German Architect and Designer Peter Behrens Carpet Design

TheGerman architect and designer Peter Behrens is more usually identified witheither architecture or product design. He is firmly locked into the Modernistcause and although it is admitted that he produced work in a range ofdisciplines, this is often put down to a relatively early phase of his lifebefore he set out on the road of Modernist architecture in particular.

Behrensdesigned for disciplines that ranged from textiles, through to ceramics, metal,glass, wallpaper, illustration, and graphics. To give some idea as the breadthof his design work, four disciplines are illustrated in this article, glass,carpet, and mosaic and textile design. It has to be remembered of course, assaid somewhere elsewhere, that a designer is not necessarily automaticallyassociated with a maker. Just as it would be unlikely that an architect wouldalso be a bricklayer, it would also be unlikely that a designer would be amaker.

Acrossthe range of multi-disciplined work produced by Behrens, this article hasspecifically chosen four pieces of work that, although seemingly having littlein common, apart from the designer, are nevertheless linked. All the pieces ofwork are linked by the use of a central core as a focus in the design. All ofthe individual pieces whether produced as a skylight, carpet, mosaic, ortextile designs are individualized. In other words, they are not a repeatablepattern as such and can be seen, to an extent at least, as unique pieces ofwork that are contained within their individuality.

Thereis something about the mandala approach to decoration, which these pieces oftenresemble, that gives work that is often not intended as such, a focused,meditative, sometimes even spiritual dimension. This is particularly apparentin Behrens design for a skylight, the first illustration shown. Although meantfor a domestic setting, the skylight could easily have been requisitioned for areligious building. That particular potential leads on to ideas as to themandala style itself.

Decorativework that is contained within a framework, which can be anything from a threesided triangle, through the many different sided shapes to a true circle orellipse, and contains a central core that is often exponentially built uponuntil it reaches its framework edge, have been found across most cultures andthrough all eras. Many of them are found to be specifically symbolic andassociated with some form of spiritual dimension. Perhaps that is part of thereason that we still find them so intriguing and why we often separate themfrom the more mainstream versions of decoration and pattern work.

Although the notion of mandala like decorative work is widespread, some disciplines favour the idea of a focused central core more than others, and whilst to be fair it is often associated with more practical, technical reasoning such as the natural shape of carpets, ceramic tiles, glass windows, etc., which often follow the square or rectangle, there is still something extra that we often feel when we come across this specific type of decorative work.

You could, in some ways at least, call it a shift in perspective, one that takes us from the everyday outside world of observation and experience, to one that connects us with the inside world of contemplation and introspection. Whether this is triggered by us focusing for example on the centre of these designs, whilst also being aware of the containing framework, or series of frameworks, working out from the centre, is unknown and perhaps unknowing. It could perhaps be something else entirely, perhaps a shared experience that is locked up in our joint remembered history as a species. Whatever it may be, these specific design examples are constantly being reorganized and reenergized by each succeeding generation and will probably be with us as long as we remain as a species.

Whatever the reasoning and whatever the personal explanation of the reasoning, everyone for example will have an idea as to why the mandala-type decorative idea is still with us, from the brutally practical to the spiritually esoteric, what does intrigue me is the continuation of decorative formats in general. Decoration is an integral part of who we are, and who we have been. It flavours our lives from generation to generation. We often have no real idea as to why we are drawn to types of decorative work that we have been producing often for tens of thousands of years. We can dress specific styles in contemporary clothing, but that does little to disguise the deeper fundamental attraction to certain types of decoration.