The Study of Modernism Concept in Contrast to the Mid Century Style Essay

Abstract – This paper talks about the study of modernism concept in contrast to the mid century style and its progress till date
Modernism has not only changed the definition of a lot of things around us but also has a different meaning with time. Whether it is the dressing sense of the young generation or the look of an apartment block they all seem to reflect a drastic change in design and statement however one important thing is that its looks as if the old-is-new trend when we’re talking about Mod in today’s sense.
The world has changed big-time and therefore renovation is a common observation, Melbourne for example involves lot of examples where the previous authentic buildings have taken the shape and colour that matches the new modern era; the fact is that major change has come to the interiors rather than the outside appearance and the mid century features are a style statement.
Whether it is Harry Seidler’s “Rose Seidler House” or the “California’s case Study Houses”, they all are famous works carrying a flair of 50’s.
The old-style has global approach now and stretches internationally, on one had where the old furniture designs have shown great success across US, England, Israel, Austria & Germany, the other hand old fashioned property and fabric designs have flooded the market keeping a great upper hand as far as prices are concerned.
Modernism is spot on and the spread is global now, everyone including celebrities are taking the mid-century designs as their expression of personality, they are not just objects but images of who we are.
Modernism is the initiator of great press, magazine like “Wallpaper” prove a great promoter of the old art and architecture in the Scandinavian and Australia.
“Wallpaper” is not the soul player; Martha Stewart’s and Belle’s have been participating eagerly to promote the magic of 50’s and 60’s however “Wallpaper” stands ahead with great material and editorial expertise.
From the philosophical point of view modernism faces a feeble criticism with the explanation that machines must be given a preference as they always empowers us and a house is also a “machine for living”
The stage two of Modernism introduced a much softer approach which never ignored the use if lighter materials both inside and outside houses, Van der Rohe’s Seagram Tower in New York is a good example. Though the high rise became a trend temporarily but failed due to repeated shabby work. The modernism was now in a stage where the ideology was no more considered as cool and this was just a result of the rigid mentality of the then modernists.
With time it was difficult to do away with certain short comings, like in the 50’s space was not an issue while building a house and it was more of the colony system which appeared to be difficult later as the apartment system became more logical looking at the scarcity of land in urban areas.
But once again the debate started when the Modernists presented a few advantages of their theory like cool environment without the usage of any machines hence protesting against the fact that they were not allowed to explore their ideas and were submerged to perish before having developed properly. Few predictions made by them proved to be true, including the money involvement in the architecture of choice similarly the symbol of culture wasn’t a bad choice either where the Zig Zag chair proved an interest to the humorous Scandinavians.
Hence Modernist trends kept growing however now what stood in front was the industrial revolution and hence the style was no more non-machines based crafted objects but extremely technical gadgets which were the symbols of new hip culture. The new times were full of mass-production by machines and there was a techno-cum-retro approach which also tranquilized the authentic approach and evolved an appealing new face of modernism. Still there was a drop in the following of extremists who believed in the authentic modernist approach and therefore the young generation was more towards the belief that supported the mechanical-world.