000 03095cam a22003373u 4500
001 77565
003 UtSlPG
005 20260610134809.0
006 m
007 cr n
008 260607r20251919utu|||||o|||||||||||||| d
010 _a82207785
040 _aUtSlPG
041 7 _aen
_2iso639-1
050 4 _aN
100 1 _aLewis, Wyndham,
_d1882-1957
245 1 4 _aThe caliph's design
264 1 _aSalt Lake City, UT :
_bProject Gutenberg,
_c2025
300 _a1 online resource :
_bmultiple file formats
336 _atext
_btxt
_2rdacontent
337 _acomputer
_bc
_2rdamedia
338 _aonline resource
_bcr
_2rdacarrier
500 _aRelease date is 2025-12-29
508 _aPaul Fatula, Mary Glenn Krause, Brigham Young University and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
520 _a"The caliph's design" by Wyndham Lewis is a polemical art pamphlet and manifesto written in the early 20th century. It argues that modern life is visually impoverished and calls for a radical alliance between painter and engineer to replace moribund architecture and bring living design into the streets. Challenging studio-bound dilettantism, it critiques aspects of Cubism, Futurism, and fashion-driven taste while championing constructive, public-facing art in the spirit of Cézanne. The opening of this work lays out its thesis in a sharp preface and a vivid parable: a Caliph sketches a bold, “vorticist” street and compels an engineer and an architect to realize it overnight—proof that daring vision can drive practical form. From there, the author attacks the cult of the “queer” and the deliberately banal in modern taste, urges politicians to recognize how depressing streets sap collective life, and argues that while great artists can transform anything, most creators (and the public) need better form-content in the world around them. He calls for replacing the conventional architect with a painter–engineer partnership, critiques skyscraper pastiche and academic make-believe, and dismisses the sentimental fetish for child and “naïf” art (with Rousseau as the rare exception). He reframes machinery as raw material for art rather than an idol, contrasts the lucky seclusion of Sung painters with the coerced craft of Assyrian sculptors, and then pivots to larger reflections on the artist as primal creator, the distortions of fashion, and an early survey of Paris trends—praising Cézanne’s constructive legacy while warning that nature morte Cubism and fashion-driven experiments risk gluttonous, studio-bound cleverness over genuine construction. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
534 _pOriginally published:
_cLondon: The Egoist Ltd., 1919
653 _aAvant-garde (Aesthetics) -- History -- 19th century
653 _aAvant-garde (Aesthetics) -- History -- 20th century
856 4 _uhttps://archive.org/details/caliphsdesignarc01lewi/page/n4/mode/1up
856 4 0 _uhttps://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77565
999 _c118285
_d118285