DESCRIPTION

Wendy Kaplan, Curator and Department Head of Decorative Arts and Design for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), will present a slide show and lecture about her newest exhibition opening in October 2011 at LACMA. This exhibition, the first major study of California mid-century modern design, features over 350 objects including furnishings, architecture, ceramics, film, graphic design, industrial design, fashion, and jewelry, as well as two meticulously reconstructed period settings.

Wendy will discuss the roots of California modernism through the contributions of émigrés such as Richard Neutra, R. M. Schindler, Paul Frankl and others, whose contributions promoted California design throughout the U.S. and the world. Wendy will then explore the design innovations made possible by the conversion of WWII technologies to domestic uses, thus enabling the mass production of the famous fiberglass and molded plywood chairs popularized by Charles and Ray Eames.

The heart of the presentation will focus on the modern home, famously characterized by open plans and indoor/outdoor living and furnished with products from companies such as Heath Ceramics, Van Keppel-Green, and Architectural Pottery. Created specifically for a casual lifestyle, these new types of furnishings were often produced by other designers whose work, still largely unknown, will be a revelation for today's audience.

"The California Look" was disseminated throughout America and the world. Today's lecture will elucidate the 1951 quote from designer Greta Magnusson Grossman that is part of the lecture and exhibition title: California design "is not a superimposed style, but an answer to present conditions.... It has developed out of our own preferences for living in a modern way".