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Art Deco
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Rampage in Design
by Paul Niquette
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suddenly Deco appeared! The time was 1925; the place was Paris.
Banished that year were the serene and curvilinear flourishes
of Art Nouveau, surrendering to straight lines, curves of constant radius.
The revolution was signalled by...
L'Exposition Internationale des Artes Decoratifs et
Industriales Modernes.
All at once, the aesthetic scene was dominated by arcs and
angles, bakelite and chrome -- those were the shapes and substances most
amenable to factories. The hell with Nature; let's talk Production.
Wistfulness Alert: There was so little time between the
world wars for aesthetic nonsense.
You can write equations for Art Deco -- linear equations,
equations of the second degree. The locus must be a line segment or the
arc of a circle, never an ellipse or catenary. No third derivatives in
Deco's calculus. Inflection points are forbidden. It's as if rampaging
geometry students wielding straight-edges and calipers had overthrown the
world of design.
Photo {c} Don Kellogg
KELLOGG PHOTOGRAPHY
26 Medway Road, Studio5
San Rafael, CA 94901
415/459-4415
