Gerrit Rietveid

Dutch architect and designer Gerrit Rietveld was a member of the De stijl movement, significant to his work he pared his design down to basic cubist elements. He often used primary colours to emphasise the different parts. Most of his furniture was designed and manufactured to accompany his architectural commissions. His first attempts in search of his own artistic line were influenced by the Amsterdam school. Rietveld re-invented the structure of chairs and of other objects, built them as constructivist sculptures.

 

In 1918 he designed an early version of his legendary Red and Blue Chair which was published in the De Stijl magazine, this helped him to become a memeber in 1919. This benefited him because it helped him to be in contact with various architects assosciated with the modern Dutch movement. Rietveld's reputation grew from being a local craftsmen to an architect being recongnised across Europe. Among his numerous furniture models, The Zig Zag Chair, The Red and Blue Chair, the Schelling and Military series still remain as eternal design icons.

 

The Red Blue chair is probably one of the most recognized pieces from the Modern Movement of De Stijl Design. Each piece of the chair is either square or rectangular and this is highlighted by the use of yellow on the piece ends. The Red Blue Chairs popularity tends to come from its sculptural appearance as a work of art, probably helped by the use of color Rietveld used from the painters of the De Stijl group; Piet Mondrian and Theo van Doesburg who championed primary colours, as well as the fact that you could look through it. The fact that Gerrid Rietveid chose the chair to look good over whether it would be uncomfortble if a person actually sat on it.