Nordic wave : a study of the reception and influence of Scandinavian design in Australia

Abstract

This thesis investigates the reception and influence of Scandinavian design in Australia from 1950 to 1980, resulting from the exposure to Scandinavian-made and designed products presented in trade displays, exhibitions, retail stores and art galleries, and the reporting of these events in the media. The study also investigates the influence of Scandinavian-trained designers in Australia, individual agents and writers, and the work of craft and design industry professionals, through case studies that illustrate their proactive roles in adapting Scandinavian models of practice for an Australian context. The major 1968 touring exhibition of Scandinavian-designed applied arts, Design in Scandinavia, is used as the prime case study to illustrate the significance of Scandinavian design as a model for practice in Australia during this period. This event, specifically developed for Australia by four Scandinavian design industry organisations, was presented in five of Australia's State art museums, a university and a department store, providing a major focus for discussion about design in the context of the visual arts at a formative period of development of the Australian crafts and design industry. Concurrent with the participating galleries' aims of 'educating taste', the exhibition was also used by its organisers to reinforce the cultural value of the Scandinavian industrial products and applied arts that were already on the Australian market. This study shows how Design in Scandinavia, and the exhibitions of other Scandinavian-designed products that preceded and followed it, fostered a 'culture of comparison and fuelled discussions about Australia's supposed inadequacy in matters of design. These events were to have ramifications that continue to inform current craft and design practice in Australia. By assessing these projects against the cultural framework of Australian craft and design developments of the late 1960s and 1970s, this study shows how a relationship between diplomacy and trade was developed to serve a Scandinavian agenda for influence in a new market while creating a greater public awareness in Australia of the design achievements of Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway. These events and other models of Scandinavian design practice offered ways for Australian designers, makers, and their audiences to consider Scandinavian objects as exemplars of responsible production and social relevance in the construction of a form of modernity imbued with a distinct sense of place.