Russel Wright final project

 

Russel Wright's design

 

Since the midterm, I was trying to find what would make a good artifact for Russel Wright.
I felt that his design had the essence of industrial design in 1940s-60s and I wanted to somehow incorporate that into my project.

I didn't want to just talk about a piece that explain his life or personal life or pieces of his design because I felt that during midterm, a lot of that was covered in the presentation and in the blog.


Originally I wanted to do a collage but as I worked on the collage, I realized I was just pasting images of his design onto a piece of paper. Looking at his work, I thought one of the most significant thing he did was creating his design legacy -"good design is for everyone." I wanted to have that to be part of this project and create an artifact that embodies his legacy.


I found this old tape dispenser that reminded me of the design language in the American industrial design in the 50-60s and Wright's own design in terms of the curves and its simple shape and also its color.

I started experimenting with the tape dispenser and how I could utilize it.




I have been playing with the idea of creating scenery on found objects recently and I wanted to try to make this tape dispenser into an object that I use to illustrate Wright's idea of simple design.

Below are the examples of the method I used on a different found object.

I wanted to incorporate Wright's ideas and illustrations from his book "Guide to Easier Living" because I felt that it had all of his basic idea of what design should be. It felt more inclusive than trying to just draw or paste few of his products.

I collected some of his illustrations that I felt best describe what his design was.



I decided to include a scene of a picnic because he believe that for easier living, when there's an occasion with guests, it should be the guests and hosts preparing the meal and entertainment together and picnic was an perfect example of that.
Another scene I included as part of the work was a scene of people eating a buffet style meal inside the house, which is also another example of the "easier living".

I chose to do drawings of those particular scenes because it not only showed Wright's idea of what design should be, but also showed what life was like in 1940-60s.
At the time, a lot of people were moving from cities to suburbs and planned neighborhoods where people didn't know each other. People started hosting dinners to get to know neighbors and this new culture of meals/entertainment was started. However, things were very formal and until Wright's new idea of dinner/entertainment was introduced as a cool new way to feed and entertain guests, it was a very burdensome event.



I also wanted to somehow incorporate the image of his house at Dragon Rock into my art.
I experimented with different pieces that were natural(moss, leaves, twigs) on the dispenser but most did not feel suitable for the art because colors were too strong or the shape didn't match organic but smooth curves of the dispenser.

I found shavings of wood in the shop and I really enjoyed the volume it created without heaviness. I piled it in the empty part of the dispenser and I really liked how it seemed to recreate what I saw at the Manitoga house(the flat top with plants).




So below is my piece of art dedicated to Russel Wright's life, design, and ideas.

- Juwon