Hannah Addington

The Great Exposition of 1851 2/23/21

• Interior visual unity was becoming important during Napoleon’s era
• British Empire was not only a place to get resources and expand innovation use areas but also
markets for goods to be bought and shipped to
• Henry Cole 1808-1882
o Designed the first Christmas card
o Went to the 1849 Exposition of products of national agriculture and manufacturing
industries
• Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851
o Members of industry and Prince Albert headed the idea
o Wanted to foster international competition and local industry
• The commission hires Joseph Paxton to design the building
o Was known for building greenhouse
o Recruited because the proposed buildings from the competition were too expensive
• Train sheds and stations were designed with the building
• The building employed the modular construction
o Entire building was fabricated elsewhere and then taken apart to be built in Hyde Park
• Why was the exhibition so important?
o First international exhibition
o National interest in product design
o International competition and understanding of design trends
• Over 100,000 objects and 14,000 exhibitors
• Queen Victoria’s Reign and the Victorian Era 1837-1901
• Victorian design was eclectic and ornamental
• 1855 Universal Exposition, Paris
• 1862 Great London International Exposition, London
• 1873 World Exposition, Vienna
• 1876 Centennial International Exhibition, Philadelphia
• 1878 Universal Exposition, Paris
o Also, one in Barcelona the same year
• 1889 Universal Exposition, Paris
o Eiffel Tower is built
o Emphasizes machinery
o US pavilion has the telephone
• 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago
o First Ferris wheel and was the first one to have electricity
• 1900 World Fair, Paris
o Introduces Art Nouveau
Hannah Addington

Design Reform in England

• Government school of Design, London founded 1837
o In 1853 Henry Cole became the director
o Become Royal College of Art in 1896
• Had the realization after the Crystal Palace that manufacturers needed trained individuals to
help them come up with ideas for executing the goods
• Journals of Design and Manufactures (1849-1852) by Henry Cole and Richard Redgrave
o There is such thing as bad taste and design
• Richard Redgrave:
o Well Spring vase (1847-1848)
o Minton and Co. ceramic vase
o Ophelia (1842)
• Museum of Manufactures (later the Museum of Ornamental Arts and now the Victoria and
Albert Museum) founded in 1852 and was directed by Henry Cole
o Comprised of objects purchased from the Crystal Palace
• Gallery of False Principles (1853)
o Exhibition of “bad designs”
o Curated by Henry Cole
o What is the role of ornamentation in product of objects
o Bad:
▪ Naturalism
▪ Introduction of space
▪ “Too busy” and creates illusion of depth
▪ No different between the ornament and the form
▪ No symmetry or too random
o Taken down after a few days due to controversy
• Ralph Wornum – taught courses in history of styles at the Gov. School or Design
o 1855 Director of the National Gallery in London
o Published the “Analysis of Ornament” or “Characteristics of Style” in 1856
▪ Ornament vs Form vs Style
o Shared many opinions as Henry Cole
o Ornament decorates the form, and the form is stable across ages
• 1854 Crystal Palace moves to Sydenham
o Grand Courts: History of Design and Ornament
o Owen Jones creates “period rooms” in the Crystal Palace
▪ Rooms that show off design from different areas and times
• Owen jones Publishes “Grammar of Ornament” in 1856
o 112 chromolithographic plates
o “Savage Tribes” art is a source for ornamental art
Hannah Addington

Arts and Crafts in England 3/2/2021

• Karl Marx was sponsored by Friedrich Engels to come to England
o Together they write the 1845 report titled “Conditions of Working Class in England”
o 1848 Communist Manifesto
• John Ruskin
o Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849)
o Stones of Venice 2 volumes (1851-1853)
o Books were about moral, ethical and spiritual values
o Blamed materialism for poverty, inequality, and human misery
o Against separation of art and design
▪ Artists = designers
o Dignity of labor, value of craftsmanship
o Restoration of meaningful work and joy of work
• Ruskin later forms a relationship with William Morris who is a key figure in the arts and crafts
movement
• Morris believed that the objects in one’s home should be both useful and beautiful
• Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB)
o Members were students
o Live and work together and discuss their ideas
• Phillip Webb and William Morris, Red House, 1859
o Was a showcase of what the arts and crafts movement was about
o Chose and designed objects so that the interior felt like it was a whole
• Arts and crafts movement was about the visual pleasure when looking at things such as a house’s
interior
• 1861 – Morris, Marshall, Faulkner and Co. which made objects like what was in his Red House
o Later became Morris and Co.in 1875
o Returned to pre-industrial ways of manufacturing his objects
o Had a catalog that people could order from
• William Morris, Kelmscott Press, 1891-1898
o 53 Titles
o Arts and crafts movement for fonts
o Took a chapter from Ruskin’s “The Nature of Gothic” and made 500 copies of it in pamphlet
form in 1892
Hannah Addington

