Blog assignment 13 (Postmodernism)

The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali. Retrieved 7th of October from: http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=79018

      

The Simpsons in Salvador Dali's The Persistance of Memory by Zeitan. Retrieved 7th of October from: http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/wooda/171/171syllabus13chapter7.html

In postmodern variation of Salvador's Dali "The Persistence of Memory" by Zeitan the painting get an absolutely new modern meaning. As probably all modern especially young people know, Simpsons are a symbol of a modern family of the 21^st century. They represent both sides of modern families - ridicule negative features and underline positive ones. The appearance of Simpsons on The persistence of memory brings a new cultural message and tries to make people thing about the future instead of turning back to the past. Simpsons in The Persistence of Memory is a parody but I think it is already a new art object itself. What I personally really like abut it is that it does respect the original painting. It does not make fun of it but has a dose of healthy irony. The author “builds” something completely new and creative using famous Dali’s painting as a historical quotation and a base for it. Kaufman states that states that modern design “is the planning and making of objects suited to our way of life, our abilities, our ideals.” (Kaufman, 1948 as sited at Woodham  p.187). I consider this  parody is a very good example implementation of his words.

References:

1.Woodham, J. (1997), Pop to Post-Modernism: Changing Values in Twentieth-Century Design (p. 187) Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press

Blog assignment 12 (Politics of Design)

Solar-powered house by Victoria University of Wellington students. Retrieved from: http://firstlighthouse.ac.nz/home/

People today become more and more concerned and interested in an issue of environmental pollution. Of course designers cannot stay away and try to find ways to support and develop ecology on the planet. “Green ideology” is fortunately becoming more and more popular. Almost every supermarket today offers its customers to buy food packed using ecologically friendly materials and “green shopping bags” instead of plastic ones. Another important goal was achieved by students of Victoria University of Wellington, who managed to design and built ecologically friendly house which is called “solar-powered house”. It is using solar power, which is a renewable source for household needs of energy.  If houses such as “solar-powered house” will get a wider spread much less nonrenewable resources such as oil or coal will be used and  consequently less waste will get into the water and atmosphere as solar energy does not produce any waste at all. I strongly believe that appearance of such products on the market will give a huge jolt in solving environmental problems on the Earth.