Abstract – Furniture as Art

“Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” (Benjamin). In Architecture, people have the tendency to dismiss furniture as a finishing component to the space and not as an integral part of the work itself. In the furniture not considered to be the architecture, it is pushed to a mass produced piece that may fit the space but never perfectly as it is an outside component moving into the system. It often falls into the idea of prefabrication representing the commodification of a modern and efficient frame of mind.

However, it is often argued that furniture manufacturing itself is a science and a way to improve the standards of comfort and function. The growing dichotomy addresses issues of phenomenology in the most detailed interaction of being. In the methods of Ray and Charles Eames, the mass manufacturing of their art remained human in a sense as the forms used were their original forms. In the analysis of furniture design, does the movement of distinct specialties within architecture lead to the loss of craft and detail within the living space of a building? When furniture is designed for mass manufacturing, it inadvertently morphs and becomes a new design entirely. The question in this case becomes, is it still art and does it still connect to the building within a rootless creation?

Architects from Corbusier to Van der Rohe to Aalto took pride in their furniture design just like their architecture. While the shift to postmodernism reflect a growing complexity, the furniture has done the opposite aesthetically. The manufacturing lends to a different narrative though through CNC prefabrication techniques and various design tools that allow for an illimitable system of design to emerge. Within this body of research, the phenomenology of furniture as a mass manufactured presence versus a custom display of craft reaches the forefront.