Red and Blue Chair

Chair designed in 1917 by Gerrit Rietveld

Red and Blue Chair

Chair in the Toledo Museum of Art

Designer| Gerrit Rietveld
Date| 1918
Materials| Lacquered wood
Style / tradition| De Stijl
Height| 88 cm (35 in)
Width| 66 cm (26 in)
Depth| 83 cm (33 in)

The Red and Blue Chair is a chair designed in 1917 by Gerrit Rietveld. It represents one of the first explorations by the De Stijl art movement in three dimensions. It was not painted its distinct colors until the early 1920s. Multiple versions of the chair exist and are housed in various collections.

## History

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The Red and Blue Chair is a chair designed in 1917 by Gerrit Rietveld. It represents one of the first explorations by the De Stijl art movement in three dimensions. It features several Rietveld joints.

The original chair was constructed of unstained beech wood and was not painted red, blue, yellow, and black until around 1923.[1][2] Fellow member of De Stijl and architect, Bart van der Leck, saw his original model and suggested that he add bright colours.[3] He built the new model of thinner wood and painted it entirely black with areas of primary colors attributed to De Stijl movement. The effect of this color scheme made the chair seem to almost disappear against the black walls and floor of the Rietveld Schröder House, where it was later placed.[1] The areas of color appeared to float, giving it an almost transparent structure.[4]

A version of the chair was sold by Christies in 2011 for €10,625.[5]

## Construction

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The chair embodies one of the principles of machine aesthetic, the erasing of distinctions between the load and support through a set of interlocking elements: the (red) back plays the role of the load (supported by a crossbar underneath the seat) and provides support for the arms at the same time.[6]

In Rietveld's instructions on how to build the chair, he informs the craftsperson to print the following verse from Der Aesthet by Christian Morgenstern and attach it under the seat:

Wenn Ich sitze, möchte Ich nicht
sitzen, wie Mein Sitzfleisch möchte
sondern wie Mein Sitzgeist sich,
säße er, den Stuhl sich flöchte.[7]

When I sit, I do not want
to sit like my seat-flesh likes
but rather like my seat-mind would,
if he were sitting, weave the chair for himself.

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Rietveld did not maintain an authoritative specification of the measurements or colours and there are various versions of the chair.[8]

## Collections

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The Museum of Modern Art houses the chair in its permanent collection—a gift from Philip Johnson[2]—and an original example is on display at the Brooklyn Museum in New York City.[9] Versions of the chair are also on display at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta and the Toledo Museum of Art in Toledo, Ohio.[10][11]

The Red and Blue Chair was on loan[citation needed] to the Delft University of Technology Faculty of Architecture as part of an exhibition when a fire destroyed the entire building in May 2008. The Red and Blue Chair was saved by firefighters.[12]

## See also

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* Zig-Zag Chair

## References

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1. ^ a b Victoria and Albert Museum. Modern Chairs, 1918–1970: an international exhibition presented by the Whitechapel Art Gallery in association with the Observer, arranged by the Circulation Department, Victoria and Albert Museum, 22 July–30 August 1970 (London: Whitechapel Gallery, 1970), 8.
2. ^ a b "Gerrit Rietveld. Red Blue Chair. 1918–1923 | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Archived from the original on 2009-02-16. Retrieved 2010-09-01.
3. ^ Klaus-Jürgen Sembach, Twentieth Century Furniture Design (Köln : Taschen, c2002), 93.
4. ^ Klaus-Jürgen Sembach, Twentieth Century Furniture Design (Köln : Taschen, c2002), 92. Victoria and Albert Museum. Modern Chairs, 1918–1970: an international exhibition presented by the Whitechapel Art Gallery in association with the Observer, arranged by the Circulation Department, Victoria and Albert Museum, 22 July–30 August 1970 (London: Whitechapel Gallery, 1970), 8.
5. ^ "The Red Blue Chair". Archived from the original on 2018-02-01. Retrieved 2018-02-01.
6. ^ Spurr 2016, p. 12.
7. ^ Peter Drijver, Johannes Miemeijer, Rietveld meubels om zelf te maken (Bussum: Colophon, 2001), 28.
8. ^ Drijver, Peter (2001). Rietveld meubels om zelf te maken = How to construct Rietveld furniture. Johannes Niemeijer. Bussum, Netherlands: Thoth. pp. 28–29\. ISBN 90-6868-280-6. OCLC 49798167.
9. ^ "Brooklyn Museum". www.brooklynmuseum.org. Archived from the original on 2018-02-01. Retrieved 2018-02-01.
10. ^ "Press Release". High Museum of Art. Archived from the original on 2011-01-01. Retrieved 2009-11-20.
11. ^ "Red/blue Chair". Toledo Museum of Art. Retrieved 2024-06-15.
12. ^ "TU Delft fire news story". 14 May 2008. Archived from the original on 2010-07-20. Retrieved 2008-05-14.

## Sources

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* Spurr, David (2016). "The Machine Aesthetic in Joyce and De Stijl". European Joyce Studies. 24. Brill: 7–19\. ISSN 0923-9855. JSTOR 44871383. Retrieved 2024-08-10.

## External links

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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Red Blue chair.

* "Blueprints: Red & Blue Chair (mm)".
* "Building plan (adaptation based loosely on original)" (PDF).
* "plans in PDF with dimensions in mm" (PDF).
* Romeo, Anthony. "Gerrit Rietveld's Red and Blue Chair & What I Learned about Rest and Motion in Myself".