INSCRIBED ASSOCIATION COPY
TELEHOR:
The International Review New Vision
Mezinárodni casopis pro visuální kulturu
Internationale Zeitschrift für visuelle Kultur
Revue internationale pour la culture visuelle
László Moholy-Nagy
László Moholy-Nagy (Editor): TELEHOR [The International Review New Vision / Mezinárodni casopis pro visuální kulturu / Internationale Zeitschrift für visuelle Kultur / Revue internationale pour la culture visuelle]. Brno, Czechoslovakia: Frantisek Kalivoda, 1936. First edition: Year 1 no 1-2: Published as a special double-issue devoted to L. MOHOLY-NAGY, edited by Fr. Kalivoda. Text in English, French, German and Czech. INSCRIBED BY MOHOLY-NAGY. A good copy only: Cover detached from spiral binding and the front panel (reproducing Construction of 1926) is missing. Light chipping to edges. Interior unmarked and clean. Dated ink inscription to Charles Neidringhaus on title page by Moholy-Nagy.
Design and typography by noted Czech Avant-Garde Architect Frantisek Kalivoda. Copies of TELEHOR are seldom offered --signed copies are virtually unknown -- and an association copy of this avant-garde publication presents a singular opportunity.
8.25 x 11.75 spiral-bound book with 138 pages and 69 photographs, photoplastics, film clips, paintings and constructions, 9 reproduced in color. The only number of this Czech periodical, and one of the most important and rare of Moholy-Nagy publications. The book illustrates Moholy-Nagy's work in painting, photography, and graphics. With an introduction by Siegfried Giedion and several important texts by Moholy.
Contents:
- Foreword by Siegfried Giedion
- Letter to Frantisek Kalivoda by László Moholy-Nagy
- From Pigment to Light by László Moholy-Nagy
- A New Instrument of Vision by László Moholy-Nagy
- Problems of the Modern Film by László Moholy-Nagy
- Once a Chicken, Always a Chicken by László Moholy-Nagy: a film script on a motif from Kurt Schwitter's Auguste Bolte
- Postscript by Frantisek Kalivoda.
Important monograph on the varied career of Moholy-Nagy, modernist giant., modernist painter, Bauhaus professor, photographer, film-maker, designer, sculptor, repeated exile, more., Telehor includes Moholy's own writings on modern design -- and the merging of theory and design. Also included are many beautifully-reproduced paintings, photographs and photograms. For Moholy-Nagy, photography was of inestimable value in educating the eye to what he called "the new vision." He believed that the camera, through its ability to manipulate light and its capacity of the eye, could help us alter our traditional perceptual habits.
"As a painter, typographer, photographer, stage designer, and architect, Moholy was one of the most creative intelligences of our time." -- Herbert Read.
From Frantisek Kalivodašs Postscript: "It was my aim in editing the present issue of this journal to indicate the progress of visual art and the persepctives of its future development. For it is the basic programme of this periodical to discuss the problems of modern art and to indicate the precise connections exisitng between its various categories and, in particular, between the spheres of painting, photography and film."
"To demonstrate the underlying unity of all these arts, I could dono better than select the rich and many-sided work of one artist, L. Moholy-Nagy, whose versatility can scarcely be rivalled among his fellow artists of to-day. "
Charles Niedringhaus graduated as one of 5 students in the first graduating class of the Institute of Design in 1942. As a student, he served as Institute Director László Moholy-Nagyšs asssitant in the Basic and Product Design Workshop, as well as assisting the Director in two seminars on Contemporary Art and Design problems. The student Niedringhaus designed and built a prototype machine dubbed the "Smell-O-Meter." This device proved less useful than the machine he co-developed with Nathan Lerner for forming plywood that was used in making most of the school's furniture.
After graduation, Niedringhaus' skills in furniture design and production quickly came to the attention of Hans Knoll -- always on the lookout for designers to work for what was then Knoll Associates. Niedringhaus began his long and fruitful career with Knoll when he assisted Herbert Matter with the production of the KNOLL INDEX OF DESIGNS in 1950. Then Niedringhaus and Florence Knoll were granted a patent on July 21, 1953 for their design of a sofa/daybed on angular steel frame.
Throughout his long career with Knoll, Niedringhaus often acted as an artistic liaison linking the inspired visions of designers such as Isamu Noguchi with Knoll's engineers, draughtsmen, and marketing departments. This confluence of art and business was fundamental to Knoll's identity and success. That same confluence of art and business first encountered as Moholy-Nagyšs student in Chicago helped Charles Niedringhaus secure his rightful spot in the pantheon of American Modernism.
REFERENCES: Laszlo Moholy-Nagy: THE NEW VISION and ABSTRACT OF AN ARTIST. NYC: Wittenborn, 1946. pgs. 24-5: figs. 2 a.-b.; Laszlo Moholy-Nagy: VISION IN MOTION. Chicago: Theobald 1947. pg. 46: fig. 20; pgs. 88-9: figs. 86-92; Herbert Matter (designer), Knoll Associates: KNOLL INDEX OF DESIGNS. NYC: Knoll Associates, Inc., with Hockaday Associates, 1950; David Travis, Elizabeth Siegel (editors): TAKEN BY DESIGN: PHOTOGRAPHS FROM THE INSTITUTE OF DESIGN, 1937-1971. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002.
out of stock