In the wake of the Industrial Revolution, Modernism championed standardization in the name of democratization. Le Corbusier encapsulated the Modern dogma in Towards A New Architecture: “all men have the same needs” (136). A century after the French Revolution, the expression of individuality was once again considered passé, seen as an elitist, ostentatious pursuit. For instance, in the 1921 short film Manhatta by Paul Strand and Charles Sheeler, hundreds of identical-looking New Yorkers are portrayed debarking a commuter ferry (watch YouTube video). Indeed, American sociologist Thorstein Veblen denounced the bourgeois dress of the Victorian era as a contrivance, one that demonstrated that “the wearer could not possibly ‘put forth any useful effort’, let alone manual work“ (Batterberry 254)–and work was the engine of the industrial economy, evidenced by unparalleled urbanization and prodigious rates of production.
Simply put, mass production provided people with things that they never had before. Earnest Elmo Calkins wrote, “the public, tickled to get so many things so cheaply, accepted them without question” (Postrel 46-7). This was especially true in Europe following the First World War. Standardization could universally address, for the first time, the physiological needs of people and their personal security, what psychologist Abraham Maslow considered the two most basic needs of humans in his Hierarchy of Needs (refer to the glossary for more information).
As such, art looked to industry for inspiration. “Industry, overwhelming us like a flood which rolls on towards its destined end, has furnished us with new tools adapted to this new epoch,” wrote Le Corbusier. “Economic law unavoidably governs our acts and our thoughts” (227). Accordingly, Le Corbusier developed several schemes for mass-produced houses that were cheap, modest, sturdy, and easily built—houses that intended to establish the foundation of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Similarly, fashion designers such as Coco Chanel eliminated superfluous material, colour, and line; her garments embodied comfort, restraint, and the abandonment of ornament (Batterberry 286). Ultimately, however, neither designer had much of an affect at the ideological scale. Though Chanel borrowed from the utilitarian wardrobes of servants and maids, her “deluxe poor” garments weren’t intended for them. Le Corbusier’s mass-production concepts could not be realized by the technology of his day, evidenced by the painstaking labour required by the austere white walls at Villa Savoye—or the leakiness of its ‘efficient’ flat roof (de Botton 65).
It is within this socio-economic framework that cinema was introduced. Social unrest, partly caused by the unchecked urbanization that was testing the capacities of cities, was afforded a tabula rasa in Europe by the First World War. Thus, architects, designers, and artists—including filmmakers—rushed to fill this ideological vacuum. →
