This is the French edition album relating to the Design by design Two Centuries of Creativity exhibition at the Grand Palais in Paris until 7th January 2008.
*Design has a long story :
Springing from the Industrial Revolution at the end of the 18th century, the “industrial arts” took over the Universal Exhibitions. Nowadays, design is exhibited in museums and the new creations by furniture or objects manufacturers are presented in shows in Milan, Cologne or Paris.
The industrialists are not the only ones to promote design. The creators are designers, artists, craftsmen. Design adapts to the needs of different markets, from big series to unique pieces. There is not one design – there are many.
The exposition brings together 300 works illustrating the most memorable design currents. It presents in all their diversity the accomplishments of the biggest designers and creators of the 19th and 20th centuries, until the most contemporary period. Gathered for the first time in an exhibition of this size, the works retrace for the public a new history of design.
Straight lines or curves, geometrics or organics, structure or chaos, the objects trace a history of aesthetics. The exhibition will also be the opportunity to discover that the modernism of design has a history of its own, well known to today’s creators.
The objects are not neutral. Symbols of social status, of life style, they carry our imaginary world. They reveal a psychological insight, are the records of our desires, our fantasies. Modernist commitment for some, matter of taste or style for others…
