Just made it back to the V&A to take a proper look at British Design 1948–2012: Innovation in the Modern Age. Timed to coincide with the 2012 Olympics it “celebrates the best of British post-war art and design from the 1948 ‘Austerity Games’ to the present day”, and is full of fascinating objects and juxtapositions. On my first visit (when we were running an event at the V&A on Coventry Cathedral with the WMF, and included a quick tour of the exhibition with curator Ghislaine Wood), I didn’t get beyond the 1950s— and a couple of hours is barely enough to get a good overview.
Loved seeing David Bowie’s costume up close (kind of suprising to see it’s knitted with bits of lurex threaded yarn–very low tech)– that’s the sort of thing you need an exhibition for, and a book just doesn’t deliver.
Was facinated by Hugh Casson’s Festival of Britain perforated metal chairs (much less well known than Ernest Race’s Antelope ones)–and particually by the fact they came in soft pastel colours: baby pink, rather than bright reds etc. And amid all the colour of the post war period these two black and white objects stood out– the Homemaker plate and the poster for an early show at Denys Lasdun’s fabulous National Theatre
