****  CFDA meeting December 14 at Corosh - Guest speaker: Barry Bursak on Sustainable Furniture***

Dec. 14 Barry Bursak will speak about his experiences as an advocate and retailer of sustainable home furnishings. Barry has established himself as a long time advocate of sustainable design here in Chicago. It was Barry who organized the sustainable furnishings exhibit at the last CDS Show at the Mart. In Chicago, no meaningful discussion of sustainability can occur without Barry's experience and insight. Be sure to attend!

Jan. 11 Chris Brandel will be hosting a presentation of sustainable furniture materials. Chris has assembled a significant collection, but others are encouraged to bring their samples and knowledge of products and sources, so we can pool our knowledge. The hope is that we can identify materials that will be of use to our members in the up coming show, materials we might be able to obtain at little or no cost from the manufacturers.

New Visitors
Laurie Mckichan, Kendyl Paulus, Timothy Farley, Ron Montonera

Announcements

Judy S. Show:
Nov. 16th -19th (load in)
Nov. 19th- End of Year (show)
Unload date?

Sustainability Show

The show will be end of May thru June and July. The show will focus on the idea of sustainability (hence the title) each designer will create a piece of furniture with that idea in mind. Each designer will paint a story of why their piece of furniture is sustainable. The group discussed at length the question, what is sustainable furniture? You should be ready to tell a story about why your design is sustainable. What glue did you choose, why did you pick that wood, was it made with electric, what stain/finish, how long will your piece last, these are a few of the questions/ideas that were discussed about sustainability.

Things the group needs for the show:
 - 40-60 pieces of furniture
 -*Please email John the number of pieces and the size/dimensions that you are planning on doing for the show.
 - Catchy name for the show
 - Send Chris Brandel (cbrandel@bretford.com) all sustainability materials (sources/information) we will begin to organize a website page with links and information.

SCULPTURE AND FURNITURE
A talk to CFDA given by Glenn Adamson on November 9, 2004.

This slide lecture was a call for furniture designers to understand what is happening in the art world, particularly with sculpture. Adamson is a curator at the Chipstone Foundation, an organization that promotes scholarship in the decorative arts. He also teaches at the University of Wisconsin, Madison and works with the Milwaukee Art Museum.

Though he showed a few slides of furniture, his stated mission was to
trace the evolution of sculpture over the last eighty years and how this might relate to furniture design. His point was to show us the aesthetic shift that had occurred over this time. He began with Brancusi, an artist who started firmly in the craft-based functional world where wood was supposed to look like wood and tool marks showed that the work was handmade. This exemplified modernist ideas that were promoted by the Bauhaus between the wars: "Form Follows Function"; "Honest Use of Materials". A craft aesthetic was important, care in the making, evidence of hand processes. Adamson then moved to post World Was II where the craft aesthetic becomes outmoded in contemporary sculpture. David Smith develops a style of welded steel sculpture that pushes the visible over the tactile in the use of materials. 3-D forms leap out in space and some sculptures look like completely different works, depending on which side they are viewed from. Sculptors such as Anthony Caro painted steel a monochrome color to show off pure abstract form. The nature of the material is eclipsed.

With the rise of minimalism the space where the sculpture was shown might be as important as the work itself. Richard Serra created a lead cube held up by a steel pole leaning into the corner of a gallery, the walls becoming a part of the sculpture. He went on to create great site-specific works leading another sculptural trend.

Artists such as Jeff Koons played with the cultural attributes of materials. He recast a classical marble bust into stainless steel. There was nothing of his hand in this creation, only the idea of using a 20th century material with a older form. Many of these "postmodern" sculptures are essentially ideas. The physical forms are embodiments of the idea but have no intrinsic aesthetic merit in themselves. Remember Duchamp's "Fountain" which led the way to conceptual art?

The craft world has itself been slow to deal with these aesthetic ideas. Most are still grounded in functionalism, so that a chair should look like a chair; or in showcasing materials as materials, so that wood should look like wood. But an anti-craft aesthetic has also crept in. Some contemporary crafts purposely disguise their materials. You can't be sure if a piece is wood, or aluminum, or plastic. Or the artisan intentionally orchestrates poor craftsmanship. Gary Knox Bennet did a finely crafted cabinet and famously drove a bent nail through the front, an attack on the worship of fine craft for craft's sake. The foregoing synopsis is too short for any real understanding of eighty years of sculpture, but is simply a wake-up call to spend some time understanding this tradition. How does this relate to the design world? Adamson feels that the Studio Furniture World hasn't resolved what direction it might take. It is confused as to its goals and at the same time a bit mired in the past. There are too many Maloof knock-offs and not enough original thinking. He hopes we will take up the challenge of making furniture that is relevant without imitating other's designs. He feels that the studio furniture movement isn't hard enough on itself. He hopes that we will push to develop new ideas and designs that flow from them. The point of looking at recent sculpture trends is to learn "the art world's patterns of thought and adapt them to our designs." He feels that the most interesting designers today are very knowledgeable about contemporary art.

In the questions afterwards some asked if too much knowledge of other art might be detrimental to their own inherent creativity. He replied, "To operate from a position of willful ignorance is dangerous." Besides, all designers carry around a bunch of received ideas already and these may be more derivative than they realize.

