Blobjects and Beyond The New Fluidity in Design

by Holt, Steven Skov; Skov, Mara Holt; Patton, Phil; Sterling, Bruce

• ISBN13: 9780811847650
• ISBN10: 0811847659
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-07-14
• Publisher: Chronicle Books

Summary

"Turning away from the hard angles and edges of conventional modernism, bliobjects are the design of now, and the future. Blobjects & Beyond is the first survey of the explosion of amorphic, organic, and curvaceous design. A formless from with roots in Surrealism and the kidney-shaped motifs of the 1950s, the ever more biological blobject has come into its own, embodying and reflecting the new international ethos of fluidity." "Authors Steven Skov Holt and Mara Holt Skov - curators of a major exhibition of blobjects at the San Jose Museum of Art - and contributors Phil Patton and Bruce Sterling, parse the various manifestations of the blobject, bringing together the realms of art, architecture, industrial design, graphics, digital design, furniture, and pop culture. As a counterpoint to the effusive popularity of the blobject, the authors also address more recent, post-9/11 forms that are mutated and disturbed, dangerous and intimidating - the dark side of the blobject." "A manifesto for fluidity across disciplines, cultures, and international boundaries, Blobjects & Beyond documents the first major design language to bridge the last millennium with the new one."--BOOK JACKET.

Author Biography

Steven Skov Holt is the distinguished professor of industrial design at California College of the Arts and former editor of I.D. magazine.

Mara Holt Skov is an independent curator. She and Steven live in San Francisco.

Phil Patton is a design critic and journalist for the New York Times , contributing editor to Esquire , Wired , and I.D. , and the author of several books.

Bruce Sterling is a celebrated science fiction novelist and technology writer, and a regular contributor to Wired magazine.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	8	(3)
Introduction: A Growing Fascination with Fluid Form	11	(12)
Steven Skov Holt
Mara Holt Skov
PROTO-BLOBJECTS
Twentieth-Century Roots of Organic Form	23	(16)
Phil Patton
The Blobject Begins to Take Shape	39	(18)
Steven Skov Holt
Mara Holt Skov
BLOBJECTS
The Look and Feel of Optimism	57	(14)
Steven Skov Holt
Mara Holt Skov
The Kandy-Kolored Blobject	71	(14)
Bruce Sterling
Fluid Blobs in Motion	85	(20)
Steven Skov Holt
Beach Rocks	101	(4)
Mara Holt Skov
Trans/parent, Trans/lucent, Trans/formed	105	(14)
Mara Holt Skov
Chromified Blobjects	119	(18)
Bruce Sterling
Tiny Technoblobjects	133	(4)
Mara Holt Skov
From the Human Form Flows Fluidity	137	(20)
Steven Skov Holt
Design for the Banal: Toothbrushes	153	(4)
Mara Holt Skov
Cutensils	157	(14)
Phil Patton
BEYOND BLOBJECTS
The New Direction of the Dark Curve	171	(16)
Steven Skov Holt
Mara Holt Skov
Don't Fuck with Me	187	(12)
Steven Skov Holt
Bio/Exo/Derma	199	(18)
Phil Patton
Meta-blobs	213	(4)
Mara Holt Skov
The Blob Morphs and Mutates Out of Control	217	(15)
Steven Skov Holt
Afterword	232	(4)
Credits	236	(10)
Index	246