by the misery of this type of work, which would soon
disappear with the necessary elevation of the incomes of the rural work.’
(Suzuki (cord.) 1994, p. 25).
With this concept, Bo Bardi did not intend to exalt a primitive aesthetic, nor to classify it as folklore; she did not aim to preserve forms
or materials, but to understand them as original creative possibilities and as a source of design renewal; in this sense, she fostered
a relationship between popular and modern culture. The pre-artisanship is collective and anonymous; it is a popular production that
shows the capacity of the Northeastern people's survival. The objects
that would constitute the pre-artisanship would be useful, and the
necessity of its existence would be easily perceived. Bo Bardi carried
out an ethnographic and anthropological research of objects and
practices, which formed her point of view, and presented the actual
image of people's lives.
3 cultural roles and design practice | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 319
The context that she found in Brazil contrasted with the process
of industrialisation in Europe, which gradually went from being
handcraft-based to become an industrial production. In the South
American countries, the process of industrialisation was abrupt and
based on imported models that extinguished any autochthonous
manifestation that might have been developing. There was no opportunity for the creation of an artisanship, or of products made by a
professional corporation, a group with a specific domain of traditional
materials and techniques. For this reason, the productions that she
found in the Northeast, which she associated with a national-popular
production, were not called artisanship. Nevertheless, Lina Bo Bardi
considered that these productions were popular manifestations rich
enough in creativity, solution, and culture to have the potential to be
the basis of a national-popular culture.
In order to understand Lina Bo Bardi's approach and interpretation
of the cultural production she saw in Brazil, her interest in popular
products and their preservation, and comprehend the construction of
Bo Bardi's discourse around the concept of pre-artisanship, we will now
proceed to review three of her conceptual references, in which we find
that, when making a difference between national and nationalism,
and when talking about a national popular production, the influence of
the philosopher Antonio Gramsci is clearly distinguished. On the other
hand, when valourising the popular, local, and precarious production,
the influence of Giuseppe Pagano is perceived. Finally, Lina Bo Bardi
worked with Gio Ponti, who is known for being a great enthusiast of
popular culture and Italian artisanship and for understanding the
craftsmanship from a modern perspective in constant transformation.
Conceptual
References in Lina Bo
Bardi's Writings
Antonio Gramsci
This question will be answered negatively because for Gramsci, the
Italian national-popular culture did not exist, since the models that
instructed people were imported.
In the Quaderni, Gramsci wrote about the separation between Italian
intellectuals and the national-popular reality, and pointed out that
there was no adhesion between intellectuals and the people because
the sentimental content of art and the cultural world was completely
unfamiliar and remote from national-popular life, which would then
remain unbundled and inexpressive. For Gramsci, the absence of the
national-popular in Italy is explained by the history of the disjointed, late
and incomplete formation of the Italian State, with its constitution
being the product of a revolution made from above and not from the
people, which generated a rupture between the elite and the people,
in addition to the fact that it occurred in a social situation of delayed
capitalism. Portantiero (1988, p. 48) clarifies that: ‘It is precisely these
links that explain the resonance that the national popular category
can have in Latin American political thought. The lack of an ‘intellectual and moral reform’ capable of overcoming the divorce between the
elite and the people-nation’.
The national-popular is a Gramscian category in which other fundamental concepts of the philosopher converge such as: hegemony, the
intellectual and the subordinate, the national, and nationalism. Gramsci
pointed out the differences between the latter two, identifying
nationalism with fascism and its attempt to monopolise the meaning of national culture through practices of appropriation of the
historical past. In other words, it was the appropriation of culture
that created a fascist nationalistic identity. Thus, Gramsci referred
to the nationalist culture as a culture imposed from above, without
the participation of the people. In contrast, in the national-popular,
the popular perspective was rescued, but not to recover a past or to
restore traditions, but to formulate a popular identity and culture,
understood as a conception of the world, a modern humanism, capable of a national unification of the people and of building a hegemonic bloc that would lead social transformation.
