Memphis Design: This is the
Way the '80's Started
Introducing Memphis Design
After years of "serious" design,
with its elitist and rather narrow interpretation of and strict
rules for good taste in design, a group of avant-garde architects
and designers descended on the 1981 Milan Furniture Fair with
a collection of pieces using plastics and laminates in a jumble
of bold colors, animal prints, and odd geometric shapes (Rolies).
These items featured design details that were obtrusive, garish,
and most heinous of all, nonfunctional. The group that shocked
the Furniture Fair was the Memphis Collective. What they unveiled
that day was more than a short lived design concept, more even
than a definitive statement of and contribution to the much disputed
"Post-Modernist" design movement. It was, in fact, a first look
at a concept that would set the tone for a decade of unique design.
Elements of the Memphis style
For most of the twentieth century, Modernism reigned supreme.
Integral to this design standard was the Bauhaus principle of
plain, smooth surfaces and forms unrelieved by "unnecessary" design
elements. Furnishings were kept to a minimum, as were the use
of color and decoration. Overstuffed upholstery gave way to steel
and functional padding, warm became cool, personal became an elitist
uniformity, and cozy was abandoned in favor of clean (Labuttis).
They key principle of Modernism was function.
By the 1960's, a few designers, reacting to the constraints of
Modernism, began a period of innovation in design by experimenting
with new materials, in particular the wide variety of plastics
and laminates available, while searching for a new design aesthetic.
A notable example of this early experimentation is the 1967 Blow
Chair, an intimidating albeit apt name for a piece of blow-up
or inflatable furniture, designed by De Pas, D'Urbino, and Lomazzi
(May), which is still available from Zanotta at the time of this
writing for a staggering $581.
As the Post-Modernist movement grew, the innovation became more
radical. Superstudio, founded in 1966 by a group of young designers
from Florence, Italy, was a driving force in Postmodern design,
focusing almost exclusively on the deconstruction of Modernism.
Equal parts politics and design, Superstudio advanced the idea
of "anti-design" by creating photo-collages and exhibitions of
impractical/impossible projects, most notably the Continuous Monument,
which was a black and white grid that would completely cover the
earth's surface. They also proposed diverting a river in order
to flood Florence, Italy so that only the dome of its cathedral
would be visible (Design Museum[2]). From this tumult of political
posturing and design concepts intended to raise eyebrows (if not
ire), Superstudio created a critically and commercially successful
line of furnishings called Quaderna, which continues to be manufactured
by Zanotta.
Studio Alchymia further explored the trend toward anti-design,
embracing the influences of pop art and "banal" design. These
influences were focused on surface and decoration rather than
functionality. Ironically, despite the intentional use of the
banal, the group never mass-produced their designs, feeling that
to do so would be banal (Roper). A driving force in Studio Alchymia
was Ettore Sottsass, an architect educated in Turin, Italy. Quickly
dissatisfied with the prevailing architectural trends of the time,
especially Modernism, Sottsass soon redirected his creative energies
towards deconstructing the traditions and conventions of the Modernist
mold. As a practicing artist, architect, designer, and philosopher,
Sottsass believed that functionalism alone was insufficient (Labaco).
In 1980, Sottsass, now in his 60's and having spent much of his
career in something of a subversive, anti-design quest, left Studio
Alchymia to produce a line of furniture he called "The New Design."
That December he met with a group of young designers and architects
to discuss his plan. It was during that meeting that the project
was renamed "Memphis" after Bob Dylan's song, "Stuck Inside of
Mobile (With the Memphis Blues Again)," which was played repeatedly
that night. Sottsass proposed the name change, which the group
readily embraced, owing to its discordant references to Memphis,
Tennessee (Americana, Elvis, and the blues), and Memphis, Egypt
(one of the capital cities of ancient Egypt and holy city of the
god, Ptah (Design Museum[1]).
Memphis is Born
The concept that grew from this first meeting of Sottsass and
his Memphis Group was of a new international style that would
appeal to a sense of elite chic but would also lend itself to
a more populist palette. The aim of this design was to make fun
of, challenge, and even defy conventional tastes (Rolies). The
only rule or convention to this new style was that it completely
lacked rules and conventions.
The designs that eventually flowed from this group were, in their
own way, groundbreaking, but at the same time were also more or
less a continuation of the work of the Alchymia Group (Design
Museum[1]). However, where Alchymia strove for a more purely radical,
deconstructionist anti-design, the Memphis Group strove for flash
and splash and perhaps a production run. Memphis looked to design
movements and trends as varied as Pop Art, Las Vegas, 1950's camp,
and a few interesting lines from Art Deco (May). This eccentric
mix of style was wrapped up in a package of peculiar shapes, bold
colors, and a bit of animal print. Memphis was born.
And so it was that on that September day in 1981, in the Arc
'74 showroom at the Milan Furniture Fair, the design world was
both repulsed and intrigued by this screaming loud display of
brash and clash, curious shapes, and pointless decoration. The
eighties culture that came to embrace the concepts proffered by
the Memphis group had arrived. Along with the colors and shapes
that eventually became the hallmarks of the decade came consumerism,
and these were designs absolutely intended for consumption. Memphis,
from its very inception, was never meant to last. Sottsass himself
declared that these pieces were dedicated to life rather than
to eternity (Design Museum[1]). The Memphis design concept inspired
the eighties, a decade of neon colors, acid wash denim, big hair,
even bigger shoulder pads, and that other fabulous Italian import,
Madonna. And while Madonna continues to entertain - someone -
Memphis, like neon, stone wash, shoulder pads, and mousse'd up
hair, faded before 1990. Memphis as a style is gone, but the brash
attitude and daring compositions of the movement left their mark
permanently upon the design world. Twenty-five years later, George
Sowden, Massimo Iosa Ghini, Michele deLucchi, Nathalie duPasquier,
Aldo Cibic, and Ettore Sottsass, each in their own way, continue
to be an active and noteworthy force in the design world.
Works Cited
- Design
Museum(1). "Memphis: Product and Furniture Designers." London.
2006. 16 Sept. 2006.
- Design
Museum(2). "Superstudio: Architectural Group." London. 2006.
14 Sept. 2006.
- Design
Technology. "The Memphis Group." VC Media. 3 May 2002. 14
Sept. 2006.
- Labaco, Ronald T. "The Enduring Radicalism of Ettore Sottsass."
Los Angeles Museum of Art, Sottsass Exhibition. 2006.
- Labuttis, Klaus. "The Bauhaus Design Movement." Dezignaré
Interior Design Collective, Inc. 2006.
- May, Karen. "A
Brief History of Post-War Italian Design." Seton Hall University
Libraries. June 13, 2002. 16 Sept. 2006
- Rolies, Stijn. "Memphis Remembered." Danda. 2006. Roper, Quentin.
"A History of Industrial Design: Postmodernism." Qdesign. 8
Dec. 2000.