GalleryCard SchoolArts December 2008
Virgil Marti, Bullies, 1992. Screen-printed in fluorescent ink, rayon flock on Tyvek. Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution. Museum Purchase from General
Acquisitions Endowment Fund and Friends of Wallcoverings Fund through gift of the Raymond Family in honor of Paul Raymond, 2002-4-1. Photo: Matt Flynn.
Borrowing a nineteenth-century flo- mer intern, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design
ral motif, Marti adds images from his Museum.
junior high-school yearbook of twenty-two boys he claims bullied him as a
child. Put on display as they put him on
display, the boys are hung like a trophy
on your wall. This element of humor is
something that Marti highlights in his
work.
Wallpaper has roots in a centuries-old A design object usually enters
design tradition predominantly used for our daily lives as something that we
decoration. But what happens when dec- interact with and use, but this object
oration, design, and fine art cross paths? is designed for visual pleasure. Tra-
Contemporary artist and designer Virgil ditionally, customers also purchased
Marti blurs the lines of these traditions. wallpaper to show their social stature,
Of his work, Marti said, “the distinction personal taste, and wealth. However, it’s
between art and design has bugged me, up to the consumer to choose how they
and I’d just as soon straddle it.” After would like to view Bullies; as a home
graduating from the Tyler School of Art accessory, a bold aesthetic statement, or
in Philadelphia, he transitioned to print- a conceptual artwork.
making at the Fabric Workshop, where
he made his best-known wallpaper Bul- Things to consider:
lies. What do the objects you own say about
Bullies is screenprinted in rayon flock your personality and taste? What other
and fluorescent inks that glow under objects straddle the line between fine
black light. The wallpaper is printed in art and design? Think of ways to rede-
a repeating pattern and sold in limited sign your classroom or personal living
quantities on rolls. The pattern can be space to reflect the personalities and
cut, aligned, and repeated to allow the tastes of its users.
consumer to easily and efficiently cover
By Allison Valchuis, education assistant;
any size or shape wall with little waste. and Marianna Siciliano, Peter Krueger sum-
GalleryCard SchoolArts December 2008
Storage container set: Kubus, designed by Wilhelm Wagenfeld (German, 1900–1990),
manufactured by Vereinigte Lausitzer Glaswerke, Germany, 1938. Machine molded and
pressed glass. Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution. Museum
purchase from Sir Arthur Bryan and General Acquisitions Endowment Funds, 1990-4-1/18.
Photo: John Parnell.
Wilhelm Wagenfeld. Wilhelm Wagenfeld the container. The predecessor to Tup-was a student of the Bauhaus, a design perware, these containers made storing
and architecture school that existed leftovers simple.
in Germany in the 1920s and 30s. The The Kubus storage containers were
Bauhaus was noted for simplified forms, remarkably popular and reflected a new
combination of form and function, and step in home product design. Reflect-mass production. A product of the Bau- ing the ideals of the Bauhaus, it was
haus, Wagenfeld emphasized the need for produced to be affordable, widely avail-affordable and functional products that able, and balanced in form and function.
everyone could access. Change in design reflects our chang-
In the 1930s, new technologies like ing needs, and the Kubus containers
electric refrigerators and ovens were filled a need for efficiency that people
being produced. Space in electric refrig- demanded.
erators was limited, and people needed
efficient food storage systems to fit any
model they bought. This set of nine
clear-glass food storage containers was
a solution to maximize space in any
refrigerator. The compact, stackable
container sets could be arranged in any
way the user imagined to best fit their
own refrigerator or pantry. Made from
molded, industrial, heat-resistant glass,
By Allison Valchuis, education assistant;
these modular containers made it pos- and Marianna Siciliano, Peter Krueger sum-
sible for them to stack and fit compactly mer intern, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design
together. The Kubus containers featured Museum.
different sizes with interchangeable
lids. Because they were unornamented
and simply shaped, they were easy to
The Kubus storage container set was clean and user-friendly. Since they were
designed in 1938 by German designer clear, it was easy to see the contents of
What other designs are modular? What
are some objects that you use every
day that you could adjust to become
more compact by fitting into each other
or by being stacked? How does this
new design improve the function of the
object?
