Machine Art, 1934 (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780226507156)

In 1934, New York's Museum of Modern Art staged a major exhibition of ball bearings, airplane propellers, pots and pans, cocktail tumblers, petri dishes, protractors, and other machine parts and products. The exhibition, titled Machine Art, explored these ordinary objects as works of modern art, teaching museumgoers about the nature of beauty and value in the era of mass production.

Telling the story of this extraordinarily popular but controversial show, Jennifer Jane Marshall examines its history and the relationship between the museum's director, Alfred H. Barr Jr., and its curator, Philip Johnson, who oversaw it. She situates the show within the tumultuous climate of the interwar period and the Great Depression, considering how these unadorned objects served as a response to timely debates over photography, abstract art, the end of the American gold standard, and John Dewey's insight that how a person experiences things depends on the context in which they are encountered. An engaging investigation of interwar American modernism, Machine Art, 1934 reveals how even simple things can serve as a defense against uncertainty.

Author: Jennifer Jane Marshall
ISBN-10: 0226507157
ISBN-13: 9780226507156
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Language: English
Published: 05/30/2012
Pages: 240
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 2.10lbs
Size: 10.20h x 7.20w x 0.90d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 12/01/2012