furniture_exhibition_design 家具展厅设计【DOC精选】.docVIP

. The evolution of design in Shaker furniture Jean M. Burks Shaker furniture design was not static, evolved during the eighteenth, nineteenth, and even twentieth centuries. In the past a great deal of attention has been focused on the classic Shaker furniture produced from about 1820 to 1850--a time of intense religious renewal when the Believers were isolated from the world. The so-called stylistic decline in the furniture produced after the Civil War has been attributed to a breakdown in orthodoxy among the faithful, according to one popular theory.[1] This view holds that forsaking the simple life for worldly display was a result of internal disintegration, accelerated by increased contact with the world. Instead of paring down worldly fashion, the Shakers applied historical-revival motifs to simple forms (see Fig. 3). Perhaps this opinion reflects too closely the twentieth-century bias against late nineteenth-century taste as well as the current preference for modernism in an, architecture, and industrial design. [2]A more plausible explanation for the transformation of Shaker design recognizes that the sect was extremely progressive and concerned about its image, which seemed uncomfortably old-fashioned as the nineteenth century advanced. This was felt to be impeding conversions and complicating business relationships. In this light, both architectural modifications to existing structures and the design of interior furnishings can be viewed as conscious efforts to keep pace with the world by presenting a modem face to potential converts and business acquaintances. The theory is supported by Brother Oliver Hampton (1817-1901) of Union Village, Ohio, who wrote in 1887: Forms, fashions, customs, external rules all have to bow to the fiat of evolution and progress toward that which is more perfect. This need not alarm the most conservative Believer. For unless we keep pace with the progress of the universe our individual progress will be impossibility. We shall be