Crystal and Arabesque Claude Bragdon, Ornament, and Modern Architecture

Jonathan Massey

ISBN 10: 082294362X / ISBN 13: 9780822943624

Published by University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009

About this Item

This hard cover with red cloth covered boards and silver lettering on the spine is Near Fine to Fine condition, without only a previous owner's name on the front free purple end paper as the flaw that is noted to the volume. There are 336+ix(9) pages to this volume that is filled with illustrations, both color and black-and-white. There interior is free of highlighting, marginalia, underlining or stray marks. The boards and dust wrapper are also clean, bright and without marks, rips or tears. The spine ends are stiff and the corners sharp. The edges are a bright white. This is presumed to be a First Edition, number line is complete 10-1.

Seller Inventory # Sp673

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Crystal and Arabesque Claude Bragdon, Ornament, and Modern Architecture
• Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
• Publication Date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 082294362X
• ISBN 13: 9780822943624
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Near Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Fine
• Seller catalogs:
  • Architecture

About this title

Synopsis

From the 1890s to the 1930s, Claude Bragdon enjoyed an international reputation as an architect, designer, and critic working in the progressive tradition associated with Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, and the Prairie School. In 1915 Bragdon created “projective ornament,” a system of geometric patterns designed to serve as a universal form-language integrating not only architecture, art, and design, but also a society divided by differences of class, gender, religion, culture, and national origin. Spreading across the surfaces of buildings, posters, books, and the settings Bragdon designed for massive community singing festivals, projective ornament came to symbolize the progressive potential of modernity for thousands of Americans. Bragdon disappeared from memory when mid-century histories promoted a narrow view of modern architecture that emphasized functional planning, industrial building technique, continuous space, and the suppression of ornament. But his work left an ongoing legacy when younger architects such as Buckminster Fuller found new ways of using geometric pattern to promote architectural and social integration. Now that architects and designers are once again generating innovative work based on geometry, ornament, and pattern, <i>Crystal and Arabesque</i> draws on a rich trove of previously unpublished work to show how American modernists committed to social reform used ornament in new ways to engage the media and audiences of mass society.

About the Author

<b>Jonathan Massey</b> is associate professor in the Syracuse University School of Architecture.