Influence of Arts & Crafts 3/4/2021

• Products marketed to women as they were in charge of what the home looks like
• Some artists were going back to the guild set up
• Century Guild of Artists founded in 1883
o The Hobby Horse, 1884-1894, was the organization’s magazine
o Arthur Heygate Macmurdo, Herbert Horn, and Selwyn Image
o Took Morris’ idea that design is art and expanded upon it
• Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society founded 1887
o Walter Crane designed the ticket for exhibition 1890
o Walter Crane was also the founding member
• Walter Crane, Illustrations for The Story of the Glittering Plane by William Morris
• Crane goes on to be a well-known illustrator especially for children’s book which was a new
industry
• Charles Robert Ashbee – Guild and School of Handicraft (1888-1895)
• Form itself was the ornamentation
• Art nouveau and the arts and crafts movement are all a part of the same continuum
• centennial exhibition in Philadelphia in 1876 was where a lot of the arts and crafts ideas were
promoted
• Gustav Stickley created factories to bring the arts and crafts movement into the US
o The Craftsman magazine 1901-1916
o Catalogue of Craftsman Furniture
• Newcomb College Pottery (1895-1940) in New Orleans
o Women’s college
• Arts and Crafts opens up art to other media
• Gives way to the studio craft movement
Hannah Addington

Course Videos
• Great Exposition of 1851
o Industrial expositions dated back to the 1700’s but were always one nation only
o Located in Hyde park
▪ Not Crystal Palace
o June 12th, 1850 was the competition for the building
▪ No one won but the best parts of the favorite buildings were going to be used
▪ Winning design was submitted at the last minute
o Some trees that were there were included inside the building
o Very few accidents occurred due to rigorous testing of everything before it was added to
the building itself
o Name the Crystal Palace at the last minute
o Owen James was the superintendent of works
▪ Chose the painting job, which was red, blue and yellow based on the proportion
they were “seen in nature”
o First of May 1851 was the opening ceremonies
o Over 6 million visitors
▪ 141 viewing days from 9 am to 6 pm (daylight hours)
o The Queen came 41 times
o Second International London Exhibition was in 1862
o Building was taken down and then rebuilt elsewhere after the exhibition was over
o Different days had different prices
o Turnstiles at the entrance automatically recorded number of people going through them
o Many items were saved and are now in the Victorian Art Museum
o Booths were both inside and outside
• Apostles of Beauty
o Movement started in England in the mid-19th century
o Was a reaction to the excesses of Victorian culture and capitalism and factory work
o Started by a lot of people who were in the upper class that went to Cambridge and
Oxford
▪ Was concerned about the ownership of the work and the people in the factories
▪ Craftspeople were to be respected not like they were in the factories
o Mostly aesthetic and some socialistic aspects
o Japan was “opened” in 1854
o America’s main arts and crafts head were Gustav Stickley and Elbert Hubbard
▪ Stickley was so successful that the term craftsman become almost synonymous
with the American Arts and Crafts style
▪ Stickley also included photography in his magazine
o Chicago was a big hub in the 1890s especially for photography
o The Prairie School started in Chicago
▪ Influenced by Louie Sullivan
▪ Valued clear and precise forms and the texture and expression of their materials
Hannah Addington

• Frank Lloyd Wright and the Prairie School

o Came to Chicago area in 1887
o Loved nature and wanted his designs to be inspired by nature via geometry
o Preferred stucco, brick, and wood
o His work resonated with many engineers and businessmen of the time who also wanted
to break the historical molds of architecture
o Many artists showed sympathy for Wright’s prairie style by making their own version of
it
o Proposed a fireproof building by using reinforce concrete for everything
o “The form must fit the area”
o His style eventually made its way to Europe
o The style eventually decreased in popularity and stopped showing up in its pure form