Futurism

The Lesser Known Bel Geddes: An Assessment of the Harry Ransom Center Exhibit

The Divine Comedy, scene rendering: In a path of blue-white light Beatrice steps down from her chariot to meet Dante, 1921-1930

Image Credit: Edith Lutyens and Norman Bel Geddes Foundation

The Divine Comedy, scene rendering: In a path of blue-white light Beatrice steps down from her chariot to meet Dante, 1921-1930

Norman Bel Geddes lived a sixty-five years that connect two worlds, the Victorian past of 1893, the Atomic Age of 1958. His work reflects and resists that trajectory. The current exhibit on Bel Geddes at the Harry Ransom Center (UT Austin) divides his career into phases or stages of development. A highly creative childhood segued into a successful career as a stage and costume designer for New York Theater. Of all his work—in industrial design, in architecture, in “futurism”--his set and costume design remains my favorite. But in an important sense, Bel Geddes never left the theater.

We Have Sold The Future: The Uses of Future Hopes and Fears in Petroleum Industry Advertising

Small photo of traffic-clogged streets contrasted with sketch of futuristic city with cars travelling efficiently on roads

Image Credit: Shell

The future of Norman Bel Geddes' Futurama is optimistic. Clean architecture and efficient technology aid people as they move through the business of their day. As promised in a series of 1937 Shell advertisements in Life magazine using the words of Bel Geddes, the city of tomorrow will alleviate many commuting frustrations. Until that city emerges, however, the ads offer Shell gasoline as a way to save money and reduce wear and tear on car engines while stuck in stop-and-go traffic. This use of a hopeful future contrasts with the darker tomorrows that lurk behind many of today's petroleum advertisements, drawing attention to the double-edged sword of appeals to the future.

If Our Greatest Toy Maker Had Lived Ten More Years..

Jobs with iPad opposed to Henson with creatures

Image Credits: Newscom and  Jim Henson Tribute Forum

Novelist Bruce Sterling, who gave a very hip keynote address on designer Norman Bel Geddes (1893-1958) at this year’s Flair Symposium "Visions of the Future," concluded his remarks with a challenge: Which of us has the courage to imagine the future like Bel Geddes did? Larger than life, impracticable, earnest, utopian, democratic, dazzling: can we still dream like that?

In this post, I give it a go with a foray into the sci-fi genre of Alternate History: What if Jim Henson (1936-1990) had lived a further ten years and had gotten involved in the Silicon Valley scene? How might computing have developed differently? 

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