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Victor J. Papanek (1923-1998) designer, educator and author, was born in Vienna, Austria escaping to the United States in 1939 following the Anschluss of Austria to Nazi Germany. Educated at the Cooper Union New York in architectural design, Papanek claimed to have apprenticed with Frank Lloyd Wright in the late 1940s as well as working briefly with fellow Austrian émigré architect Frederick Kiesler.
Early on in his career be became a follower and ally of Buckminster Fuller who wrote the preface to the first English language edition of Papanek’s widely read and seminal publication Design for the Real World: Human Ecology and Social Change (1971). The book’s ground-breaking ideas and uncompromising critique of contemporary, profit-drive design culture initially divided the design community. Ultimately, however, the polemic was an enormous success: translated into over 20 languages and published globally, it remains one the most widely read design books to date and has never fallen out of print.
In the course of his career, Papanek applied the principles of socially responsible design in collaborative projects with concerns such as UNESCO and the World Health Organization. He considered design as a political tool in recently decolonised nations as well as peripheral communities in Europe and the USA.
A polemicist of both words and objects, who used his designs to provoke the large-scale rethinking of design’s social purpose in everyday life, Papanek’s career spanned the shifting terrain of twentieth-century design culture. It is telling that his most experimental work took place in the setting of universities and colleges in politically conservative American states.
Along with the influential Design for the Real World (1971), Papanek’s publications (co-authored with James Hennessey) include Nomadic Furniture I (1973), Nomadic Furniture II (1974), and How Things Don’t Work (1977). He is sole author of Design for Human Scale (1983) and The Green Imperative (1995).
