Memphis RESOURCE PACK This Memphis resource pack aims to give students an increased knowledge and understanding of the methodology and aesthetics of the 1980s Italian design group. It also provides students with inspiration for their own design projects. The pack is suitable for teaching students at Key Stage 3 and above. It is part of a series comprising resource packs on the following subjects: ➜ ➜ Innovation Verner Panton Chairs Memphis Packs are supplied in photocopiable loose-leaf format and are designed to be interchangeable, so that common elements of each may be combined. In this way it is possible to assemble Memphis packs on: Designing Innovation Manufacturing & materials Ergonomics Handling collection – creating your own Design Museum Activities ✂ The Design Museum is the world’s leading museum of 20th and 21st century design, and the UK’s largest provider of design education resources. Its network of contacts in industry and the design world make it a bridge between the design profession, industry and education. To order additional packs or for further information about the Design Museum Education Programme, please contact: Education Department Design Museum 28 Shad Thames London SE1 2YD T 020 7403 6933 F 020 7378 6540 E [email protected] www.designmuseum.org Designed by Pencil Cover: Carlton cabinet by Ettore Sottsass, 1981 © Design Museum 2001 Memphis for teachers’ notes T Using this Resource Pack he Memphis group was formed as a reaction We are all T against the Modern movement, which favoured“ clean, undecorated lines and industrial materials. It very sure was short-lived and in many ways did not achieve its stated aims but was influential in changing attitudes that Memphis to design in the 1980s. Memphis products helped furniture will bring about the wide-ranging mixtures of materials and influences which characterise post-modern design. soon go out Aims and contents This Design Museum resource pack of style. is for teachers and students from Key First Memphis exhibition catalogue, 1981 Stage 3 upwards. It aims to enable ” students to draw inspiration from D See D for designing for more detail on Modernism Memphis to generate new and ➜ ➜ exciting ideas and to understand in Background information simple terms how Memphis The enormous social and cultural influenced the development of changes of the 1960s and 70s – twentieth-century design. the rise of feminism and mass Students will gain an insight into the communication, for example – character, practice and inspirations of led to a reaction against Modernism Memphis from the following sections: and a move amongst designers to embrace popular consumerism and Designing youth culture. Rather than accept Manufacturing & materials Ashoka painted metal table lamp by Ettore the Modernist principle that form Ergonomics Sottsass, 1981 should be dictated by function, Innovation The different sheets directly relate designers wanted to experiment in Activities and design briefs for to each other and the information and the manner of artists to define a new different ages and abilities are ideas on them sometimes overlap. language for design. included. Suggestions for assembling Sections from other Design Museum Italian designers were more inclined a Memphis handling collection for packs can also be combined with than others to adopt this approach: use in the classroom complete the contents of this pack to form a after the Second World War, Italian the pack. comprehensive resource. industries had developed in Timeline: INFLUENCES ON MEMPHIS 1903 1906 1913 1919 1925 1934 1945 Wiener Werkstätte Deutsche Fordism – Henry Bauhaus art school Art Deco – the Paris ‘Machine Art’ World War Two crafts movement Werkbund founded Ford introduced the established by Exposition des Arts exhibition at ended. Italy, Japan founded in Austria. in Germany to bring first production-line architect Walter Décoratifs et Museum of Modern and Germany began The founders together artists and system in his US Gropius in Germany Industriels exhibited Art, New York. to revive their admired the simplicity manufacturers to factory to in an attempt to unify furniture and interiors devastated industries of the work of improve the quality manufacture the the arts and industry influenced by Cubism with US help. designers such as of German design. Model T Ford and create designs and African art. Charles Rennie motor car. for mass-produced Mackintosh. articles. To order additional packs or for more infomation about the Design Museum Education Programme, please contact: Education Department, Design Museum, 28 Shad Thames, London SE1 2YD. www.designmuseum.org Tel 020 7403 6933. Fax 020 7378 6540. Email [email protected] Memphis them. Memphis produced a wide Activity guidelines range of