Antonio Gramsci, a Marxist philosopher, was born in 1891 and died
in 1937. He was a founding member of the Italian Communist Party,
and in 1926 began writing The Southern Question, a study of southern
Italy. Gramsci was an opponent of fascism, for which he was arrested
in 1927 and sentenced to 20 years in prison, from where he wrote the
Quaderni del carcere [Prison notebooks]. Between 1948 and 1951, these
works were published in Italian and then translated into different
languages. The Quaderni was composed of a programme of studies
articulated in four points through which Gramsci tried to understand ‘the popular creative spirit in its different stages and degrees of
development’ (Liguori & Voza (org.), 2017).
Another critical concept in Gramsci is that of folklore. Understood as an
‘indigestible cluster of fragments’ (Gramsci, 1961) of different conceptions of the world, it is the people's culture, which is a disorganised one.
According to Juan Carlos Rodríguez (Rodríguez, 2016, p. 3), the question underlying these texts was: ‘how have Italian intellectuals contributed to the creation of public and social life in a united Italy?’
It is important to note that the concept of folklore in Bo Bardi's
work was applied differently than in Gramsci's. For Bo Bardi, folklore was the imposition of the bourgeoisie on popular culture,
320 | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 3 cultural roles and design practice
3 cultural roles and design practice | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 321
a category that limited production and popular culture to what the
dominant classes determined, and that took popular manifestations without situating them in their context of emergency. What
Gramsci would call folklore, for Bo Bardi would be the popular culture, the culture of the people. It is an extrapolation of the concept
to another denomination.
Pagano was interested in rural architecture, a theme to which Casabella
dedicated several articles. From 1932, he began to research the architectural and artisanal production of peasants, observing its functionality and usefulness in coherence with its emergence as a manifestation that corresponded to the practical needs of the people. In 1936,
he published the volume of the IV Triennial of Architecture of Milan
dedicated to Italian rural architecture.
There are several texts in which Bo Bardi directly or indirectly
addresses the Gramscian concepts, such as: Culture and non-culture
(1958), Technique and art (1960), Brennand Ceramics (1961), Northeast (1963),
Five years among the ‘whites’ (1967), and Environmental planning: The design at
the impasse (1976). These concepts are undoubtedly part of the conceptualisation of the idea of pre-artisanship as a production that reflects
the popular cultural base of a country.
Giuseppe Pagano
Different researchers — Anelli (2014, 2016), Pereira (2007), and Mange
(2010) — have identified Pagano as a significant reference in Bo
Bardi's publications. Although the trajectory of this architect is not
entirely contemporary with Bo Bardi, his work had a meaningful
impact on the architectural scene in the country, even after the war.
Pagano's rescue of rural architecture and his criticism of the attempt
to recover the past to establish a nationalist architectural identity by
the fascist party resonate with the critical actions and ideas that Bo
Bardi developed in Brazil.
Pagano (1896-1945) was born in what is now known as Croatia.
He graduated in architecture at the Polytechnic of Turin in 1924
and, in 1936, he directed the Milan Triennale in collaboration with
Guarniero Daniel, where he held an exhibition of Italian rural architecture. It was, according to Maria Airoldi: ‘the first time that the
theme of minor architecture is brought to the attention of architects and the public [...]’ (Airoldi n.d.). Although Pagano was attracted
by fascism in the early 1920s, in 1942 he began openly criticising
the regime; for which he was arrested in November 1943, and in
December 1943, the Ministry of Popular Culture suspended the magazine Casabella (of which he had been the editor alongside the openly
antifascist Edoardo Persico). Pagano died of pneumonia in 1945 in
the Mauthausen concentration camp. During his last years of life,
he was undoubtedly influenced by his colleague Persico, and became
critical of any manifestation that sought to become the art of the
State and that aimed to form a nationalist identity based on the idea
of a return to the past. On the contrary, he defended the universal
values of architecture, and an architecture that would dialogue with
the modern European movement and functionalism.
