Chair (Objekt)

The chair—you're likely sitting in one right now. Yet, despite its common presence in offices, restaurants, and homes, we very rarely stop to think about the origins of the chair and its place in culture. After all, the human body is actually more suited to sitting on the ground than on a chair; and as a result, chairs often cause back problems. Nonetheless, in Western culture, as Anne Massey explains, the chair is an object that marks our place in the modern world. Massey explores how, particularly in the last hundred years, the chair has become a revered object of design. Certain chairs have become iconic—like the Eames Lounge chair and Verner Panton's S Chair, which are photographed, exhibited in art museums, and slavishly copied by cheaper models. Other chairs have reached iconic status simply through their everydayness—think of Van Gogh's chair or the way Shaker chairs have become emblematic of a simpler and purer lifestyle. Massey further examines how chairs have been crafted, from local to global manufacture. In doing so she elucidates the meaning of the chair in contemporary culture, as well as the development, design, and manufacture of this ubiquitous object. Drawing on design, art, popular culture, and personal experience, Chair is an engaging and informative biography of this everyday object and will appeal to anyone interested in why we choose to sit on the chairs we do.

The chair—you're likely sitting in one right now. Yet, despite its common presence in offices, restaurants, and homes, we very rarely stop to think about the origins of the chair and its place in culture. After all, the human body is actually more suited to sitting on the ground than on a chair; and as a result, chairs often cause back problems. Nonetheless, in Western culture, as Anne Massey explains, the chair is an object that marks our place in the modern world.Massey explores how, particularly in the last hundred years, the chair has become a revered object of design. Certain chairs have become iconic—like the Eames Lounge chair and Verner Panton's S Chair, which are photographed, exhibited in art museums, and slavishly copied by cheaper models. Other chairs have reached iconic status simply through their everydayness—think of Van Gogh's chair or the way Shaker chairs have become emblematic of a simpler and purer lifestyle. Massey further examines how chairs have been crafted, from local to global manufacture. In doing so she elucidates the meaning of the chair in contemporary culture, as well as the development, design, and manufacture of this ubiquitous object.

Drawing on design, art, popular culture, and personal experience, Chair is an engaging and informative biography of this everyday object and will appeal to anyone interested in why we choose to sit on the chairs we do.

We sit on one every day in our home, school or office. Yet how often do we think about the origins of the chair or of its place in the world? This book provides an anatomy of the chair and its history, and even considers the predetermined ways in which we interact with others when seated, for a chair can communicate the authority of its owner, the sitter, and even the creator. During the last one hundred years it has become established as a revered object of design. Examples, such as the Eames Lounge Lounge chair, Verner Panton's S Chair, Herman Miller's Aeron office chair and Jasper Morrison' Air chair, have been photographed for glossy magazines, exhibited in art museums and galleries, and sometimes slavishly copied in knock-off cheaper models. Other, more humble, chairs have also reached iconic status, such as Van Gogh's Chair, or like Shaker chairs have become emblematic of a simpler and purer lifestyle. Charis have been crafted, constructed in a remarkable variety of A history of the origin, design and manufacture of the chair, as well as an explication of its place in our culture. Chair discusses and provides images of many iconic chairs, including the Eames Lounge chair, Verner Panton's S Chair, the Aeron office chair and Van Gogh's chair.