Perspective: Innovation | Scratch Pad May

Apr 28, 2021 By Perspective

Get your summer reading list started with our design inspiration recommendations for summer. From iconic rock stars to fashion designers, visual artists and a look at the impact of design we’ve got you covered.

By Perspective Apr 28, 2021

Above Image: Helen Frankenthaler in her East 83rd Street and Third Avenue studio, New York, April 1964, Alexander Liberman © J. Paul Getty Trust

WHERE TO GO

Broken Nature

Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY

Runs through August 15

The exhibition Broken Nature—a collaboration with the Triennale di Milano—highlights the concept of restorative design, and offers strategies to help humans repair their relationship to the environments that they share with other species and each other. From regenerating coral reefs to exploring feeding an overpopulated planet, the works in Broken Nature illustrate how design and architecture might jumpstart constructive change.

Organized by Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator, Department of Architecture and Design, and Director, Research and Development; and Anna Burckhardt, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Architecture and Design

An inside peek at Kim Gordon No Icon

Photo by Courtesy of Rizzoli

An inside peek at Kim Gordon No Icon

Photo by Courtesy of Rizzoli

WHAT TO READ

Kim Gordon: No Icon

Kim Gordon (Rizzoli, October 2020)

Enter the mind of artist, alt-rock pioneer, author and style muse Kim Gordon through her personally curated scrapbook. No Icon maps Gordon’s life from her California childhood to her rise in New York’s downtown scene as co-founder of Sonic Youth.

With a foreword by musician and actor Carrie Brownstein, the scrapbook weaves an intimate portrait of Gordon with unpublished personal photographs, song lyrics, artworks, private objects, ephemera, and more.

(Above: An inside peek at Kim Gordon No Icon, courtesy of Rizzoli)

How Design Makes Us Think And Feel and Do Things

Sean Adams (Princeton Architectural Press, February 2021)

From the look of a new pair of sneakers to the choice of a font in an ad, the influence of good (and sometimes bad) design surrounds us in obvious and not-so-obvious ways. Graphic designer Sean Adams explores the power of design through hundreds of examples, examining the sociological, psychological, and historical reasons it makes us think, feel, and do things.

(Below: An inside peek at How Design Makes Us Think and Do and Feel Things, courtesy of Princeton Architectural Press)

An inside peek at How Design Makes Us Think
How Design Makes Us Think and Do and Feel Things

Photo by Image courtesy of Princeton Architectural Press

An inside peek at How Design Makes Us Think
How Design Makes Us Think and Do and Feel Things

Photo by Image courtesy of Princeton Architectural Press

WHAT TO WATCH

The Minimalists: Less Is Now

(Netflix, 2021)

Stuff: We all have it. It takes up space in our home—and our lives. And in a consumer culture where more is more and anything is available almost instantly, the duo behind 2016’s Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things is back to show how cutting back can help build a more fulfilling life.

Minimalism features interviews with experts, celebrities, and everyday minimalists, all to make the case that “it’s never too late to start over with less.”

Stylish With Jenna Lyons

(HBO Max, 2020)

When Jenna Lyons—once described as “the woman who dresses America”— left her top post at J. Crew in 2017, few would have guessed her next move would be to head up a TV show.

With Kyle DeFord and Sarah Clary rounding out the squad, the show follows Lyons as she launches her new business—from designing her office to hosting mobile fashion makeovers. There’s also a reality show element as she tests potential creative associates to join her upstart company.

The Minimalists Less Is Now

Photo by Image Courtesy of Netflix

The Minimalists Less Is Now

Photo by Image Courtesy of Netflix

Stylish with Jenna Lyons Courtesy

Photo by Image courtesy of Squire Fox HBO Max

Stylish with Jenna Lyons Courtesy

Photo by Image courtesy of Squire Fox HBO Max

WHAT TO LISTEN TO

Recording Artists

What does it mean to be both a woman and an artist during the feminist and civil rights movements—and how does that influence the art that they have made? Host Helen Molesworth looks for answers in season one of Recording Artists, a podcast from the Getty.

Venture through the lives and careers of six female artists (Alice Neel, Lee Krasner, Betye Saar, Helen Frankenthaler, Yoko Ono, and Eva Hesse) as they describe their work, relationships, and feelings about the march of feminism. The series combines archival interviews from the 1960s and ’70s, along with contemporary artists and art historians offering their own POV on the recordings.