322 | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 3 cultural roles and design practice
For Marina Mange:
‘Giuseppe Pagano framed the theoretical foundations for the interpretations of
Mediterranean vernacular architecture, the foundation of an entire school of
architects that sought to deal with the issues of memory and traditions within the
modern culture that generated, in the 1950s, the current of neo-realism.’
(Mange, 2010, p. 30).
Indeed, other architects and theoreticians were also interested in
rural architecture at the time — albeit with nationalist interests — that
would call it Mediterranean to try to give it an aura of tradition rooted
in a context. Pagano, on the contrary, did not see in these architectural manifestations, elements that contributed to formulating an
identity of Italian architecture, but elements that united the whole
civilisation, a rational architecture, and not a national one.
Gio Ponti
Like Gramsci, Ponti was born in 1891. In 1928, he started Domus, a magazine dedicated to the diffusion of design, architecture and decorative
arts. Later he founded the Lo Stile magazine, which stayed in print
until 1947. Several figures from the Italian architectural and artistic
scene, such as Pagano, Persico, Pietro Bardi and Lina Bo Bardi contributed to both magazines.
Ponti worked within the fields of design, architecture, crafts, and art.
While trying to make his creations reflect an idea of Italianity, his
projects also reflected rationalist and functionalist theories (examples
of this are his ‘typical houses’ called ‘Domus’, and the ceramics he
developed in Richard Ginori). He shared with other architects and artists the idea of creating a modern language that did not rupture with
Italian traditions.
In the article La casa all'italiana, with which Ponti began as editor of
Domus magazine, he expressed his ideas on how:
‘[...] art, architecture and design must merge to create an environment that offers
comfort, not so much in terms of the mechanical application of patterns in dimensions
3 cultural roles and design practice | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 323
Bo Bardi, despite being heir to the European avant-garde, grew up in a
country that did not fit in with this modern Europe. The history of its
formation as a nation-state was characterised by great social inequalities, difficulties in social cohesion, and national unification. The
development of capitalism was not similar to the rest of Europe and
arrived late in a context in which the majority of the population was
dedicated to agriculture while the rural aristocracy lived in opulence.
From this perspective, there are several points in common between
the Brazilian reality and the history of Italy, and we conclude that the
Italian references are only a starting point to explain Lina Bo's performance in Brazil.
that guarantee the minimum living space needed, but rather the comfort necessary
to nourish the soul of modern humanity, according to the classical Italian tradition.’
(Ponti, 1928).
Ponti's editorial line was based on respect for the past of the Italian
culture and on the proposal of models that could reconcile the traditional with the modern (Lamonaca, 1997).
Bo Bardi, in her literary Curriculum, wrote: ‘In Milan, in order to
‘acquire practice’, I joined the office of the famous architect Gio Ponti,
leader of the movement for the promotion of Italian handicrafts,
director of the Milan Triennials and the magazine ‘Domus’ (Bardi,
1993). Bo Bardi collaborated in both Domus and Lo Stile, where she wrote
about themes that would be recurrent in the coming years: popular
housing, architecture, industrial design, popular art, crafts, valorisation of the vernacular and ‘prefabrication as a new construction
technique’ (Mange, 2010).
The concept of pre-artisanship may reveal the European heritage
through which Bo Bardi interpreted as the new reality that she faced.
But it is also possible to think that it was Bo Bardi's way of naming
and trying to distinguish practices that were the product of a different
historical reality where non-Western pre-industrial activities existed,
a context with diverse heritages (African, pre-Columbian, European)
manifested through culture, a culture that could not be fully explained
by a Western-modern interpretation and demanded the creation of
new concepts.
