{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O1767812"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1767812/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2024NR9827/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2024NR9827/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"low","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2024NR9827","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":null},"record":{"systemNumber":"O1767812","accessionNumber":"E.1421-2023","objectType":"Design","titles":[{"title":"'Prism' chair design computer generated print out","type":"generic title"}],"summaryDescription":"The ‘Prism’ chair was designed by furniture designer and maker Fred Baier (1949 -) and is one of the earliest pieces of British furniture to be designed using CAD (Computer Aided Design). The museum acquired a blue, red, black and gold lacquered ‘Prism’ chair in 2010 for the exhibition, Postmodernism (2011/2012) and it was included in a section on the geographical diffusion of this ‘new wave’ style. In conversation with Glenn Adamson, curator of the exhibition, Baier explained, ‘I said to myself, why don’t you do a chair that doesn’t look like a chair? Make it out of lumps of geometry?’ \r\n\r\nBaier is recognised as one the most prominent British studio furniture makers working in a stylistically radical mode in the 1980s. He was born in 1949 in Yorkshire and studied furniture at Birmingham College of Art (1968-1972) and at the Royal College of Art (1972-1975). He achieved success in the 1970s with support from the Crafts Council who acquired his work for exhibition. In the 1980s, Baier moved to the USA where he began to use 3D-modelling programmes such as CAD to design his pieces.\r\n\r\nThe ‘Prism’ chair is a combination of three prismatic solids interpenetrating at unconventional angles. Baier and software engineer Paul McManus worked together to use a 3D modelling programme called VAMP to create the set of computer sketches for the chair, showing it 'unfolded'. Baier described the process in a piece he wrote for the museum when the chair was acquired: ‘Prism Chair was something I designed while being a guinea pig user for a pioneering 3D modelling programme called VAMP. This was in the early 80s when computing was an anathema to most people. 3D modelling involved typing gobbldygook [sic] for ages until an image finally appeared on screen. To see an alternative view of this composition took several further minutes and comparing these views had to be done through dot matrix printouts. I was keen to see improved ways of evaluating the proportion and composition of a design so we developed a programme which produced cut and fold models like on the back of a cornflakes packet. Prism chair was the first proper piece of furniture developed through this process after several years of experimenting, inventing bits of computing and the computers themselves improving in giant leaps.’ To evaluate the design for its proportion, stance and balance, Baier made a cut out, fold and stick model, observing that, 'at the time there was no way of looking at any computer model, like for example, making a revolving movie or MP4. Each view of a model was an individual image on screen or available as a dot matrix A4 print out.'\r\n","physicalDescription":"","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Baier, Fred","id":"A35603"},"association":{"text":"Designer","id":"x36960"},"note":""},{"name":{"text":"McManus, Paul","id":"A35604"},"association":{"text":"CAD operator","id":"THES281256"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[],"techniques":[],"materialsAndTechniques":"","categories":[{"text":"Product design","id":"THES49025"}],"styles":[{"text":"Post-Modern","id":"AAT22208"}],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":["2024NR9827"],"imageResolution":"low","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"LVLD","id":"THES49658"},"free":"","case":"MD","shelf":"66","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"Design","id":"AAT102051"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1989","earliest":"1989-01-01","latest":"1989-12-31"},"association":{"text":"Designed","id":"x29338"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[{"object":{"text":"W.13-2010","id":"O1171343"},"association":"Design"}],"creditLine":"Gift of the artist","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"297","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"210","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[],"objectHistory":"","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"'Prism' Chair design by Fred Baier, c. 1989, computer generated print out on paper","bibliographicReferences":[],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["E.1446-2023"],"accessionNumberNum":"1446","accessionNumberPrefix":"E","accessionYear":2023,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2025-04-09","recordCreationDate":"2023-10-24","availableToBook":false}}