Portfolio Task Three
Paul Brandreth
Graphic Design Year One
Choosing a particular period from 1800 to the present, in what ways has art or design responded to the changing social and cultural forces of that period? (Two specific examples)
Napoleon III and the rebuilding of Paris.
I have decided to answer the question using the rebuilding of Paris undertaken by Napoleon III, as I feel that when the reconstruction of Paris happened it caused a change in social and cultural aspects towards the people of France and the reaction from designers and artists. I want to talk mainly about the design of new Paris by Baron Haussmann commissioned by Napoleon III and the effect the new city had on designers within the city and also the new opportunity of museums opening for artists to express different styles of artwork that hadn’t been shown before, this would share cultural, political and social reactions towards the new city that could be viewed by all audiences.
“If I were the master of France, I would like to make Paris not only the most beautiful city in the world, the most beautiful that ever existed, but also the most beautiful that could ever exist… If the Heavens had granted me another twenty years and some leisure, you would have looked in vain for the old Paris; you would not have been able to see the slightest trace of it.”(Horne,2004,62) This quote from Napoleon in 1798 would later happen after his nephew Napoleon III started his plans for Paris.
Napoleon III took on Baron Haussmann to renovate the city centre that deconstructed the med-evil structures into new easy access, speed and new forms of materials to the city. Quote on Haussmann, “Below the ground he laid 1,300 miles of sewers, and above ground 85 miles of new streets, including wide boulevards lined with well-proportioned buildings.” (Dixie,2004,94) The design of the city was designed using straight roads and a grid system, this would offer the people of Paris to travel around easier and also travel around at a greater speed. The city would be built using truth to materials that would speak for themselves, new industrials materials and technology and based on the idea of from following function.” The rich were no longer expected to live with the poor, who were dispersed to the cities rim.” (Littlewood,2002,247) The new design by Haussmann created a social and cultural change from when he was appointed, all the poor were moved out towards the outskirts of the city, to leave a more appealing audience in the city.
The trottoir roulant was designed to bring speed to the city, and the new form of transport would offer the people of the city to travel around a lot quicker. There were two different speeds, slow and fast the faster 9/kmh. The idea was to walk onto the slow one first then walk onto the faster after, but due to the structure it injured to many people and was later replaced by new escalators. This was designed using the idea of form following function; people could get easy access and understanding from Haussmanns design layout using the grid system and the quick speed of transport of the trottoir roulant. This would bring the social and different cultures from different audiences from Paris to share their differences when using the new transport method.
“For the Universal Exhibition, Gustave Eiffel constructs the Eiffel tower. Over 300 metres high, it stands as a symbol of the new age of technology and is vilified and revered accordingly.” (Littlewood,2002,263) Gustave Eiffel was true to new materials and not to look back at old styles but tried creating the new. The tower has brought audiences from all over the world to look at it, and this offers the people economy and a new understanding of different cultures being imported from new audiences from around the world. “ The traffic problems created by some thirty million visitors to the exhibition give rise to the project for building an underground rail network, the Paris Metro.” (Littlewood,2002,264) Concluding this quote I feel that the value of interest being brought to Paris caused the economy to rise so the people from Paris would be able to trade easier. Also this brought cultural influences to the city with tourism travelling from all around the world. This was a response to Haussmann’s design for the city so it could be adapted to large visitors to make travelling and commuting easier, the huge statue would stand out to large audiences and bring the different social categories together to both understand and view the design rather than something in an art collection where the higher class could view it easier than the lower class.
Also at the same period Napoleon III set up a museum for rejected artists, Salon Des Refuses, in Paris in 1863, to exhibit their work, which soon created similar communities across every major cities around the world, during 1914 as the first World War started. “By the end of the 20th Century, it has been estimated, the number of artists in France (most of whom were in Paris) had nearly doubled, and that of journalists and “men of letters” had trebled”(Cottington,2005,17). This was successful for Napoleon as it reflects the capitalism created brought new revenue and pulled new audiences from around the world into France. Also Napoleon III helped forward the art movement by creating the new city and resources but where would we be now if Napoleon 1st would of made the changes a hundred years before.
Because of the new museums being opened for artists it attracted artists from out of Paris to display their work. Picasso in 1907 displayed his painting named Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, after spending the summer of 1907 working with hundreds of loose sketches and visiting the Musee d'Ethnographie du Trocadero for inspiration. “It was Barr who discovered that Picasso originally gave the male figures in the early studies identities as a medical student and a sailor, and that the medical student carried a skull in some variants; for him, this identified the initial idea as an allegory of vice and virtue, which was effaced by the removal both the student and the sailor. For Steinberg, the medical student represented the reflective observer and the sailor the participant, and their removal finally gave the painting over to participation: the participation of the spectator. Far from being a probing analyst, Steinberg’s spectator takes the place of the prostitute’s client – the surrogate of the sailor – and the prow like table that thrusts into the brothel from the spectator’s space partakes of his phallic, penetrative energy.”(Green,2001,10) When Napoleon opened up museums it gave everyone in Paris from different backgrounds share their culture. This would of opened up the opinions and cultural differences shown in the artwork between the different social classes to start a new response to previous artwork being viewed in the city. From the quote above Picasso viewed galleries in Paris and responded to the new artists showing their cultural and different social differences which would later help Picasso to produce work in the city such as Les Demoiselles D’Avignon, which I feel Picasso expresses his experiences of life and what happens within the brothel and the kind of characters you would find. This artwork could be understood to any audience. People believe that this was the start of cubism. He also brings in Cultural references using a sailor, medical student and two Iberian central nudes and two Africanized nudes on the right.
“Shut out of mainstream and its material rewards, many self-styled avant-garde artists also channelled their idealism not only into experimentation with their chosen medium and its possible new modes and meanings – but into belief that art had a public role play, that it could be lifted from the status of trivial and anecdotal entertainment to which it had sunk in the salons”. (Cottingham,2005,18) This quote explains the new movement would offer artists to express more of everyday life using different materials and resources to respond to personal experiences they encored within the city to produce artwork that would communicate to the majority of the public.
To conclude the essay I feel that the social and cultural changing’s within artists and designers in Paris all fell back to the new City Napoleon III ordered for design. The change of the med-evil times and windy streets of the mixed poor and lower class to the more modern, simple new city would offer tourism and to bring in the economy with new audiences that brought along new cultural aspects to share with the original people of Paris and a good research resource for designers and artists to respond to.
Littlewood, I.,(2002) The Rough Guide History of France. London. Rough Guides
Dixie, C., (2004) World Cultures: France. London. Teach Yourself
Green, C., (2001) Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d Avignon. Cambridge. Cambridge Press
Cottingham, D., (2005) Modern Art A Very Short Introduction. Oxford. Oxford Press
Horne, A., (2004) The Age of Napoleon. Great Britain. Phoenix