According to Mange:
‘The most significant lessons that Lina Bo Bardi will bring to Brazil will be those
related to the studies of Italian crafts, developed by Gio Ponti as a strategy for
emancipation from the Italian utility industry; and the studies of Giuseppe Pagano
on minor architecture. These concepts were the embryo of the concept of popular
culture and pointed to the strategies of action that Lina Bo Bardi will adopt in her
work.’ (Mange, 2010).
We would add that Ponti's appreciation of craftsmanship from a modern perspective, and the interest he had in the intersection between
industrial and artisanal production would also be important to Bo
Bardi's work.
Final Considerations
From her experience as an architect in Italy, Bo Bardi brought to Brazil
important considerations on crafts, vernacular architecture and several issues regarding the formulation and pursuit of national identity
in relation to the material culture of a country.
We found that Gramsci's influence on Bo Bardi's thoughts was of a
deeply theoretical ideological and conceptual nature; that Pagano's
influence came both from his interpretation and critique of nationalism from the sphere of architecture, and from his valorisation of popular constructions around Italy; and finally, that Ponti's influence came
from his insights on the relationship between craftsmanship/industry
and design/national identity.
324 | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 3 cultural roles and design practice
Acknowledgements
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This article is part of the research project entitled ‘Design in Adversity. Between Cuba
and the Northeast of Brazil’, supported by the ‘Fondo Nacional para la Cultura y las
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Branding Japanese Olympics: The
Evolution of Design Between Local
Tradition and Global Trends
Tranti, Claudia; Master Graduate in Communication Design | Politecnico di Milano, Italy
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In view of the postponed Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, this paper aims to trace the evolution in the design of the
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communication strategy: the phantom Olympics of Tokyo and Sapporo 1940, as well as the Games of Sapporo
1972 and Nagano 1998, allow for the analysis of the development of the Olympic design following a regular time
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research on the subject, it is possible to identify four recurring themes within the Olympic narrative: nationalism,
internationalism, universalism and globalisation. Over time, the relationship between these visions of the world
has changed deeply, producing radically different design outputs.
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The Olympics: A
Cultural Performance
of Global Proportions
T
he Olympic Games are one of the biggest sports events in the world.
Since its birth in 1894, the Olympic Movement has been affected by the influence of consumerism. Plenty of strategies have
been used to face the expenses of hosting the Games: from the sale
of tickets and gadgets to long-lasting sponsorships with worldwide
partners (Chappelet, Ferrand & Séguin, 2012).
Despite the Olympic Charter's statements against involvement in
political affairs, the movement often found itself in the middle of
international conflicts: the multitude of boycotts during the Cold War
era or the struggle for the recognition of the National Committees of
China and Taiwan are just a few examples (Guttmann, 2002).
Ana Sofía López Guerrero is a PhD student in the Design program at the Faculty of
Architect and Urbanism at the University of Sao Paulo. Her lines of research are History
and Theory of Design and Material Culture in Latin America. She is a beneficiary of the
FONCA-CONACYT program.
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6534-0394.
<anasofialopezguerrero@usp.br>
Marcos da Costa Braga is a designer, with a PhD in Social History and Professor of the
Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism, at the University of São Paulo. He is a research
member of the LabVisual/USP and author of several publications on the History of Design
in Brazil.
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0978-2550.
<bragamcb@usp.br>
326 | Lina Bo Bardi and Pre-Artisanship in Northeast Brazil | 3 cultural roles and design practice
The sturdy link between the Olympics, politics and consumerism,
allows the tracing of a critical analysis which involves design: a crucial
tool to express both values and identities and to enhance the mass
production of consumer goods.
The visual communication of the Games, as well as the design of the
symbolic venues and objects related to the event, are the touchpoints
which establish a link between the audience and the values spread
by the Olympic Movement. The importance of these aesthetic experiences has been effectively expressed by Kang and Traganou (2008): ‘The
key features of the reception of the Olympics are grounded upon the
3 cultural roles and design practice | Branding Japanese Olympics | 327