products and interiors in a Activities 1–4 are appropriate for variety of materials, including students across a wide age range textiles, furniture, glass and (Key Stage 3/4) and can be used as ceramics. They used expensive preparatory work for a design project materials side by side with cheap or as discrete classroom or everyday ones such as plastic homework tasks. The animal theme laminate. Despite their intention to in Activity 1 could be used as the produce prototypes for industrial theme of a project for younger Letraset fabric by Ettore Sottsass, 1983 production, however, Memphis students (Key Stage 3). Other the artisan tradition, with skilled products were only ever themes which work well are Logos, craftsmen in small-scale workshops manufactured in small numbers for Space, The Sea and Food. using batch-production methods. an educated and wealthy few. Activity 5 is for older students (Year Mass manufacturers produced Memphis members were convinced 12/13) to gain an understanding of well-designed goods with a strong that design should be short-lived, a the use of past and present popular appeal, such as the Vespa part of the fashion process. In fact, influences to inspire their work. motor scooter. their ideas were absorbed into The designer Ettore Sottsass mainstream international design and Affluent – rich. was exasperated by the inflexible became part of the development of Anarchic – chaotic, without rules. and patronising attitudes of the post-modernism. Art Deco – design movement of the 1930s which international design community. used simple geometric forms and luxury materials. Atomic – based on atoms, the smallest particle At the same time he was inspired of an element that can take part in a chemical by cultural, emotional, philosophical, reaction. Batch production – the manufacture of a Buzz words ancient and contemporary influences. specific number of products, from as few These included design movements as a dozen up to thousands of articles. Consumerism – the idea that high spending and technological advances as on goods and services is the basis for a shown on the timeline below, and sound economy. Culture – the range of activities and ideas a variety of other influences such shared by a particular group of people at a as science fiction films and African particular time (often relating just to the arts). textiles. With Michele De Lucchi and Feminism – the belief that women have the same rights as men (for example, to work, or Alessandro Mendini he established vote). Studio Alchymia in 1979, drawing Kitsch – over-colourful, tasteless or sentimental art. inspiration from fashion, the media Laminate – a material made by placing thin and everyday materials. Sottsass layers one on top of another. Manifesto – a public announcement of a set of eventually fellout with Mendini, beliefs, aims, etc. however. He founded Memphis in Media – channels of communication that reach people quickly, such as television, newspapers 1981 with De Lucchi and other and radio. designers to explore a visual Modernism – a movement favouring language for design based on design based on function, without unnecessary decoration. popular culture and kitsch. Patronise – to act towards someone as if you Their photogenic products attracted are better than they are. Photogenic – looking attractive in photographs. immediate international attention, and Post-modernism – a movement favouring the young designers flocked to Milan self-conscious mixing of a wide variety of styles and materials. Grand floor lamp by Michele De Lucchi, 1983 from all over the world to work for Radical – Groundbreaking, revolutionary. 1950s 1960s 1966 1970s 1979 1981 1980s Consumerism Pop culture exploded Archizoom group Punk reacted against Studio Alchymia founded Memphis Post-modernism – developed in fashion, music and in Italy explored the Pop and hippy by Ettore Sottsass and established by designers are worldwide. Growth art. Influence of the radical or ‘anti- movements with Alessandro Mendini to Ettore Sottsass to inspired by of a style-conscious, ‘space race’ between design’ through violent and anarchic question the relevance of redefine the Memphis and affluent society in the US and the Soviet exhibitions and imagery, mixing a Modernism and language of design. similar movements Italy. Atomic forms Union, feminism and manifestos. variety of materials experiment with pattern to experiment and and cheerful colours youth culture. and motifs. and colour. rediscover playful widely used. ‘The Banal Object’ elements of design. exhibition at the Venice Bienniale. © Design Museum 2001 Memphis for designing 1 D Where Memphis came from emphis was part of a reaction against the rules Banal – lacking originality, of the Modern movement in architecture