In the 1930s, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt enacted the New Deal as a response to the Great Depression. As part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), the Federal Art Project (FAP) was launched. It employed artists for the purpose of drawing, painting, and sometimes photographing useful, everyday objects to create the Index of American Design. Though the FAP spanned thirty-six states, Kentucky by Design: The Decorative Arts and American Culture, edited by Andrew Kelly, focuses on the objects recorded in Kentucky. Spawning from the work of Alan Weis, who first began searching for and compiling information about the objects, through the connections made with Madeleine Burnside, executive director of Frazier History Museum in Louisville (both contributing authors), this book also serves as a catalogue for the upcoming exhibition at the Frazier History Museum.
At first glance, Kentucky by Design is a beautiful and impressive book. Its over 300 large glossy pages immediately invite the reader to flip through the stunning photographs and watercolor paintings of the featured fifty (of 218) Kentucky Index of American Design artifacts. These artifacts include cupboards made by Thomas Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s father, Shaker furniture and textiles, a variety of quilt styles, and even mass-produced items such as powder flasks and mechanical coin banks. Though a significant portion of the book is made up of these images, along with detailed descriptions and known information of the objects, the book begins with well-researched scholarly articles by Erika Doss, Jerrold Hirsch, and Jean M. Burks. The articles speak specifically to the importance of the Index of American Design to Kentucky, to what was selected for the Index, and to what was excluded, providing a valuable foundation for the rest of the book. As a further supplement, there are six appendices and a full checklist of Kentucky objects from the original Index. The most interesting and helpful appendices include interviews with the national director of the FAP, Holger Cahill, and the administrator of Kentucky’s FAP, Adele Brandeis, as well as the guidelines set for and disseminated to the Index artists. The various contributors and approaches used to examine the selected objects demonstrate the versatility of folklore scholarship. These objects transcend centuries and through the various ways they are studied and featured, they provide insight into different periods of American history.
The book provides three different contexts for understanding these objects. The first of these is through the object’s original purpose. According to the Index’s guidelines (Appendix 5), the Index sought “to compile material for a nation-wide pictorial survey of design in the American decorative, useful and folk arts from their inception to about 1890” (269). Looking at furniture, textiles, and other household objects and their original use provides insight into the lives of early European-American people. (The book is careful to point out the Index’s glaring omissions of Native American and African American art.) Through the study of material culture of everyday life, we can gain a unique and clear insight into the way people lived.
A second frame through which to view the objects is the process of creating the Index itself. The work being done on the Index from its inception in 1935 until it was closed in 1942 was about recognizing and embracing an American national identity. Nationalism was on the rise in many areas of the world leading up to World War II, and, as a young nation, the United States was in the midst of an identity crisis. As the field of American studies was developing, centered on the question of what it means to be American, the FAP’s response was to define the United States through its design history. Of particular interest were the design elements that came out of necessity, with the authors quoting architect Louis Sullivan’s “form follows function” more than once (5, 47). By focusing on the way Americans lived and how that was reflected in their design, the Index reveals how America’s identity emerged as something separate from the other nations of the world. The Index promoted that notion and aided in the folk revival, where traditional forms influenced modern design. Portraying objects from Kentucky, in particular, in such a way challenged the stereotypical backwoods image of Kentuckians, and instead pushed them, particularly the simple designs of the Shakers, to the forefront of modernity.
The third frame this book uses is to approach the objects through the exhibition perspective. As the objects have been removed from their original context and revered through cataloguing, they have gained meaning. Rather than being valued for their intended use, they are now valued for this added meaning of historic significance, influence on American design, and formation of a national identity. The objects have therefore transcended that original use value and are now appreciated for their aesthetic value, as they are put on display.
The book is very inclusive and at times repetitive. The beginnings of many of the articles offer the same information about the WPA and FAP. As a scholar and appreciator of Kentucky history, I find that the book also points to flaws in the organization and intention of the Index itself. Many of the objects chosen for Kentucky were not native to Kentucky, instead imported by the wealthy citizens of the state. A disproportionate number were also Shaker-made. Though it intended to provide an accurate portrayal of American life, the Index was highly selective in what it chose to perpetuate, and the book could have done more to address that.
Despite these flaws, Kentucky By Design is gorgeous and the articles contribute to an understanding of a moment in American history and the efforts made to give the United States a proud identity. The three contexts provide a thorough understanding of the importance of these objects and reflect theories of material culture applied to the study of folk objects. Ultimately, this book contributes to the larger conversation on material culture and the many ways that the study of objects can provide insight into creative expression and everyday life.
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[Review length: 997 words • Review posted on October 4, 2016]