Installation for XIV Milan Triennale

"One of the world’s most widely recognized graphic designers, Bass studied, worked with, and, like many postwar American designers, was greatly influenced by the European modernist and educator György Kepes and his book Language of Vision. Bass helped spread a love of the modern aesthetic to American designers and audiences and played a vital role in the development of a more playful approach to modernist design. He moved to Los Angeles from New York in 1946 to work on film-studio accounts for his Manhattan employer, and opened his own studio in 1952, one of the first in which designers worked directly with clients rather than through an agency. Launched in 1923, the Milan Triennale had long been a showcase for modern decorative and industrial arts with a goal to “stimulate relations” between those who design and those who produce the work. In 1968, the Triennale abandoned its customary format and invited participants, including Bass, to 'respond to the issue of quantification and urban life.' Bass’s concept looked at 'compartmentalization.' Working with architect and exhibition designer Herb Rosenthal, Bass created a 'skyscraper city from stacked file cabinet/ boxes… A number of the boxes could be opened to reveal objects and sounds reflecting a sense of mass accumulation of things ‘that threatens the quality of contemporary life.’' Included in the exhibition was Bass’s film Why Man Creates, originally produced for Kaiser Aluminum, which celebrated 'the importance of a creative vision in contemporary life' and of redirecting energy to 'that which is most deeply human in us.' It was a year of social protest and upheaval, and this spirit spilled over to the Triennale when rebellious Italian students closed down the event but left the Bass piece intact. Writes forecasting expert James Woudhuysen, 'They put his maze of 6,000 stacked filing-cabinet drawers to use, admired the trays full of mannequins, flowers, and butterflies, and played his Oscar-winning short film, Why Man Creates, again and again.'"—Louise Sandhaus, Earthquakes, Mudslides, Fires & Riots: California and Graphic Design 1936-1986, p 98