Gaetano Pesce and Karim Rashid at the 92Y

On November 3^rd, the final in a series of lectures at the 92Y “Dialogues with Design Legends”, two stalwarts of the design world, Gaetano Pesce and the generation younger Karim Rashid, spoke and debated voicing thoughts not only about their own work but about the future of design, and in particular the role of plastics. Moderated by New York Times critic, former editor at House and Garden, and contributor to MODERN Magazine, Martin Filler seamlessly bridged the gap between Pesce and Rashid, whose perspectives, while seemingly different, ended up being strikingly similar. Filler introduced both designers without letting on that Pesce and Rashid were already old acquaintances. Other unexpected connections also populated the lecture, as Filler mentioned that Pesce and he currently live in the same building in New York, whose lobby’s interior is indebted to Pesce’s chance idea for countering a recent and potentially disastrous lobby redesign.

Pesce, the influential 70 year old Italian born designer, who is best known for his furniture and objects produced using various resins and plastics, discussed the idea behind his seminal “Up” (1969) collection of inflatable furniture manufactured by B&B Italia, and now also part of MoMA’s permanent collection. He then went through several slides illustrating important pieces spanning the breadth of his career, along the way sharing key ideas about his design philosophy such as his belief that “the future is done by originals, not by copies”. He spoke of returning to the pre-industrial idea of “old” art, where each piece was unique.

Born in Cairo and raised in Canada, Rashid is well known in the design world for colorful and futuristic visions of everyday products such as shoes and trash cans, to larger projects including furniture and restaurant and hotel interiors. Identified by Filler as Gesamtkunstwerk, which is the German word for totally integrated works of art, Rashid’s designs manage to combine utility and aesthetics in a way few designers have done before. Speaking of the origins of his ideas and designs, Rashid revealed that not only had Pesce taught him in a graduate design course in Naples 25 years ago, but that Pesce’s idea of the “non serialized object” became so ingrained in Rashid’s young mind that it has since grown to become one of the key ideas behind his own designs, which frequently incorporate plastics and various new forms of the material praised by Roland Barthes in 1972 as “the first magical substance which consents to be prosaic”.

Though Pesce’s and Rashid’s work can be separated by innovations in plastics and production methods, their similar views on medium further connect the two designers. Pesce reminded the audience that all architecture and design, though it may be constructed with an idea of legacy in mind, is bound to disintegrate and disappear with the passage of time, which is why in his own work eternity and permanency never cross his mind. However, as he pointed out, this question certainly appears to be on the mind of the conservation department at MoMA, which is currently studying ways to conserve his pieces. Agreeing with Pesce, Rashid explained how, especially in today’s rapidly changing consumer society, nothing is permanent, and the idea of making an object to last is hardly a key element to consider when making good design.

-Beatrice Thornton