The Modern Interior - Penny Sparke

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Résumé :
Provides a persuasive account of the forces, conflicts and debates that have underpinned the emergence of something we effortlessly refer to as the 'modern interior'. This title focuses on the realities as well as concepts of the modern interior, whether in the hands of professional decorators and designers, or in those of its amateur inhabitants....

Biographie:
Penny Sparke is Pro Vice-Chancellor in the Arts at Kingston University, UK. She is also the author of As Long As It's Pink: The Sexual Politics of Taste and Elsie De Wolfe: The Birth of Modern Decoration....

Sommaire:
Today's home is filled with pieces from Pottery Barn, IKEA, and Crate & Barrel, and we pore over glossy catalogs in hopes of achieving the modern interior. This idealized aesthetic is the subject of Penny Sparke's study, as she explores the style in both its absolute form and the diverse decorating approaches seen in the contemporary home.
The shift from Victorian to modern style, The Modern Interior reveals, was not as simple and smooth as it is often perceived and the book probes the complicated history behind that transition. Sparke examines the work of such designers as Marcel Breuer, Frank Lloyd Wright, Charles and Ray Eames, and Mies van der Rohe, and draws upon design examples from the United States and Europe to reveal that, unlike the designed exteriors of buildings and institutions, the idea of the interior has been a largely abstract conception promoted through exhibitions, retail stores, and mass media.
A comprehensive and in-depth investigation of the design environments we live and play in, The Modern Interior will be essential reading for all scholars and interested observers of architecture and modern design culture....