Good Design

A revelatory chronicle of the rich dialogue between German modernist design and Brazilian postwar art

In 20th-century design, Germany and Brazil have shared a rich history of cross-cultural fertilization. Good Design traces the origins of Brazilian design in Ulm, Germany, at the Ulm School of Design (HfG), which was founded in 1953 by Inge Aicher-Scholl, Otl Aicher and Max Bill. The school is famed for its progressive curriculum--which emphasized the holistic, multidisciplinary context of design--but its interaction with Brazilian artists is less well known.
Good Design follows the trajectory of this interaction between HfG and Brazilian institutions such as the Institute of Contemporary Art (IAC), which is linked to the Museum of Art of São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand (MASP) and the Superior School of Industrial Design (Esdi) in Rio de Janeiro. It also charts lines of influence between the German designers Bill, Aicher and Karl Heinz Bergmiller and the Brazilian artists Lygia Pape, Almir Mavignier and Geraldo de Barros.