How modernism came to Surrey
Rationalism on Set: Glamour and Modernity in 1930s Italian Cinema Estorick Collection, N1
With its stripped-back view of austere structures and polished surfaces, Gastone Medin’s “stock exchange” set for Carlo Ludovico Bragaglia’s 1933 film comedy O borso o la vita (Your Money
or Your Life), speaks of radical Italian modernist design. It also reminds me of Surbiton Station.
As exhibition themes go,
Rationalism on Set’s is about as niche as it gets: the use of modern architecture and design in a handful of Italian romantic comedy films during the interwar years.
Indeed, far from making wild claims, the show’s tone is almost apologetic, at least in its early stages.
Subject to censorship from Mussolini’s fascist government, Italian cinema in the Twenties was going through what is now generally seen as a fallow period. At the same time, Italian architecture and design lagged behind the rest of Europe. In 1928, though, a group of architects calling themselves the MIAR (Italian Movement for Rational Architecture) created a new architectural philosophy: Rationalism, an Italian version of the international modernism of Corbusier and Walter Gropius, that was to have an innovative impact on the look and style of film in Italy and beyond.
In the first room, a group of photographs of exquisitely stylish interiors from all over Europe set the tone. Such has been the fashion for the clean-lined, open-plan modernist aesthetic in recent years that any one of them could have been put together last week.
Which is where the Surbiton connection comes in. Modernist architects and designers aimed for a classic, timeless feel that could be applied anywhere in the world. This is why Surbiton station, that under-sung modern masterpiece in Surrey commuter land, shares a similarly stark, quasi-industrial aesthetic with Florence’s magnificent railway station and, as these exhibition photos reveal, Stuttgart’s post office and Dunstable’s gliding club.
While, in its wall text, the show refers to the influence of Italy’s own, home-grown modern movement – Futurism – on the country’s cinema, there’s precious little evidence of its whirling, cubistic forms in the photographs, sketches, title cards and film stills on show. Instead, the prevailing look is international modernism at its glossiest.
Meanwhile, the German provenance of the tubular steel furniture seen in just about all of the sumptuously lit black and white photographs in the exhibition, is itemised with almost fetishistic relish.
In fact, many of the films featured here were heavily influenced by Hollywood comedies, which explains why the ocean liner-style bar in The Last Adventure (1932), for instance, looks made for Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers to cavort across. And in a film still from Two Happy Hearts, a group of very Italian-looking men in evening dress could easily represent their Hollywood counterparts.
Even so, if there’s virtually nothing in the exhibition that looks specifically Italian, that’s because really it’s about the triumph of an aesthetic that aspired to universality, one which appeared way-out in its time, but now feels satisfyingly classic, and for which our enthusiasm shows no sign of abating. While these sets were constructed on studio sound stages using the thinnest board and plaster, they convince completely as real interiors: ones that many of us would kill to live in.
Until June 24. Details: 020 7704 9522; estorickcollection.com