Victor Papanek: Designer for the Real World
2021; Oxford University Press; Volume: 34; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1093/jdh/epab040
ISSN1741-7279
Autores Tópico(s)Cultural Industries and Urban Development
ResumoThe provocative and paradoxical work of renegade designer, critic and educator Victor Papanek has become increasingly relevant recently, as designers, critics and educators today more emphatically than ever grapple with issues such as social design, design activism, design for development and ecological design. Historians, too, have become more interested in these aspects of design, looking back at historical events and actors who tried to envision a more socially and ecologically responsible role for design. As a vocal proponent of ‘design for the real word’, Papanek and his work often figure as a cameo or a touchstone in such accounts of design’s struggles to sidestep the seemingly inescapable logic of the consumer society. But despite this increased attention, and in contrast to his role model and sometime co-star R. Buckminster Fuller, who has become the subject of a vast bibliography, in-depth, monographic treatment of Papanek’s work has been a long time coming. The recent exhibition Victor Papanek: The Politics of Design at the Vitra Design Museum represented a first foray into this rich material, but Alison J. Clarke’s long-awaited new book offers much deeper insights into the life and work of Papanek. As Director of the Victor J. Papanek Foundation, Clarke has, of course, been in a privileged position to write this book, enjoying unlimited access to Papanek’s personal archive. Complemented by numerous interviews and a wide range of institutional archives, this has resulted in an impressively researched project.
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