Figure 1. Zaha Hadid, “Genesy”, 2009
Zaha Hadid (1950 – 2016), an architect who was very well known for her radical deconstructivist design and who became the first female architect to be awarded the Priztker Architecture Prize in 2004 (Zukowsky, 2019). Recently, one of her work was displayed at the The NGV “Designing Women” exhibition which outlined and praised the roles of women in design in the contemporary culture (NGV). Out of all the pieces displayed at NGV, Hadid’s work interested me the most which is a floor lamp designed by her in 2009, called the Genesy Lamp (Figure 1). I find it appealing for both being functional and has its own unique personality. In this blog, I want to talk about how Zaha Hadid delivered her exploration and research about systems of growth in the natural world via the the Genesy Lamp while referring to the piece of work to “Good Design” and “Bad Design”.
The Genesy Lamp is a floor lamp made out of Polyurethane with gloss finish. It has a very organic shape as it is inspired by the growth of trees in the forest, like a sweeping canopy that grows through a strong supporting network at the base. The main components of this organic analogy are transformed into the Genesy Lamp’s fluid design. The design gets more and more complex further up as it spreads out into more branches, which makes the design more dynamic. With the height of 195cm, one can stand underneath the light and feel like standing underneath a tree, or a tall natural creature. The negative space between the branches adds more contrast to the piece, the contrast between positive and negative, convex and concave, tension and compression. With a linear halogen light in the head and and LED light projector covered in the lower section, together with the touchpad power and dimming controls built in the middle part of the body, the Genesy Lamp has both direct and indirect lighting which can be adjustable.
The Genesy Lamp lamp is a good example when talking about “Good Design” as it can serve both sides: Functions and Aesthetic. Design work are meant to have their own personalities and stories, and design is not always about just the aesthetic (Christoforidou, 2012). It is also about originality as its value is taken away when the designer is just trying to imitate someone’s previous work. While talking about the beauty of good design, “Beauty” was divided into three different ways, one is “pure beauty” which means non-functional, another type of beauty is the one that has purpose, such as architecture and the last one is the kind of beauty that exists in the ideally beautiful, morality for instance (Christoforidou, 2012). Furthermore, it is suggested that instead of “taste”, designers usually choose to focus more on “forms”, therefore “good taste” becomes “good forms”. Form language is sometimes used as a criteria for criticism and a good understanding of forms is based on subjective values such as balance and symmetry (Christoforidou, 2012).
Looking back to Hadid’s work, a floor lamp, which is definitely functional, has a very organic, beautiful and distinct shape that reflects Zaha Hadid’s style very well and the audience can also easily tell where she got the inspiration from. It is suggested that “Good Design” can only be measured in relation to the intention of the designer and “Bad Design” are the ones that cannot deliver the designer’s intention (Christoforidou, 2012). In an exclusive interview with Zaha Hadid by Wow Magazine in 5th of May, 2013, she said that her work was about working with concepts, logic and methods that examine and organize the complexities of contemporary life patterns. Moreover, in an another interview with Phillip Stevens from Designboom, she also stated that her design approach was very abstract as a result of her interest for fragmentation and with ideas of abstraction and explosion. Hadid was also very famous for her fluidity in her designs and she was called the “Queen of curve”. Her intention and design approach were shown clearly in the Genesy Lamp as she came up with a unique concept she she brought the fluid, complexity and patterns into the lamp, which matches the statemenr above about what “Good Design” is. From that, it is concluded that to make “Good Design”, a designer’s competency is very crucial to criticize whether a design is good or not. If one practitioner wishes to be acknowledged for their creativity and imagination and skills, designing something just for the aesthetic is not enough but there has to be a certain depth in their thoughts and objectives.
The terms “Good Design” is still very vague in our modern life nowadays and there are a lot of discussions and arguments around it. It is also about the barrier between being functional and being aesthetical. Some believe that good designs should only serve the visual purpose and some think that designs are made to improve the living standards of the society, not to think about the appearance. Should designers shift their design principles to just one side or should they try to keep the balance in between, just like what Zaha Hadid did with the Genesy Lamp? The question has yet to be answered because of the variation of the definition of “Good design”.
Reference:
Figure 1. Zaha Hadid, Genesy, 2009. Exhibited at National Gallery of Victoria (NGV).
Designing Women, NGV International, Melbourne, accessed 01/04/2019.https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/exhibition/designing-women
Christoforidou, Despina. Olander, Elin. Warell, Anders. Svengren Holm, Lisbeth. 2012. “Good Taste vs. Good Design: A Tug of War in the Light of Bling.” The Design Journal, Vol.15, No. 2 (2012): 188- 191.
Stevens, Phillip. “Zaha Hadid Interview Discussing Her Shoes for United Nude.” Designboom. October 11, 2016. Accessed April 01, 2019. https://www.designboom.com/design/zaha-hadid-interview-united-nude-re-inventing-shoes-5vie-milan-design-week-04-11-2015/.
“Zaha Hadid Architects | Genesy Lamp.” Arthitecturalcom Zaha Hadid Architects Genesy Lamp Comments. Accessed April 01, 2019. https://www.arthitectural.com/zaha-hadid-architects-genesy-lamp/.
Zukowsky, John. “Zaha Hadid.” Encyclopædia Britannica. March 27, 2019. Accessed April 01, 2019. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Zaha-Hadid.
“Ways of Designing: Zaha Hadid.” WOW! (Ways Of Working) Webmagazine. March 15, 2018. Accessed April 01, 2019. https://wow-webmagazine.com/ways-of-designing-exclusive-interview-zaha-hadid.
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