MACKINTOSH, CHARLES RENNIE (FURNITURE PIECE: "SIDE CHAIR")

Charles Rennie Mackintosh, a British product designer who lived from 1868 to 1928 and whose life was centered around art, is frequently mentioned while discussing the history of architecture and art in the nineteenth century. After taking lessons at the Glasgow School of Art, where he first met his wife, he later worked as an apprentice architect at the school. His renown in a significant portion of the nineteenth century was a result of these and other artistic endeavors. However, it is crucial to consider the source of one of his most famous pieces of art, the side chair, which bears his name. The relevance of the side chair among Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s braid array of artistic designed is the inspiration he got from his patron’s demands and the importance of the chair in the later appreciation of the dining room and art culture as a whole.

The artist’s major influence was the radical change that was taking place at the time when people were shifting from rural urban areas following the Industrial Revolution. It was after William Morris and a group of other artists started to rebel the mass-revolution and characterless designs that had become too common and decided that they would focus of Art and Craft. It was at then that Mackintosh became inspired by nature as a source of inspiration and desired to produce new pieces of art that were more elegant and modern. There were two main movements initiated in the Art Vouveau, a French phrase that meant new art. The first was the curvilinear while the second, which Mackintosh developed, was called the rectilinear style that featured aspect of geometry, shapes, still elongation, and gracefully stronger material. Through the inspiration drawn from the rectilinear art movement, Mackintosh was able to design the side chair which was among the many high-backed chairs that emerged at the time.

The side chair was completed in 1897 by its architect Mackintosh through the inspiration of the Arts and Craft Movement that was principled under the slogan of natural organic forms for modern and stylist art forms. The material and the construction methods in the production of the chair were not technologically innovative considering the advances in technology in the nineteenth century but on an abstract level, the chair was sleek and attractive. It was a clear poetic response that the architect got from the industrial culture of Glasgow and served as a physical from of the impact bust economy. It was armless and often used in the dining table and Mackintosh designing of this type of chair was for one of his patrons Catherine Cranston. Her family usually sold tea and the need for a chair that would be used in the dining table was key to the production of the art work. The image of the chair is as shown below.

As stated before, the inspiration for the designing of the chair was following the visit to Miss Cranston’s tearoom in 1897, the same year the chair was made. The tearooms were a must for visitor as it was a norm for Cranston to give ordinary citizens access to progressive designs. To the designer, Mackintosh, the chair would be perfect for creating an intimate conversational space. He improved it further because considering that he was working on the project for a female patron, he ensured that there was an oval headrest that served as a frame for the hats that women wore in France at the time and that was typical of tea drinkers. The general appearance that the chair assumed is that of a soaring bird that had been created out of a large oval plaque when viewed through the shape at the top of the chair. In 1990, Mackintosh and his wife Margaret Macdonald later took up the idea of the chair to incorporate the chair as one of the several tearoom designs. Having been the first of its kind for a married couple, it was apparent that the chair served to challenge the conventional separation of public and private chairs which ended up being a characteristic feature for masculine and feminine spheres of influence.

In summary, it is apparent that the designing of the side chair in the late nineteenth century was primarily as a result of the motivation that Mackintosh got from the art and craft movement. The need for a chair that served to meet the needs for his patron Cranston and the general public following the Industrial Revolution ensured that the chair was designed to meet the needs of its target population, the female tea drinkers. Thus, from the motivation gotten from the side chair, Mackintosh is arguably one of the most influential architects to incorporate design and sleek style that ensured success of art not only for Europe at the time but also in the present day.















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Bibliography

Museum of Modern Art. “Charles Rennie Mackintosh Side Chair 1897.” MoMA, 2017. https://www.moma.org/collection/works/2293?locale=en.

Museum of Modern Art Learning. “LESSON TWO: Take a Seat: Exploring Chair Design.” Museum of Modern Art Learning, 2011. https://www.moma.org/momaorg/shared/pdfs/moma_learning/docs/design_2.pdf.

———. “Side Chair Charles Rennie Mackintosh (British, 1868–1928).” MoMA Learning, 2017. https://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/charles-rennie-mackintosh-side-chair-1897.

The National Trust of Scotland. “Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868 – 1928).” http://www.nts.org.uk/Learn, 2015. http://www.nts.org.uk/learn/downloads/artists/Charles Rennie Mackintosh.pdf.

White Hill. “Charles Rennie Mackintosh Product Designer.” White Hill, 2010. http://www.whitehill-sec.glasgow.sch.uk/Websites/SchSecWhitehill/UserFiles/file/Higher Art Homework/Product designer C R MACKINTOSH.pdf.