At the end of this critique of the studio furniture world, he became more positive and said he sees great potential. The fact that this design world has been a bit provincial and out of contact with the art world could become its strength. He complimented CFDA for being one of the "most active groups in this movement." Thanks, Glenn Adamson for the compliment and sharing your ideas

The Cultural Center staff assures me that the Sustainable Furniture Show will be seen by more than 20,000 people, including local residents, national and international visitors to the city. Plus we plan to wage a serious campaign to have the show covered in the regular and trade press. Plainly said, this may be the best opportunity to place your furniture before the public that you will ever have in your life. Plus, this is a fabulous opportunity to familiarize yourself with the issues surrounding sustainable design, which may be the most important development in the field since the Bauhaus. You definitely do not want to miss out on this one!

We will need 50 to 60 pieces to fill the gallery. The list below shows the people who have contacted me so far to commit pieces to the show. As you can see, we are only a fraction of the way there, so I am sending out Calls For Entries to designers and design groups across the area. Current members of the CFDA need to declare their interest to me as soon as possible and get their names on the list. Kriegshauser@iit.edu.

Sustainable Furniture: Chicago Designers Respond

The members of the Chicago Furniture Designers' Association (CFDA) will put on a major show of sustainably designed furniture entitled Sustainable Furniture: Chicago Designers Respond, which will be held at the Chicago Cultural Center. The show will open on Friday, May 27, 2005 and run through mid August. More than twenty thousand people are expected to view this show, and in addition we plan to arrange extensive media coverage. We invite furniture designers and makers in the Greater Chicago Area to join our organization and submit one or more pieces for exhibition.

The theme of the show is sustainable furniture design. The ideal we are working towards is furniture that can be produced without exhausting the resources of which it is made or degrading the environment we live in. By organizing this show we hope to raise the public's awareness of sustainable furniture design and showcase the work of designers in the field. If you are interested in this project, we want to include you.

Would you like to participate? Here's how.
· Join the CFDA. Go to cfdainfo.org and download a membership form. Fill it out and send it in. The dues are $75 annually. Full time students and apprentices are half that amount.

· Mail a proposal for the piece(s) that you plan to exhibit using the form being posted on the CFDA website, cfdainfo.org. If the piece already exists, or if the design is well advanced include an image of it, and briefly explain how or why it is sustainable. If your piece is still in the conceptual stage, simply explain as much as you can about it. Include a check for $125 to the CFDA for each entry. This money will be used to cover the cost of publicity and the opening reception.

The judges will review proposals as they are received and accept or reject them
as speedily as possible. Note that if a proposal is rejected, it may be revised and resubmitted at no additional charge. Also, the judges retain the right to exclude pieces from the show based on their viewing of the actual piece.

· The deadline for submitting proposals is January 31, 2005 though we encourage earlier submission.

The judges are: Barry Bursak, a prominent, Chicago area advocate of sustainable design, Thomas Gentry, a professor of architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology specializing in environmentally sensitive design and Lee Weitzman, a recognized, Chicago based furniture designer and retailer. These judges will screen all the entries and exclude pieces that are incompatible with the theme of the show, or that exhibit low standards of workmanship. Their judgment will be final.

After your design(s) has been accepted, in addition to preparing the actual piece, you must prepare a statement explaining how your piece(s) is sustainable. These statements will be exhibited alongside each piece of furniture. Their length can be one or two letter sized pages. Brevity is good, and the statements can include graphics as well as text. These statements must be received by April 12, so they can be arranged and printed in a common format.

Finally, you will be responsible for delivering your piece together with an unpainted display pedestal to the Chicago Cultural Center on May 11, 12 or 13. The staff of the Cultural Center will paint these pedestals.

The show will open on May 27, 2005 with a public reception.

The CFDA has been in existence for 12 years. Our members include artists, designers and craftspeople interested in original furniture design, both custom and production. We meet monthly to hear programs relevant to the field, and we sponsor annual public shows of our members' work. Please consult our website, cfdainfo.org, to learn more about us.

Hey Tor, you might be inspired to see branches and twigs featured in several bed settings, including a Calvin Klein ad....

And some clippings related to the sustainable movement:

Teragren buzz words: Renewable & Environmentally, socially and economically responsible

A Herman Miller ad informing the public of Wheat Board ("moisture resistant and similar in appearance to particle board") - part of Herman Miller's new line of furniture products  Although they mention Dow Bio-Products as the manufacturer of wheat board, the ad interestingly gave me the impression Herman Miller introduced the eco-friendly product.

Found this one interesting - opening line: " In the growing market for environmental products, a lot of companies are talking the talk... but are they walking the walk?" Further in the ad they talk about searching for environmentally sound products, their pride in sustainable offerings, and their concern for safe products. Carnegie Fabrics

Other Miscellaneous items:

Lee Weitzman's chair in the Interior Design Fall Market magazine:

An Italian chair design:.... Quote from the Robb Report magazine: "The leader of the pack is B&B Italia.... One of its early masterpieces and still a best seller is Gaetano Pesce's Up chair, which harnessed the mutability of expansive polyurethane in a chair that literally sprang into shape as it was liberated from its packing case."